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A mumpsimus (/ ˈ m ʌ m p s ɪ m ə s / MUHMP-sih-məs) is a "traditional custom obstinately adhered to however unreasonable it may be", [1] or "someone who obstinately clings to an error, bad habit or prejudice, even after the foible has been exposed and the person humiliated; also, any error, bad habit, or prejudice clung to in this fashion ...
An antonym is one of a pair of words with opposite meanings. Each word in the pair is the antithesis of the other. A word may have more than one antonym. There are three categories of antonyms identified by the nature of the relationship between the opposed meanings.
A contronym is a word with two opposite meanings. For example, the word cleave can mean "to cut apart" or "to bind together". This feature is also called enantiosemy, [1] [2] enantionymy (enantio-means "opposite"), antilogy or autoantonymy. An enantiosemic term is by definition polysemic.
Converses can be understood as a pair of words where one word implies a relationship between two objects, while the other implies the existence of the same relationship when the objects are reversed. [ 3 ] Converses are sometimes referred to as complementary antonyms because an "either/or" relationship is present between them.
In music, an ostinato (Italian: [ostiˈnaːto]; derived from the Italian word for stubborn, compare English obstinate) is a motif or phrase that persistently repeats in the same musical voice, frequently in the same pitch.
Oxymorons are words that communicate contradictions. An oxymoron (plurals: oxymorons and oxymora) is a figure of speech that juxtaposes concepts with opposite meanings within a word or in a phrase that is a self-contradiction. As a rhetorical device, an oxymoron illustrates a point to communicate and reveal a paradox.
The word is used by Charles M. Schulz in a 1982 installment of his Peanuts comic strip, [51] and by Peter O'Donnell in his 1985 Modesty Blaise adventure novel Dead Man's Handle. Charlophobia – the fictional fear of any person named Charlotte or Charlie, mentioned in the comedic book A Duck is Watching Me: Strange and Unusual Phobias (2014 ...
For example, the 2003 and 2004 lists were determined by online hits to the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary and Online Thesaurus and to Merriam-WebsterCollegiate.com. [5] [6] In 2006 and 2007, Merriam-Webster changed this practice, and the list was determined by an online poll among words that were suggested by visitors to the site. [4]