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Antonyms are words with opposite or nearly opposite meanings. For example: hot ↔ cold, large ↔ small, thick ↔ thin, synonym ↔ antonym; Hypernyms and hyponyms are words that refer to, respectively, a general category and a specific instance of that category. For example, vehicle is a hypernym of car, and car is a hyponym of vehicle ...
A thesaurus (pl.: thesauri or thesauruses), sometimes called a synonym dictionary or dictionary of synonyms, is a reference work which arranges words by their meanings (or in simpler terms, a book where one can find different words with similar meanings to other words), [1] [2] sometimes as a hierarchy of broader and narrower terms, sometimes simply as lists of synonyms and antonyms.
Elegant variation is the use of synonyms to avoid repetition or add variety. The term was introduced in 1906 by H. W. Fowler and F. G. Fowler in The King's English. In their meaning of the term, they focus particularly on instances when the word being avoided is a noun or its pronoun. Pronouns are themselves variations intended to avoid awkward ...
Every day (two words) is an adverb phrase meaning "daily" or "every weekday". Everyday (one word) is an adjective meaning "ordinary". [48] exacerbate and exasperate. Exacerbate means "to make worse". Exasperate means "to annoy". Standard: Treatment by untrained personnel can exacerbate injuries.
Definitional retreat – changing the meaning of a word when an objection is raised. [23] Often paired with moving the goalposts (see below), as when an argument is challenged using a common definition of a term in the argument, and the arguer presents a different definition of the term and thereby demands different evidence to debunk the argument.
An industry word is a specialized kind of technical terminology used in a certain industry. Industry words and phrases are often used in a specific area, and those in that field know and use the terminology. [25] Precise technical terms and their definitions are formally recognized, documented, and taught by educators in the field.
An illustration of a weasel using "weasel words". In this case, "some people" are a vague and undefined authority. In rhetoric, a weasel word, or anonymous authority, is a word or phrase aimed at creating an impression that something specific and meaningful has been said, when in fact only a vague, ambiguous, or irrelevant claim has been communicated.
The word or group of words that is to be defined is called the definiendum, and the word, group of words, or action that defines it is called the definiens. [6] For example, in the definition "An elephant is a large gray animal native to Asia and Africa", the word "elephant" is the definiendum, and everything after the word "is" is the ...