Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2010 January 25

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January 25

Same difference

I'm looking for some words that mean something and that something's opposite. For example, cleave means both to split apart as well as to cling together. DRosenbach ^{(Talk | Contribs)} 03:33, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

This isn't quite it, but the prefix "bi-" can be used to mean "twice a [week, month, etc.]" and also every other [week, month, etc.] ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:42, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

This is it: The term is Auto-antonym, and the article has a few examples. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:46, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I googled [same word opposite meaning] and this page[1] was one that turned up and put me on to "auto-antonym". "Fast" and "overlook" are mentioned. There's a link to detail page that has a bunch of them. FYI, I looked up "cleave", and both meanings come from the same root, which is related to "cloven", as in an animal with a naturally split hoof. The only thing I can figure the two opposite meanings have in common is that the two objects are separate but close together. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:50, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

The generally accepted eymologies have the two cleaves as separate words with separate origins. The "adhere" one comes from the Old English weak verb clifian (akin to clǣg, "clay"), whereas the "separate" one comes from the Old English strong verb clëofan, a descendant of the Indo-European root *gleubh-. Deor (talk) 07:05, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm going by what my 1960 Webster's says. It may be that further research has been done since then. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 07:09, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Heh. Only yesterday, I was musing on how "secrete" means to hide something and also to reveal something (as in production of bodily fluids). -- 202.142.129.66 (talk) 03:59, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Their common origin is a Latin verb that means "to separate". ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 04:03, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

"Fast" comes from Anglo-Saxon and means "firm" or "strong", which is why it's used in three ways: to abstain from food; to stand in one place; to move quickly. All require strength. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 04:06, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

The peculiar (to us Americans) usage of "Public School" in Britain, vs. the way the term is used in the U.S., might qualify. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 04:10, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

This may not count, because it's slang, but for some time now, "bad" used in certain contexts is a synonym for "good". ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 06:12, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I would certainly not include your example of bad, which appears to arise from sarcasm, much as "fat chance" being equivalent to "slim chance" (and thus the opposites of both also refer to the opposites of the opposites :) and the name "Tiny" being used to refer to very large people. DRosenbach ^{(Talk | Contribs)} 13:00, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

And the equally sarcastic, "Yeh, yeh", with proper intonation, mocking agreement to some statement. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 17:35, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

In the late 80s in England some kids used to say "bad" with a high-low-high intonation to mean "tremendously good", with no sarcasm whatsoever. That reminds me; "wicked" can mean tremendously good and tremendously bad as well. --Kjoonlee 23:17, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

And "sick", not to mention "fully sick". -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 06:57, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

"Fuse", meaning both to fall apart by melting and to come together by melting. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 09:59, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

By the way, the term "same difference" is an example of an oxymoron. ~AH1^(TCU) 19:45, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Granted -- by its use, I meant to refer to the object of my query in a punny way (the word that means not only what it means [same] but also its opposite [different]). DRosenbach ^{(Talk | Contribs)} 02:51, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

And then there's that special sub-group of pairs of homophones (words that are spelled differently but pronounced the same) that have contrary meanings; e.g. "raise" and "raze". I don't know if these have a name - antohomophononym, perhaps? homonymantophone? -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 03:10, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Whirling dervish

I am not a native speaker of English, I just translate books writenin English to Hungarian. As I read my book I found the expression whirling dervish. In this case it is said to an animal. I looked up the word in Wiktionary, and I found there that it is an expression. Colud somebody descibe me its meaning? --Ksanyi (talk) 10:43, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

See Mawlawi Order for some information about these people - and they are people, by the way, not animals. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 10:46, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Excuse me. Leave me to copy here the original sentence. "I actually touched the plate and and the honey badger turned into a roaring wherling dervish!" Thank you foryour help again. --Ksanyi (talk) 11:13, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

It is used as a figure of speech here. The honey badger did not literally turn into a whirling dervish, it (presumably) spun around in a most agitated manner to bite the careless observer. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 11:31, 25 January 2010 (UTC)