A New “Nym” for You!

Synonym. Antonym. Homonym. We have all heard of these. And maybe you have heard of this one, but frankly I hadn’t: contronym.

But wait! When I started to research this post, I discovered that there are boatloads of words that end in –nym, which looks like, sounds like, and means name. Ah, there’s one! Pseudonym (false name or pen name).

Anyhow, I guess if you are a champion Scrabble player, you might know many words that end in –nym, but I guess I never really thought about it. When I taught seventh grade English, one of the most fun things we did was study Greek and Latin roots. Most of them were actually prefixes. I would put a few on the board (this is back before tech took over), and the students listed all the words they cold think of with that prefix or root (and we did a few suffixes). But -nym, for some reason, wasn’t on my list. We studied pseudo (pseudonym), anti (antonym), homo (homonym — and yes, the kids did twitter about that one, since they were twelve ), syn (synonym), and contr (contronym), but not –nym.

And now, since I discovered that there are boatloads of strange words that end in –nym, I will have to talk about them in future posts. But for today:

Synonym – Why you need a Thesaurus. Syn means same or together. We all know what synonyms are, and writers need them! Mad, angry, irate, furious are all synonyms.

Antonym -The opposite of synonym. Anti means against, so these words are opposites. Old and young, hot and cold, dark and light, etc.

Homonym – Words that sound the same and are spelled the same, but have different meanings. Wait! Then what is a homophone? Words that sound the same, but are spelled differently and have different meanings. Many times, the distinction is not made, and they are all called homonyms. But technically —

• Homophones: bare/bear, board/bored, clothes/close, bizarre/bazaar
• Homonyms: train (to teach)/train (a locomotive), play (something acted on a stage)/play (to have fun)

We already mentioned the common word pseudonym. Another common one is acronym. An acronym consists of initials of something that then is pronounced as its own word: NASA and NATO are examples.

Contr/contra means opposite (contrary, controversy). So a contronym is a word that has two opposing meanings. Here are some examples:

Bolt: To secure–or to flee

Bound: Heading somewhere–or restrained from movement

Cleave: To adhere to -or to separate from

Dollop: A large amount (British English)–or a small amount

Fast: Quick–or stuck 

Finished: Completed–or destroyed

First degree: Most severe (murder charge)–or least severe (a burn)

Fix: To repair–or to castrate

Hold up: To support–or to get in the way of

Left: Remained–or departed

Out: Visible (stars)–or invisible (lights)

Overlook: To supervise–or to neglect

Rent: To purchase use of something–or to sell use

Rock: An immobile mass of stone –or a shaking movement 

Sanction: To approve–or to boycott

Seed: To sow seeds–or to remove them

Skinned: Covered with skin–or with the skin removed

Strike: To hit–or to miss in an attempt to hit

Throw out: To dispose of–or to present for consideration

Trim: To decorate–or to remove excess from

Trip: A journey–or a stumble

Wear: To endure– or to deteriorate

Wind up: To end–or to start up

A little more obscure than synonyms and antonyms, huh?

And a little like oxymorons.

Stay safe. Wear a mask.