There's a Word for It

What do you call a word that can convey opposite meanings depending on how it's used? A word such as sanction, which can mean either "allow" or "prohibit." Or screen, which can mean "conceal" or "show."

In our Glossary of Grammatical & Rhetorical Terms, we call this two-faced creature a Janus word--like the two-headed Roman god.

At least that's one name for it. Depending on your source for language lore, a self-contradictory word is also known as enantionymy, antilogy, contronym, contranym, autantonym, auto-antonym, and contradictanym.

You see, in the fields of grammar and rhetoric, there's always a word for it. And often more than one.

For instance, do you know the term for . . .

• . . . a question that's tacked onto the end of a declarative sentence, like this: "At least we tried, didn't we?"
  That's called a tag question. Or, if you prefer, a question tag.



• . . . the substitution of a more offensive word or phrase (such as "coot" or "geezer") for a nicer one ("old gentleman")?
  That would be a dysphemism--the opposite of euphemism.



• . . . a word or phrase that appears to qualify the words both before and after it--as in, "Instructors who cancel classes rarely are reprimanded"?
  This ambiguous construction goes by the name squinting modifer (also known as a two-way modifier or a squinting construction).



• . . . a noun (such as jeans or doldrums) that appears only in the plural and does not have a singular form?
  Try plurale tantum--a Latin phrase meaning "plural only."



• . . . a text that deliberately excludes a particular letter of the alphabet (such as Ernest Wright's Gadsby--a story of more than 50,000 words that not once uses the letter e)?
  That's called a lipogram--from the Greek for "missing letter."

How often will you have an opportunity to use any of these terms? Probably not very often. All right--never. Unless, like me, you're in the habit of pestering friends and colleagues with questions that begin, "Do you know the term for . . . ?"

More About Grammatical & Rhetorical Terms:

• Glossary of Grammatical & Rhetorical Terms
• Top 24 Grammatical Terms That We Should Have Learned in School
• Top 20 Figures of Speech
• Top 20 Rhetorical Terms That We Never Learned in School

Image: Janus, the Roman god of gates and doorways and of beginnings and endings, was customarily depicted with two heads looking in opposite directions