OK, wondrous words. Every Wednesday, BermudaOnion hosts a meme in which we report on words we've encountered in the past week's reading that we'd never known before. This week, I have two, and they're doozies, especially if you're a grammar freak. I encountered them in The Know-It-All by A.J. Jacobs.
(1) meronym--the middle point between two opposites, e.g. the meronym of "hate" and "love" might be said to be "indifference".
(2) capitonym--a word which is pronounced differently and has a different meaning if the first letter is capitalized, such as "august" and "August."
I'm not sure that knowing those two words will be of great use to me, since I've been a fluent user of the English language since early childhood and got along all right without them, but I do find the concept of the meronym a fascinating one. Perhaps they should teach that one in schools and on Sesame Street!
Those are both interesting words. I'm not sure I'll be able to use them in every day conversation, but I'm glad to know them. Thanks for participating - hope to see you some more!
ReplyDeleteGlad you joined in the fun of Wondrous Words! And thank you for sharing these two, they're very interesting finds. The Know-It-All is the one where he reads the whole Britannica, right? I seem to recall that there were plenty of good words there...
ReplyDeleteThe blogging world is a grand place. Glad to see you joining in on this one. I, too, really like meronym. Not sure when I'll use it, but gonna keep it up my sleeve.
ReplyDeleteYes, The Know-It-All is the Britannica project; makes my current reading challenge look simple by comparison, doesn't it?
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