I had not heard the word “Contronym” before. Perhaps that is why I am always getting beat down at Scrabble. Anyway, for the handful of my fellow wordsmiths here that might possible be in the same boat, this is a fun article by Judith Herman published on Mental Floss way back in 2018. How did I miss it?
It features fun writing like this ambiguous sentence: “Because of the agency’s oversight, the corporation’s behavior was sanctioned.” Does that mean, “Because the agency oversaw the company’s behavior, they imposed a penalty for some transgression,” or does it mean, “Because the agency was inattentive, they overlooked the misbehavior and gave it their approval by default”? We’ve stumbled into the looking-glass world of contronyms—words that are their own antonyms.
Here is the complete article, with the required baker’s dozen ads at the end. Have fun!
Rusty Bent Nail 