The Seven Deadly Nyms

I got this breakdown on The Seven Deadly Nyms here: http://searchenginewatch.com/2160501 The blog itself is focused on online search queries but the application and repercussions of what the writer presents is vast in the context of applied heuristics in communication and language procedure. Like for instance in the Preamble to the US Constitution which is chocked full of deadly nyms.

The first deadly nym is a set of words called contronyms, or Janus words. A contronym is a single word that has multiple meanings that contradict the others. Some common contronyms include:

Fast - moving quickly vs. firmly stuck in place
Hysterical - overwhelmed with fear vs. outrageously funny
Root - establish something new vs. dig out completely

The second deadly nym is a group of words known as heteronyms. Heteronyms are similar to antagonyms, with a subtle difference. Heteronyms are words that are spelled identically but have different meanings when pronounced differently (bow, desert, object, refuse).

Heteronyms can sometimes be the result of melioration, or the acquisition of a positive meaning by a word that's traditionally had a negative meaning. "Bad" is an example. In its original sense, bad means nasty, spoiled, broken, etc. But pronounced "baad" it takes on the slang meaning that's just the opposite: good, cool, or fashionable.

A particularly insidious example of a melioration is the word "factoid," which means "A piece of unverified or inaccurate information that is presented in the press as factual, often as part of a publicity effort, and that is then accepted as true because of frequent repetition," according to dictionary.com.

Watch out for the opposite of heteronyms: polyonyms. These are different words have the same meaning (Jupiter, Zeus, Oden). Depending on what you're looking for, you might miss some important information if you use only one variant of a polyonym. For best results, find and use them all.

For the spelling-challenged, homonyms are the most pernicious deadly nym. Homonyms are words that have the same sound but a completely different meaning (to, too, two). Some homonyms are also contronyms -- words that are spelled and pronounced like another word but have a different origin and meaning.

The fifth deadly nym: capitonym, a word that changes pronunciation and meaning when it is capitalized. Capitonyms are commonly words that become proper nouns when capitalized: amber is a yellow, orange, or brownish-yellow fossil resin; Amber is the eighth-grade softball team captain. You polish silver with ammonia and silicon, though you'd never dream of applying the same to a polish sausage.

Next up: caconyms. A caconym is an erroneous name, especially in taxonomic classification. While caconyms might be useful for tracking down archaic or outdated usage, you're likely to end up with inaccurate information if you use them in search queries.

The seventh deadly nym is the obscure but lethal exonym, especially if you're searching for non-local information. An exonym is a place name that foreigners use instead of the name that natives use (Cologne:Koln; Florence: Firenze; Morocco:Maroc). Beyond provoking a chuckle from locals, using exonyms as search terms will likely net results biased toward foreign information, which may not be as accurate as home-grown content.