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Pastimes : SI Grammar and Spelling Lab -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: The Philosopher who wrote (3187)	7/19/1999 8:27:00 AM
From: Justin C	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 4711

Aloha -- used as both a greeting and a farewell.

To: The Philosopher who wrote (3187)	7/19/1999 12:11:00 PM
From: Tiger Lily	Respond to of 4711

Christopher, I absolutely love Click & Clack! If you miss the broadcast you can catch it on the net at cartalk.cars.com. The dual meanings of the word "cleve" gave me fits a few months ago while I was working on a Sunday New York Times crossword puzzle. So for me, that was the word that immediately came to mind. Cheers Lily

To: The Philosopher who wrote (3187)	7/19/1999 12:53:00 PM
From: Edwarda	Respond to of 4711

How about "ravel"?

To: The Philosopher who wrote (3187)	7/19/1999 2:10:00 PM
From: jbe	Respond to of 4711

There are not that many words in English that are their own antonyms (sometimes called contronyms, or antagonyms), that is, words that are their own exact opposites. There are, however, quite a few with incompatible meanings. A couple of examples of "pure" contronyms: clip (attach, detach) dress (add to, take away) trip (stumble, be light on one's feet) And of "impure" contronyms: help (assist, prevent --as in, "I can't help it") fix (repair, castrate) buckle (to fasten, as transitive verb; to fall apart, as intransitive) By the way, Christopher, it is "cleave," not "cleve." The reason for the antithetical meanings of "cleave" is that each is derived from a different root. Originally there were two separate words, one for each meaning; in time, they just "grew together."

To: The Philosopher who wrote (3187)	7/22/1999 12:05:00 AM
From: The Philosopher	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 4711

Over on the Feelings thread I used dialogue as a verb and got shot at by Steven and CobaltBlue. I shot back with the OED acceptance of dialogue as a verb, with citations going back to Shakespeare (multiple citations), Richardson (in Pamela), Coleridge, and Carlyle. Not bad company! And citations go up as late as the 1880s and 1890s (including uses in America), so it wasn't just an English word or a medieval usage that died out. It's not a common usage today, though. So, why not? What happened to it? Why, if it was good enough for quality writers for centuries, is it suddenly considered not good usage?