Same Word 😐 — Opposite Meanings 🤯

English is crazy… and today I’m going to prove it. I am going to show you 10 *contronyms* — words that have two opposite meanings at the same time. Yes, the same word can mean one thing… and also the complete opposite. Why? Because English likes to cause problems. We’ll look at real examples like *“dust”,* which can mean to remove particles or add particles. The word *“left”* can mean gone or remaining. *“Sanction”* can mean approve or punish. And it doesn’t stop there. We also cover *“bound”, “buckle”, “custom”, “finished”, “clip”, “original”,* and *“scan”* — all words that flip meaning depending on context. https://www.engvid.com/contronyms-10-english-words-that-mean-the-opposite-of-themselves/ I can help you make sense of English! Sign up for tutoring: https://EnglishWithRonnie.com 🤯 More of my videos about crazy English: https://youtu.be/zaa0r2WbmYo https://youtu.be/4GfhDRosMOs In this lesson: 0:00 10 words that mean their own opposite! 1:48 dust 3:59 left 4:37 bound 5:58 sanction 6:36 buckle 8:10 custom 9:23 finished 10:01 clip 10:56 original 11:55 scan Transcript: Hey, so I'm waving a feather duster in you here. Since you asked, yes, I did buy this from a garage sale for $3, and it is originally from South Africa. Thank you, Ostrich, for giving me this opportunity to use you in my video. And, you know, before I do these videos, I actually have to do, like, research and kind of educate myself on what I'm going to talk about, because some people on the internet just spew bullsh—. So, not my game. I came across these things, and yeah, they're cool, they're going to blow your mind or they might f— with your head. That's what they did with mine. And they have two names just to be fun as well. The first one is "yanis", not "janus", and the second one is a contronym. If you know your Latin, you'll know that "contro" means "against", and "nyms" means "words". Against words. Words against words. It's a world battle. Battle. It's a word battle. So, let me give you some background history lesson. "Yanis" was a Roman god with two faces. Cool. Awesome. Everyone has two faces. And he symbolized the beginning and the end of something. Cool. Maybe like yin-yang. I don't know. So, what does this have to do with English? Oh, man. This is where you're going to just hold on to your seats and your hat because we're in for a wild ride, ladies and gentlemen. Let's look at these words, and I challenge you to think about them before I tell you what they mean. So, the first one, "dust". So, as I told you, this is a duster, and dust are very small particles in the air. Oh, there's some now. If your house... If you don't dust your house, people come and they take their white glove... They don't do this anymore. They're like, "Ew, your house is dusty." Dust is, like, skin particles from humans, and dogs, and cats, and animals, and just crap in the air that lands on your table. So, you have to dust your house. And what are you doing when you dust your house? You are removing the dust, so, uh-uh, hence the duster. So, "dust" means to remove dust. Okay, that's cool, but it also has another meaning. Oh, and this is the thing with these yannuses and these contronyms is the other meaning is the complete opposite of the first one. Check it out. To add particles. Example, people can... Whoa. People can dust a cake with sugar. So, you might get a beautiful cake that you've made, it's chocolate, and you want to put a nice design on it. You can dust it with some nice icing sugar, and it looks like snowflakes. It's really cool. So, you can dust a cake, you can do a crop duster. This is a crop duster, it's great. A crop duster is when you fart and you leave the room, and it just... The fart particles go into everyone's noses, and they're like, "Who is that?" Like... Crop duster, dust to spread small particles. I know you're going to remember that one now. So, "to dust" means to remove dust, or it means to add dust. Is your mind blowing yet? They're both verbs. And as you can see, I've labelled them for your next social event. Oh, is it a noun or a verb night? Means adjective, and of course, noun and verb. So, the next one, we left. Example, oh, I left the building because I'm Elvis. I left the building. It means I left. Bye. I departed. The other meaning is, oh, to stay or remain. As an example, this chocolate cake that you made with the dusting of icing sugar, oh look, there's a piece left. I'm going to eat it. So, "left" can mean that something's gone or something is still there. Let's just continue blindly. "Bound". If you guys ever go on a train or a subway, you don't understand what they say, right? Sure, blah, blah, blah, blah, but sometimes it's clear. This train is northbound, northbound, so it means it's heading in the direction of north. I'm bound for Oklahoma. Yeehaw. Go to a cowboy rodeo. So, "bound" means to go in a direction. It also means, and this is doubly f—, "tie up" or "tie down". Okay, phrasal verb. […]