Terrific

Stupid english trivia. I needed to look this word up today, and according to Dictionary.com (Ref: The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language), the word Terrific is it's own antonym. Whenever I don't want to tell my stepson how I really felt about a movie, I can just say it was "terrific".

ter·rif·ic (t-rfk) adj.

Interesting question.

Interesting response...although I'm not convinced that the various meanings can be considered as 'antonyms'. There are many, many words that have multiple meanings, and not just in the English language. In this case, 'frightful' as the definition of 'terrific' is not really an antonym to 'extraordinary', or 'magnificent' (Merriam-Webster). The root idea may be som

Thank you both. Indeed it is a very interesting word. I thought it might have a name for it in grammar.

bmo

Don't give up on the question, BMO. There may be a grammatical term for it. If there is , someone on EnglishForward will know. Stay tuned.

There are more words like this:

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~cellis/antagonym.html

Thanks. The website helps.

bmo