Oxymoron

Have you ever heard of oxymoron? If you have, you might have learnt that oxymoron is something very interesting and very unique that you'll find yourself engage in it. As for me, I love oxymoron, that's why I post this article here:

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Oxymorons express ideas with two 'opposing' words.

Check this out: "...faith unfaithful kept him falsely true." This seemingly contradictory sentence (reminds me of Dzof Azmi's "Contradictheory" in StarMag) listed as an example to elucidate the meaning of "oxyomoron" (Concise Oxford English Dictionary/COED, 1995), has long fascinated me.

The term "oxymoron" is in itself an oxymoron - a Greek derivation from oxus ("sharp") and moros ("foolish"/"dull"). An oxymoron is: a figure of speech in which apparently contradictory terms appear in conjunction (COED, 1995; P978); or more simply stated: a phrase that combines two words that seem to be the opposite of each other, for example a deafening silence (Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary/OALD, 2002;P908)

By the way, with a measure of qualified success, the term advanced learner is also rated an oxymoron.

All who are "mad about English" (and those caught in a love-hate relationship with it) will willingly vouch that the versatility of this quirky language stretches to infinity and beyond. It would therefore, make me a perfect idiot/moron if I tried to give you an exact estimate or a detailed summary of the stunts this language can pull. Yet being in active retirement, instead of doing nothing, I thought to explore a brief survey, this fascinating facet (oxymoron) of my favourite language.

After my shamelessly proud public courtship of "Partners in rime" (MOE, Aug 4), which now seems to appear invisible, I thought to make a brief foray into how this linguistic partnership can turn, as quickly, from rhyme to "crime" - partners they remain, yet strange bedfellows and honest cheats, in an act to tease - and hey, they deliver, that much is easier!

So, taking the only option available, I signed on the dotted line for an amicable divorce from my earlier liaison. Yes, why not? A divorce court with its sometimes pretty ugly proceedings comes to mind. Never mind the unequal justice. If you happen to be a local celebrity, you also reap while portions of negative gain like good gossip in the form of loud whispers of disparaging remarks. All of which leaves you feeling half-naked, both inside out. So, don't go making a deliberate mistake of courting an undesirable attraction in the first place.

Well, it all sounds vaguely familiar because an absurd truth of life is that it is a paradox. A "paradox" sits at a close distance to an "oxymoron" because of shared commonalities. In that, it is a seemingly absurd or contradictory statement, even if actually well founded. A common example to illustrate this is "more haste, less speed". Go figure. Another may be: It is a curious paradox that professional comedians often have unhappy personal lives. (OALD, 2002; P918)

Good grief! Clever fools aren't we? See how we almost always use exact opposites to make our point. Even trading secrets and affectionate insults in the name of friendly argument. A fine mess, actually. At times you feel numb just thinking how we relish pitting clearly ambiguous expressions against each other to create a typically unusual effect. A planned surprise, that's what it is, really! Clearly, we have already made an accurate forecast of its intended effect, of which we are almost certain. What a quite scream! A controlled chaos that celebrates our plying of this pliant body of language. My educated guess? It is an obvious secret shared by all conniving language lovers.

Permit me now to run on auto pilot for some randomly organised contradictory pairs scopped out from all of one days' (Aug 29) newspaper: artistic chaos, free gift, constructive criticism, organised mess, unsung heroes, bad/ill health, fair trial, casual intimacy, school vacation, home school, immediate future, minor disaster, science fiction, real potential, reality TV, and I best come to a rolling stop now but not before adding the ubiquitous road safety cautionary accident alert (if you are alert, you can avoid accidents, surely), to my found list. Of course, you can tease out a day's worth from any newspaper, any day.

Then there is Aloha - a Hawaiian expression used both of "hello" and "goodbye". It is popularly said to be the only self-contained (single) oxymoron. However, thanksgiving be to English, the classic language known to celebrate both theory and then "contradictheory".

I know you can think of thers besides eggplant and pineapple. With no intent to be rude, there is also the butt with its colloquial backside. Not forgetting wholesome is another English stand-alone oxymoron. It is a word wrought with bittersweet memories of how my (wholesome) love for the language was nurtured by a father who spoke impeccable English and who taught me early to pessimistically optimistic.

Before I say Aloha then, I don't mind confiding that my fetish for shoes saw me purchase a genuine replica of a catwalk designher pair. Dzireena Mahadzir with her "Sense of Style" would approve, knowing my easy problem - I may be an active retiree who enjoys tax relief, but one who is also afflicted with financial immobility. That should bring me to a full stop.


Written by Lucille Dass,
Adapted from The Star (Star Two), pg19, 29 September 2010

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