-
Kevin
-
November 14, 2022
-
Common Questions
Your writing, at its best
Compose bold, clear, mistake-free, writing with Grammarly's AI-powered writing assistant
You might hear a lot of terms regarding semantics that sound similar: homonym, metonym, synonym, and so on. Today, our word of the day is synonym. In this article, you will learn what a synonym is, how to use a synonym, and why synonyms are useful.
What Does Synonym Mean?
According to Dictionary, the definition of synonym is a word with the same meaning or similar meaning as another word. synonym is three syllables — syn-o-nym — and the pronunciation of synonyms is ˈsɪnənɪm. A dictionary of synonyms is called a thesaurus.
You might run into near-synonyms, which are related words to synonyms but might have a slightly different definition or be a different part of speech.
Why Should You Use Synonyms?
You might wonder why it would be useful to know multiple words that all mean the same thing. Why not just know one of them and leave the rest? Many times, synonyms of words come with different connotations.
Connotation is the feeling that a word evokes, separate from its dictionary definition. Sometimes, two words might mean the same thing, but one has a positive connotation while the other has a negative connotation.
Learning synonyms is also an efficient way to learn new words. If you know the definition of one word and then learn all of the synonyms of that word, you have just expanded your vocabulary exponentially!
Knowing synonyms can also be helpful when it comes to taxonomic names or scientific names. The average person might not know the technical term for a species of plant or animal, so knowing the common words for these things can prove very useful.
What Is the Etymology of Synonym?
The word synonym has been in the English language for a very long time – since the early 1400s! This word comes from the Ancient Greek syn, Greek sunōnumon and synōnymon, the Latin onoma, and the Latin synōnymum.
What Are Examples of Synonyms?
Below, you will find several example sentences of synonyms. Each of these examples of synonyms uses two words with the same denotation but a different connotation. See if you can identify which word has a positive connotation and which word has a negative connotation.
Example #1: Youthful vs. Sophomoric
Sentence 1: The new intern at the company brought youthful energy to every meeting.
Sentence 2: The new intern at the company brought sophomoric energy to every meeting.
Question: Which of the above synonyms has a positive connotation in this context? Which one has a negative connotation?
Answer: Youthful has a positive connotation, and sophomoric has a negative connotation.
Example #2: Secluded vs. Isolated
Sentence 1: The parents took their children to a secluded cabin in the woods to escape city life.
Sentence 2: The parents took their children to an isolated cabin in the woods to escape city life.
Question: Which of the above synonyms has a positive connotation in this context? Which one has a negative connotation?
Answer: Secluded has a positive connotation, and isolated has a negative connotation.
Example #3: Ancient vs. Vintage
Sentence 1: The teenager’s father gave him an ancient pickup truck from the 1960s to drive.
Sentence 2: The teenager’s father gave him a vintage pickup truck from the 1960s to drive.
Question: Which of the above synonyms has a positive connotation in this context? Which one has a negative connotation?
Answer: Vintage has a positive connotation, and ancient has a negative connotation.
Example #4: Humorous vs. Goofy
Sentence 1: The CEO gave a humorous speech at the company’s annual conference.
Sentence 2: The CEO gave a goofy speech at the company’s annual conference
Question: Which of the above synonyms has a positive connotation in this context? Which one has a negative connotation?
Answer: Humorous has a positive connotation, and goofy has a negative connotation.
Example #5: Assertive vs. Domineering
Sentence 1: The employees chatted about their boss’ assertive behavior during the meeting.
Sentence 2: The employees chatted about their boss’ domineering behavior during the meeting.
Question: Which of the above synonyms has a positive connotation in this context? Which one has a negative connotation?
Answer: Assertive has a positive connotation, and domineering has a negative connotation.
What Are Translations of Synonym?
Different languages besides the English language contain their fair share of synonyms. If you are studying a different language, you can reference this list of translations of synonym from Nice Translator.
- Dutch: synoniem
- Catalan: sinònim
- Polish: synonim
- Swahili: Synonym
- Italian: sinonimo
- Marathi: प्रतिशब्द
- Lithuanian: sinonimas
- Chinese (PRC): 代名词
- Turkish: eşanlamlı sözcük
- Estonian: sünonüüm
- Danish: synonym
- Greek: συνώνυμο
- Hindi: पर्याय
- Hebrew: שֵׁם נִרדָף
- Hungarian: szinonima
- Latvian: sinonīms
- Chinese (Taiwan): 代名詞
- Arabic: مرادف
- German: Synonym
- Icelandic: samheiti
- Portuguese (Brazil): sinônimo
- Malay: sinonim
- Serbian: синоним
- Ukrainian: синонім
- Romanian: sinonim
- Russian: синоним
- Basque: sinonimo
- Amharic: ተመሳሳይ ስም
- Swedish: synonym
- Bulgarian: синоним
- Bengali: প্রতিশব্দ
- Norwegian: synonym
- Slovak: synonymum
- Malayalam: പരായം
- Kannada: ಸಮಾನಾರ್ಥಕ
- Vietnamese: Từ đồng nghĩa
- Czech: synonymum
- Urdu: مترادف
- Welsh: chyfystyron
- Telugu: పర్యాయపదం
- Thai: คำพ้องความหมาย
- Indonesian: persamaan Kata
- French: synonyme
- Korean: 동의어
- Croatian: sinonim
- Spanish: sinónimo
- Portuguese (Portugal): sinônimo
- Filipino: kasingkahulugan
- Tamil: ஒத்த பெயர்
- Finnish: synonyymi
- Japanese: シノニム
- Slovenian: sinonim
- Gujarati: પર્યાય
What Are Synonyms of Synonym?
Power Thesaurus provides several synonyms for the word synonym!
- acceptation
- alternate
- alternative
- alternative expression
- alternative word
- analog
- convertible terms
- copy
- duplicate
- equivalence
- equivalent
- equivalent word
- euphemism
- expression
- identical same
- metonym
- other word
- paraphrase
- same
- substitute
- very same
What Are Antonyms of Synonym?
Antonyms are words with the opposite meaning of a given word. Take a look at these synonyms of the word antonym, which are also antonyms of synonym, from Power Thesaurus.
- another adverse
- antilogy
- antipode
- antipodes
- antithesis
- antonym
- contradictory
- contrary
- contrast
- converse
- counter
- foil
- inverse
- negation
- negative
- negatory
- obverse
- opposite
- opposite word
- opposites
- other extreme
- reverse
- term
Conclusion
A synonym is a word with the same or a similar meaning to another word or phrase.
Sources:
Antonym synonyms – 100 Words and Phrases for Antonym | Power Thesaurus
