We all recognize onomatopoeia even if we don't know the term. Whoosh, bang, ding, whisper, crack, and other words sound like what they mean. I've been looking for words that sound like the opposite of what they mean, and I came up with the term onopatomoeia to describe them.
Tranquil doesn't seem like a tranquil word to me with that qu sound in it and all. I came up with some others: Soundlessness, bomb, uncomplicated, glided, and bold. So now my challenge is to demonstrate that these words sound like the opposite of what they mean.
Soundlessness, with all the S sounds is quite obviously not very soundless.
Uncomplicated is a five syllable word with a three-consonant run in which your vocal cords have to go silent and come back on very quickly, definitely not simple, which is what it actually means.
Bomb sounds like a beat in a piece of music, The Drummer Boy. Listen to the song and when you hear the SOUND "bomb" tell me if it's destructive with lots of fire and rubble.
I don't think anyone would be comfortable claiming that, when someone says the word "glided," it "glided" out of their mouth. It's got three glottal stops in it, and stopped is the opposite of glided.
Now with the word "bold" the meaning gets in the way and kind of makes it feel like it's a bold word. How about a bowl? Is that a bold word? It's very close to bold. So is old, and bowl and old are not bold at all. When I really get in touch with the sounds of the word "bold" they aren't bold at all. It seems kind of weak and ineffective as a group of sounds.
I'm looking for others. If you have any suggestions, please reply! My favorite so far is... well, it's a tie between soundlessness and uncomplicated.
