Difference between oxymoron and paradox

For example, a character who is both charming and rude might be referred to as a “paradox” even though in the strict logical sense, there’s nothing self-contradictory about a single person combining disparate personality traits.

One oxymoron example is “deafening silence,” which describes a silence that is so overpowering it almost feels deafening, or extremely loud—just as an actual sound would. Oxymorons are often used in everyday conversation and in a breadth of writing, such as literature, poetry, and songwriting.

Commonly known as “doublespeak,” equivocation is the use of vague language to hide one’s meaning or to avoid committing to a point of view. Irony is a literary device that relies on the difference between expectation and outcome. An oxymoron is a figure of speech where two words of opposite meaning are used together.

Can a person be an oxymoron? While we are loath to place restrictions on language use, oxymoron usually refers to a set of contradictory words (such as bittersweet) rather than to a contradictory person.

My dictionary defines today’s oxymoron as a “combination of contradictory or incongruous words.” If you stop to think about it, two of our more common oxymorons are “terribly nice” and “awfully good.” Never use “awfully good” when praising someone’s cooking, and never use “terribly nice” to describe a kiss.

Suddenly the room filled with a deafening silence. The comedian was seriously funny. You are clearly confused by the situation you have found yourself in. Her singing was enough to raise the living deceased.

Bigger half.

To say that one half is bigger than another is an oxymoron because it means that they can’t be halves. What’s meant is something like “the bigger of what ought to be, or was intended to be, two equal pieces.”

if it’s “exactly” then it can’t be “almost exactly” by the mere definition of the word exactly. “almost” means “nearly” – d’uh! This is an oxymoron because the two words are contradictory and it’s unnecessary to use it. However, the contrasting words/phrases are not always glued together.

Upside Down

Although this oxymoron may not be entirely incorrect, it still has contradicting meanings. When something is facing upwards, then how is it down? It’s just funny that we use the word “upside” to represent something that is turned.

1 : a tenet contrary to received opinion. 2a : a statement that is seemingly contradictory or opposed to common sense and yet is perhaps true. b : a self-contradictory statement that at first seems true.

When you really think about it, the concept of dry ice should be an oxymoron. The most common form of ice that we usually see on a daily basis is made from water, which of course is quite wet to the touch and turns back into water once it melts.

Use oxymoron to refer to a word or phrase that contradicts itself, usually to create some rhetorical effect.

paradox. Antonyms: precept, proposition, axiom, truism, postulate. Synonyms: contradiction, enigma, mystery, absurdity, ambiguity.