To speak fluent English you need to keep learning something New in the English language. Have you heard of Janus words, they are also called two-faced English words. In this English lesson with Michelle, you are about to learn something new, Janus English Words. Watch this complete lesson as you are in for a surprise, Janus words are words with multiple meanings, as if someone is having two faces. Sounds interesting? Well Michelle brings you English words with multiple meanings, its the best way to remember English words and use them in your English conversation to speak English fluently.
You are watching this lesson on Let’s Talk – Youtube Channel with more than 1500 plus free English speaking lessons to make you speak fluent English. You will find topics such as English grammar rules, Accent Training, Us Accent, UK accent, IELTS Speaking test training videos, Videos for Job Interview Skills, Words with meaning for competitive exams, English conversation practice, Tips to learn English and much more. Take a look at the playlists below to access these lessons and learn English easily and faster.
Complete Video Transcript :-
Hi guys! Hi guys, H from the Spiderman, so you’ll see that I have got apparently two faces. Do you know there is someone else like that who’s got two faces his name is Janus. He is the Greek God. On his name we have some words in English, that have two opposite meanings, okay, the word “Naughty”, it can mean something nice and it can also mean someone very notorious. In this lesson with me Michelle, you are learning Janus words, words that have opposite meanings. So please join me I bet you you’ll have great fun. So guys here we have some words that can mean entirely different entirely opposite, not just different. So let’s look at the first word that we have with us on the board, to cleave to something or to cleave something. It can have two meanings. When you cleave something, you cut it essentially you cut wood, so cutting the wood is called cleaving the wood that’s the first meaning. To cut the wood. So you could say that he was cleaving the wood, but it can have an entirely opposite meaning, instead of cutting, you can cling to something or you can hold tight to something. So to cleave to something means hold tight to it. In certain cases you principles that you have for your life, you could say that I always cleave to my principles which means you always follow your principles. So to cling to something. Haven’t they got entirely different meanings? Let’s see the second one that we have, to hew something. Now to hew is a synonym for cleave and it has the similar opposite meanings, the first meaning of Hew is to cut the wood, so whenever you see lumberjack he is cutting the wood, which means he is hewing the wood, again the same meaning, to cut the wood, right. Now what is the other meaning? Now Hew also means that you adhere to something, you adhere to particular principles or set of principles that you follow. So if you wanted to, you wanna you this word for someone else, you could say that the politician hews to the principles of his party. Or the politician hews to the party policies. Which means to adhere, that is to follow something. So cutting and following are definitely opposite meanings. You know English is quite double faced, trust me on that. The next word that we have is a Sanction. So have you heard this word before? Which meaning of the word do you know? So most often we use the word sanction, when we are talking about something which is formally approved off. So these day that we know a lot of Nations are sanctioning gay marriages, which means that they are approving gay marriages. So that is formal approval. So you could use it in the sentence by saying, so and so country, or may be the UK is now sanctioning gay marriages. But it has an entirely different meaning as well. It can mean to impose a ban. Which is entirely different from allowing something. It just opposite. So when you impose a ban on something you could say that you are sanctioning it. So for an example, right now you, US is not ready to lift up its sanctions against North Korea because of the nuclear incident that happened recently. So that ways it’s not ready to lift up the ban or it’s not ready to lift up the sanctions. To impose official ban. Funny isn’t it? So very opposite. Let’s look at the next one that we have, to scan something. So scanning can also mean two things, first what we mean by scan is to look carefully for every detail, right? So what happens when there is a murder and Police comes in they scan the room for any signs that they can find, you know to find out who murdered. So they scan the rooms or they look for, carefully throughout the room. So the first meaning is to look very carefully for every detail. You could use it in a sentence by saying, that the captain scanned the horizon with the binoculars, but it can have an entirely different meaning as well. Scanning can mean to have a quick look at something. So you know recently I was having some problems and I got some blood tests done and as soon I got the reports, I was reading them and I was scanning them which means I was looking very carefully that what’s gonna happen what are the details, Then I took the report to my doctor and she just scanned through it, which means she quickly looked through it. I also scanned through it but I scanned through very carefully with details, but she scanned through with just a glance. So when you have a glance, to have a glance. SO the doctor, scanned through the report quickly. Now let’s come to the next one which is surely the most combustible word in this whole lesson, combustible means something that can easily catch fire, and that’s exactly what this word means which comes from the word flame, right? But you do not call that word Inflammable, you call this word as Inflammable, So inflammable is something that can easily catch fire. Easily catch fire. So if you ever looked, ah at the description that you have on deodorants, you’d read that, deodorants are highly inflammable, which means they can easily catch fire. But here’s the catch. let’s look at this word, this word is incomplete which is the opposite of complete and this word only in these two letters make it an opposite for complete, so these two words has the power to make a negative of any word, now if we separate this and this if we say its inflammable, it can also mean that it’s not flammable, it can just mean the opposite, like complete if we say incomplete which means it’s not complete. So inflammable could be something which is not flammable or not combustible, and if you actually go with the wrong meaning, I’m sure you will end up burning something or someone. So be careful about which meaning it is carrying whenever you are reading something. Mostly it is something that will easily catch fire. Now quickly look at the other four words we got. To trip, ah, okay to trip, we all love going for a trip, but sometimes we can just trip which means we can fall while you are walking if you suddenly stumble, or catch your foot upon something . May be there is something on the ground, or toy or something and you just stumble over the toy, that means you tripped over the toy. Which means to stumble. So if we say that He stumbled or he tripped which means is that he fell down. So we could say that he stumbled over the toy or stumbled over the glass or he tripped over the glass, but trip can have an entirely different meaning again, and as a verb it can have a different meaning, so to trip means to walk very carelessly, you know when you are so happy and you walk very nimbly nimbly means very softly with light feet, so if you are just like going around the room like this without thinking anything serious, that’s when you are tripping in the room, so if you see somebody going in the room just carelessly thoughtlessly, so can say she is tripping around the room joyfully. So to go around thoughtlessly, or to walk nimbly. So these are just opposite meanings either you stumble or you walk thoughtlessly. Okay the next one that we have, is an oversight. This the most tricky word that you can possibly have and let me tell you, even John F. Kennedy got it wrong in his speech. SO oversight means to look at something with supervision, to look at something very carefully. So a watchman is having an oversight which is a careful supervision over a building. So oversight can mean a careful supervision. Right you could say that the watchman was having an oversight over the organization which means he was looking carefully at the organization. But that’s not all, oversight can also mean to make some errors, by not being careful. So this one careful supervision, and the other is to make errors by not being careful. So as for me the other day I was reading by bank statement and it was full of oversights, it had so many errors and mistakes why because the person who drafted the bank statement, he did not draft it carefully. So these are two very opposite meanings. The second last that we have these two have also entered so Mr. Janus, the Greek God has also entered the slang world and he’s got a hold of the word bad, so bad actually means good, bad things are good sometimes. So if you say that that’s a bad T-shirt if a native speaker tells you that, trust me he could also mean that it’s a good T-shirt. Sometimes bad is used in its intensity to mean something good. Sometimes something very good, or wonderful. But you have to understand contextually, that what the person is saying, does he actually mean the negative meaning or the positive meaning. The final one that we have is something very wicked so I had a wicked time teaching you this lesson. Does that I had an evil time? No. So evil actually, wicked actually mean evil. Something which is truly evil. But I sure didn’t have evil time teaching you this lesson but instead I had wonderful time so wicked means to have a wonderful time or to have great time doing something. A wonderful experience. Wicked can also be used as an intensifier where you can say that oh, come on that was wicked cool, that means it was extremely cool or it was very cool Now this is a very new one and I’m sure you would love to have that in your vocabulary. And why only this word, all these words are surely pimp your vocabulary add to your vocabulary and you can go out there be wicked and be good, be bad and be nice at the same time double faced like Mr. Janus, I hope you had fun, like I had promised you in the beginning of the lesson come back for more lessons with me this is Michelle signing off. Bye bye
Add comment