16 Words that Describe Themselves

Most words have a rather abstract connection to the things they describe. The word yellow is not actually yellow. The word square is not a square. Nor do we expect them to be. That’s the way of the world and the arbitrary nature of language. But some words do embody the properties they denote. We call them “autological words,” and they are a self-centered, self-referential bunch. Here are 16 of them. (And for more autological words see the list maintained by Henry Segerman.)

1. Word
2. English
3. Erudite
4. Noun
5. Buzzword
6. Cutesy
7. Polysyllabic
8. Sesquipedalian
9. Unhyphenated
10. Magniloquent
11. Recherché
12. Proparoxytone
13. Hellenic
14. Obfuscatory
15. Suffixed
16. Heterological

Word

Yup, that’s what it is. (Though Merriam-Webster’s definitions are a little more complicated: Among them are “a speech sound or series of speech sounds that symbolizes and communicates a meaning usually without being divisible into smaller units capable of independent use” and “the entire set of linguistic forms produced by combining a single base with various inflectional elements without change in the part of speech elements.”)

English

Well, it ain’t French.

Erudite

It is a very scholarly word, this word that means “scholarly.”

Noun

Verb, adjective, and adverb are nouns too.

Buzzword

Been hearing this everywhere. (Merriam-Webster has two definitions: “an important-sounding usually technical word or phrase often of little meaning used chiefly to impress laymen” and “a voguish word or phrase.”)

Cutesy

Barfsy. (The Oxford English Dictionary’s first citation dates back to a 1968 piece in The New York Times Book Review: “Start with the cutesie title. Pursue the mysteriously jumbled chronology.”)

Polysyllabic

Lots of syllables in this one.

Sesquipedalian

A term meaning “long word” from the Latin for “a foot and a half long.” We have the ancient Roman poet Horace—and literary critics—to thank for the word: According to Merriam-Webster, “Horace ... was merely being gently ironic when he cautioned young poets against using sesquipedalia verba—‘words a foot and a half long’—in his book Ars poetica ... But in the 17th century, English literary critics decided the word sesquipedalian could be very useful for lambasting writers using unnecessarily long words.”

Unhyphenated

And should remain so.

Magniloquent

Grandiose and pompous indeed.

Recherché

Rarified? Affected? Pretentious? Mais, bien sûr.

Proparoxytone

This word means “stressed on the antepenultimate,” or third-to-last syllable. It’s pronounced “pro-par-OX-y-tone.”

Hellenic

Of Greek origin. From ancient Greek Ἑλληνικός (ellhnikos).

Obfuscatory

Do you want to be straightforward and easy to understand? Then don’t use this obfuscatory word.

Suffixed

Now that you mention it, prefix works too.

Heterological

The opposite of autological is heterological. A heterological word, like yellow or square, does not describe itself. So does heterological describe itself? If yes, then by definition it’s autological, so then it doesn’t describe itself. But if no, then heterological is heterological, therefore it actually does describe itself, which means it’s autological … does your head hurt? Welcome to the Grelling-Nelson Paradox.

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