Questão 2672444

Instruction: answer questions 36 to 42 based on the following text.

Janus Words – Two-faced English

1. _____As if reading and writing English is not difficult enough, the language includes a number
2. of words with opposite meanings within themselves. These are often called Janus words, after
3. Janus, the Roman god of doors and beginnings. (January, the first month of the year, is named
4. for him.) Janus usually was represented in art as having two bearded faces that faced in opposite
5. directions, as do doors — and as do Janus words.
6. _____Some Janus words – and this is just a selection – include to scan, meaning either to look
7. carefully (“The captain scanned the horizon with binoculars”) or to glance quickly at (“She
8. scanned the report in a few minutes”); to peruse, with similar senses, meaning both to read or
9. examine carefully and to look at or read casually without much attention to detail; and
10. inflammable, easy to burn, and an especially treacherous term since the in- prefix is sometimes
11. considered to be negative, with the result that the highly combustible word is understood as
12. meaning “not flammable.”
13. _____The wordplay that characterizes slang also exploits Janus effects. For example, bad can
14. stand for “very good, excellent, wonderful, sexy” in different contexts. Variations on this theme
15. include not bad, not half bad, and not so bad, which translate as “good,” “pretty good,” or,
16. depending on intonation — “Not bad!” — as “very good.” Even worse than bad is wicked, which
17. is truly evil, but also is a Janus word in some contexts, meaning “really good, excellent,
18. wonderful.” Wicked seems to have acquired its “good” side more recently than did bad. Wicked
19. may also be used as an intensifier, signifying “very, extremely,” as in a complimentary review
20. of a book for young adults: “Even if ‘Gorgeous’ . . . never quite realizes its full potential, it is
21. still a wicked good time” (New York Times Book Review, May 12, 2013).
22. _____Similar to Janus words are what might be called Janus sentences, which have been
23. constructed, usually deliberately, to be so ambiguous that opposing meanings can be read into
24. them. These are especially useful when one is asked to write a letter of recommendation and
25. wants to be honest but not to risk being sued for slander. For example, “You’ll be lucky to get
26. Jones to work for you” could be understood to mean that Jones will be a fine employee – or that
27. once employed, he’ll hardly ever do any work. “You’ll never catch Jones goofing off or playing
28. computer games” may just mean that Jones is too smart to be caught. Then there is the book
29. review credited to Dorothy Parker: “It is not a novel to be dismissed lightly.” She added,
30. however: “It should be thrown aside with great force.” Meanwhile, I am awaiting the day when
31. some dear friend tells me: “I shall lose no time reading your next Cambridge post.”
32. Hmmm.

(Avalaible in: https://dictionaryblog.cambridge.org/2013/07/01/janus-words-two-faced-english/#more-2382 – text especially adapted for this test).

The use of “might” highlighted in line 22 suggests that the term “Janus sentences” is.