HOW TO PRONOUNCE
paradox
/ˈpɛɹəˌdɑks/
Press play to hear how to pronounce paradox.
American Pronunciation Guide · 0:47
Watch on YouTube ↗
Watch on YouTube ↗
LISTEN FOR THIS
Keep the main beat on the first syllable.
Use three syllables, with a light middle vowel and secondary stress on dox. The x represents k followed by s; keep both at the end without another vowel.
3 syllables · Stress on syllable 1
TRY SAYING
“The essay explores a familiar paradox.”
APG practice sentence · CC BY-SA 4.0
CMU Pronouncing Dictionary ↗What does paradox mean?
noun
- An apparently self-contradictory statement, which can only be true if it is false, and vice versa.
- A counterintuitive conclusion or outcome.
- A claim that two apparently contradictory ideas are true.
More meanings (7)
noun
- A thing involving contradictory yet interrelated elements that exist simultaneously and persist over time.
- A person or thing having contradictory properties.
- An unanswerable question or difficult puzzle, particularly one which leads to a deeper truth.
- The use of counterintuitive or contradictory statements (paradoxes) in speech or writing.
- A state in which one is logically compelled to contradict oneself.
- The practice of giving instructions that are opposed to the therapist's actual intent, with the intention that the client will disobey or be unable to obey.
- (obsolete) A statement which is difficult to believe, or which goes against general belief.
Definitions regrouped for readability · CC BY-SA 4.0
IPA pronunciation
/ˈpɛɹəˌdɑks/
Pronunciation used in the listening tip.
CMU Pronouncing Dictionary ↗Pronunciation varies by speaker and region. About these dictionary pronunciations.
In the pages of books
See this word in context.
Those, however, who mock American journalism from the standpoint of somewhat mellower traditions forget a certain paradox which partly redeems it.
But they faced, as all men since them have faced, that central paradox of the South, the social separation of the races.
More book examples (3)
But all in vain the quips we heard, We lay and sobbed upon the rocks, Until to somebody occurred A startling paradox.
By the way, do you remember an old paradox upon this subject, "What nobody cares to give away, yet nobody wishes to keep?"
As digesting, when all is said, merely means liquefying, it is no paradox to assert that the maggot digests its food before swallowing it.