(this is free)

In writing a fictional language, what if opposites are represented as the same word? So that a vice and virtue are the same trait unless distinguished as positive or negative. So where being frugal is good, and stingy is bad, they would use the same word and you can only tell which is represented by the tone or the rest of the sentence. Perhaps more different opposites such as stinginess and generosity are represented by only slight word variation. This could go a lot of ways.

Fascinating idea.

Hmmm....reminds me a little of the language in 1984 (I forget its name). In that language, they only have one word -- for example, 'good' -- and the negative is just not-good. 'Very good' becomes 'good-plus' and 'Very, very bad,' 'not-good-plus-plus.' Simple

As far as having them be the exact same word, that would bring up a bunch of interesting scenarios where maybe someone's true intentions aren't really known, and it depends on the person telling the story to color their motives. Or maybe a person can defend himself by bringing context to this ambiguous describing word.

I like this

The concept you're talking about is actually present in English to some extent...I've often found those particular words very interesting–how they could mean 'opposites', and context was the only way to tell what they were in a particular usage. 'Leniency', for instance. It would be so interesting to take it even farther and have most of the words do that....

One example of this in English is the word "cleave." With one preposition, it means (roughly) "divide", and with a different preposition it means "join".

Yeah, I always thought 'cleave together' in the old hymns sounded funny to me.

Like you're using an ax to attach stuff.

Bahaha! That's funny. XD I remember that word giving me a lot of confusion in my younger years.

Whereas for me, "cleave to" is a very natural phrase that's been in my vocabulary as long as I can remember, but "cleave from" was a phrase I learned much later.

Actually, the language in 1984 (it's called Newspeak, by the way ) also has single words that can mean either good or bad things. For instance, the word "duckspeak." Applied to somebody you don't like, it means blabbering pointless talking. Applied to somebody you do like, it means a good sort of talking.

I could see something like this developing in a culture where people never wanted to say negative things outright. So instead they used positive words just with certain intonation and body language in certain contexts, and then those words developed to have both positive and negative meanings.

Actually, you see this to some extent in English with words like "retarded." That word isn't supposed to be offensive, or positive either, for that matter - it just has a particular medical meaning. But people also use it as an insult. At least, they used to, I'm not always on top of current American slang. But these days people have stopped using "retarded" in the medical sense because of the negative sense it's acquired. So somehow you'd have to find some way to explain why people don't start inventing new words that are less ambiguous...again, something about their culture could probably deal with that! Also, there might still be a lot of words that aren't ambiguous - maybe the ones that can mean multiple things are more polite or more familiar or something...?

Anyways, very interesting idea...I'll have to consider it next time I create a language for a culture that loves indirect communication!

Like saying "Bless his heart" when you're annoyed with someone?

I'm not really familiar with that expression...but probably yes.