These regions are very fertile.

Correct — C, (c) barren.

The underlined word is ‘fertile’ and the Directions over this set ask for the opposite. The subject of the sentence decides which opposite. ‘These regions are very fertile’ is about LAND, and land that bears crops abundantly is called fertile while land that bears nothing is called barren: barren hills, a barren waste, the barren stretches of the Deccan trap country. Barren is the word English has always used of ground that yields no growth, and it is therefore the direct contrary of fertile in the sense the sentence has fixed.

The pairing is old and settled. Fertile comes from Latin ferre, to bear or carry, the root that also gives fertility, fecund and to bear fruit; barren comes through Old French and has meant unfruitful ground since Middle English. Put the two together in one sentence — ‘the fertile plain gave way to barren rock’ — and the contrast is immediate and needs no explanation, which is the test of a true antonym pair.

Barren also carries the sense across from land to anything unproductive: a barren discussion, a barren victory, barren years. That extension is worth knowing, because it is the same extension ‘fertile’ makes in the other direction — a fertile imagination, a fertile source of trouble.

The wider point for this set is that a word’s opposite is chosen for the sense the SENTENCE activates. ‘Fertile’ applied to a person means able to have children, applied to an imagination means inventive, and applied to a region means productive of crops. Fix the sense first, and the opposite follows from it.

Why the others are wrong

• (a)sterile — The Commission’s key does not take this option, and the word deserves an honest account rather than a dismissal. ‘Sterile’ is a real contrary of ‘fertile’, but it is at home in two senses that this sentence does not activate. Of living things it means unable to produce offspring or seed — a sterile hybrid, a sterile animal — which is the biological opposite of fertility. Of instruments, dressings and laboratories it means free from living micro-organisms, as in a sterile syringe. It is also used of ground, and ‘sterile soil’ is found in technical writing about soils that will not support plant life. What it lacks is the ordinary English pairing with a region or a landscape: the word that has done that work for centuries is ‘barren’, and it is the word the sentence about regions calls up. ‘Sterile’ has a third common use in modern English — a sterile debate, a sterile atmosphere — where it means lifeless or unproductive of ideas.
• (b)arid — ‘Arid’ means dry, having very little rainfall, and it describes a CLIMATE rather than the productive capacity of the soil. The distinction matters and is easy to demonstrate: dry regions with water brought to them can be highly productive, which is what irrigation in north-western India exists to achieve, while a well-watered region on thin soil may still grow little. Aridity is therefore a cause of unproductive land rather than a synonym for it, and it is a cause that can be removed. English does use ‘arid’ figuratively for anything dry and lifeless — an arid style, an arid discussion — but even there the picture is of dryness rather than of ground that will not bear.
• (d)productive — ‘Productive’ is a near synonym of ‘fertile’, not its opposite: productive land, a productive mine, a productive meeting. It is placed in the set for the candidate who has not carried forward the instruction printed over the first item of this block, or who has confused this set with the one that follows it on the next page. That set is printed in an identical shape — a sentence with one word underlined and four words beneath — and asks for the word NEAREST in meaning. Anybody who reads this item as a synonym question will choose this option with confidence, which is exactly what it is there for.

The item tests the vocabulary of land and its productiveness, and behind that the rule that the opposite of a word depends on the sense the sentence puts in play.

The English words for unproductive ground are not interchangeable. ‘Barren’ says the ground bears nothing. ‘Sterile’ says it cannot support life, and in its commoner senses it belongs to reproduction and to freedom from germs. ‘Arid’ says it is dry, a statement about rainfall. ‘Waste’ and ‘wasteland’ say it is uncultivated and unused. In Indian revenue and land-use records the categories are stated with the same care — culturable waste, barren and unculturable land, fallow land — because the difference between land that cannot be cultivated and land that is merely not being cultivated is a difference of policy and of money.

‘Fertile’ itself covers several senses and each has its own opposite. Of soil, fertile means capable of producing abundant crops, and its contrary is barren or infertile. Of a person or animal, fertile means able to reproduce, and its contrary is sterile or infertile. Of a mind or an imagination, fertile means inventive and richly productive, and its contrary is barren, sterile or unimaginative in the figurative sense.

The practical lesson is to read the noun the adjective is attached to before choosing the opposite. Here the noun is ‘regions’, and regions are land.

Key facts

• ‘Fertile’ comes from Latin ferre, to bear or carry, and means capable of producing abundantly; of land its plain contrary in English is ‘barren’, which has meant unfruitful ground since Middle English.
• ‘Barren’ extends from land to anything unproductive — a barren discussion, a barren victory — matching the figurative reach of ‘fertile’ in a fertile imagination.
• ‘Sterile’ is an opposite of fertile in the reproductive sense (unable to produce offspring or seed) and in the medical sense (free from micro-organisms), and it is also used figuratively of a lifeless debate.
• ‘Arid’ describes climate and rainfall rather than the capacity of the soil; dry land supplied with irrigation can be among the most productive there is.
• ‘Productive’ is a synonym of fertile and is placed in the set for a candidate who has not carried forward the instruction that this block asks for opposites.
• Indian land-use categories keep the same distinctions: barren and unculturable land, culturable waste, and current fallow are counted separately because they mean different things.

Common traps

• Choosing the option that is an opposite in a sense the sentence has not put in play. ‘Regions’ sends the reader to land, and the word English uses of unproductive land is ‘barren’.
• Taking a cause for a synonym. Aridity is a reason land may bear little, and it can be answered with irrigation, so it is not the same idea as unfruitfulness.
• Reading the item as a synonym question and choosing ‘productive’. The instruction for this block was printed once, at the head of it.
• Assuming that only one option can have any claim at all. Where two words are both defensible, the one to mark is the one the sentence’s own noun calls for.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Select the option that is opposite in meaning to the underlined word : Years of careless cropping had left the once fertile fields barren and cracked.

  • (a)arid
  • (b)fecund
  • (c)sterile
  • (d)fallow

  Answer(b) fecund — the underlined word here is ‘barren’, so the opposite wanted is a word meaning abundantly productive, and ‘fecund’ carries exactly that sense of fruitfulness. ‘Arid’ and ‘sterile’ are near neighbours of barren rather than its opposites, and ‘fallow’ describes land deliberately left uncropped for a season, which is a choice about use and not a statement about fertility.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  In which one of the following sentences is ‘sterile’ used in its medical sense ?

  • (a)The debate proved sterile and was wound up after an hour.
  • (b)The dressing must be kept sterile until the wound is examined.
  • (c)The hybrid variety is sterile and produces no viable seed.
  • (d)The plateau is sterile and supports only scrub.

  Answer(b) The dressing must be kept sterile until the wound is examined. — in medicine ‘sterile’ means free from living micro-organisms, which is what a dressing has to be. Sentence (a) uses the figurative sense of unproductive of ideas, (c) the reproductive sense of unable to produce seed, and (d) the sense of ground that will not support growth.