It's the Word of the Day podcast for December 6th.

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Today's word is ambigram, spelled AM, B-I-G-R-A-M. Ambigram is a noun. An ambigram is an image of a written

word or phrase that is intended or able to be oriented in either of two ways for viewing or reading.

Here's the word used, and a sentence from Parade magazine by Wendy Wendt.

When spelled out in the sand, SOS is conveniently readable as an ambigram,

readable both right side up and upside down.

There is little ambiguity about the origins of the word ambigram.

It was introduced by cognitive scientist Douglas R. Hofstadter in his 1985 book, Metamagical

Themas, questing for the essence of mind and pattern, in which he wrote of the

pleasing activity of doing ambigrams, where shapes must be concocted that are poised exactly

at the midpoint between two interpretations. Since then, ambigram has been used primarily to refer to

an image of a written word or phrase

that either forms the same word or different word when reflected or turned upside down.

For instance, when reflected, bud turns into dub, while Maliamam reads the same both ways.

And when turned upside down, the word swims reads the same, while the word

wow turns into mom. Some ambigrams are natural, such as the word dollop, while others can be designed

or created with calligraphy. Caligraphic ambigrams are quite popular and often used as logos or

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