Semantic Change and Its Sources in the English Language



The article is devoted to the investigation of sources, stylistic and the historical factors which lead to a semantic change in English. The author tries to explain the significance of this process in language development.

The word is one of the most crucial things we, as human beings, have ever possessed; it is a constituent of speech that is in charge of human’s ability to comprehend the outworld. When put together into sentences, words form necessary basis for communicative process, with the help of which the knowledge of the world takes place. They help arrange a coherent and understandable spoken language. We form a phrase from the appropriate words to convey our thoughts as clearly as possible and deeper. Aldous Huxley in ‘Brave New World’ gives the following description of the word marking its strong power: “Words can be like X-rays if you use them properly — they’ll go through anything. You read and you’re pierced.” Knowing the possibilities that it gives; people should feel the responsibility and be quite careful when choosing words.

Semasiology is the subbranch of linguistics dealing with lexico-semantics, i.e., the nomination of individual objects and phenomena of reality. The lexical meaning of a word, which is the subject matter of semasiology, is its content, the correlation between the sound form and the concept of reality historically set up in the minds of the speakers. The meaning of words helps to distinguish objects. So, if we say that this is a bird, then in this case we are only interested in the fact that we have a variety of flying vertebrates, whose body is covered with feathers, and the forelimbs are transformed into wings. These features make it possible to distinguish a bird from other animals, for example, mammals.

When discussing the change of meaning, we differentiate between 3 notions: causes of semantic change, nature and results of the process of change of meaning.

The nature of semantic change is connected with the relations between the old and the new meanings. There are two kinds of associations involved in semantic changes: a) similarity of meanings — metaphor; b) contiguity of meanings — metonymy.

Similarity of meaning is the conjunction of the dictionary meaning of a word with the contextual one, based on the ascribing distinctive feature of one thing to another, not naturally innate to it. According to Galperin, a metaphor becomes a stylistic device when two different phenomena (things, events, ideas, actions) are simultaneously brought to mind by the imposition of some or all of the inherent properties of one object on the other which by nature is deprived of these properties [1]. This is a powerful tool of imagery — the relationship of reality to its vision by the author. Metaphor is obtained as a result of creativity against the background of a whole text about a man and his aspirations, nature, history, mythology.

For example: ‘My heart's a stereo

It beats for you, so listen close.’

— ‘Stereo Hearts’, Gym Class Heroes

Contiguity of meaning or metonymy may be described as a stylistic method of replacing words to others based on the connection of their adjacent meanings. This word is a lot like a metaphor, but their interrelation is akin to an association between two concepts represented by these meanings or cognate to the interrelation of two objects. In metonymy, a thing or a thought is described by some addition (action or function). Instead of the thing itself, another inherent thing or thought is called.

For example: England decides to keep check on immigration.

Results of semantic change — are the consequences of a semantic change; its change in denotational and connotational meaning. As a result of semantic change this area of meaning can be restricted or expended. ‘Restriction’ of meaning is also known as ‘narrowing’ or ‘specialization’; ‘extension’ can be called ‘broadening’ or ‘generalization’ as well.

“The specialization of meanings is established mainly in the language of different classes and professions, since each such group is particularly close to certain ideas.” [3] Narrowing of a word seems to cut off its lexical meaning and bind to it a strict, precise definition. The notion of each word is divided into a number of differential features. For instance, the word ‘meat’ in old English meant ‘any edible things, including drinks’, nowadays it denotes ‘a flesh of an animal’.

‘Broadening’ — paradigm-related semantic change, which is based on the connection between members of the same lexico-semantic paradigm. It is a process opposite to the one we discussed above; generalization is a type of modification, when a word’s meaning broadens, which means it is used by masses of people. As an example, we can take a word ‘plant’, that originally carried a meaning ‘shrub’. Today it can designate any representative of flora.

The causes of semantic change can be both alteration in objective reality and internal system language changes. The connotation changes as a result of redefinition of already existing objects or with the entrance of new ones and changing socially conscious attitudes towards them. If for some reason a word disappears from the language, its subject is redistributed among other vocabulary units. Causes of semantic change are traditionally classified into linguistic and extra-linguistic. Extralinguistic causes are those when a new object or concept comes out in the life of society. Thus, the reflector of the fire of the chimney, ‘the screen’, received a new function with the advent of the cinema and television screens, transmits its name to a new concept, thereby changing the volume of the meaning of the word. Linguistic causes are factors acting within the language system describe linguistic causes of language change. In the period of formation of the modern English language system, the so-called struggle of synonyms was a very topical issue, when borrowings coming to English forced out the original or borrowed words to a different sphere.

I. V. Arnold give following description: “Synonyms — are two or more words of the same meaning, belonging to the same part of speech, possessing one or more identical meaning, interchangeable at least in some contexts without any considerable alteration in denotational meaning, but differing in morphemic composition, phonemic shape, shades of meaning, connotation, affective value, style, emotional coloring and valence peculiar to one of the elements in a synonymic group.” It can also lead to more significant semantic structure adjustment, as it happened with ‘starve’, which in the Old English period had the meaning ‘to die’. Under the pressure of the synonym die, its value first narrowed to ‘die from hunger’, and then changed altogether to its modern notion.

In accordance with the findings of this article, quite often, a change in the objects and phenomena of the world around us, as well as a change in our ideas and knowledge about the world, does not entail replacing the old names, the semantics of which undergo significant changes. On the contrary, already existing names are transferred to a new range of objects or phenomena that emerged during development, especially if their purpose and functional orientation remained the same. People learn objects, qualities while collaborating, and certain attributes of these objects, qualities or phenomena of reality form the basis of the meaning of the word. Therefore, for a correct understanding of the meaning of words, it is necessary to become familiar with the public sphere in which the word existed or exists.

References:

1. Galperin I. R. English Stylistics — M.: URSS, 2014, p.140
2. Арнольд И. В. Лексикология современного английского языка: Учебник для институтов и факультетов иностранных языков. М.: «Высшая школа», 1986. — С. 194.
3. Пауль Г. Принципы истории языка. — М.: Наука, 1960. c.108