Semantic change involves altering, removing and adding meanings to a word over time. It is a gradual process and governed by the public speaking community. Michel Bréal attempted to discover the laws that dictate semantic change, but it was later agreed that there are no apparent laws. Semantic shift is the most general way to describe the change, which can be classified into semantic expansion and restriction, worsening and improving, metaphorical use, reanalysis and truncation. The language is fluid and constantly evolving, making linguistics a fascinating subject.
Semantic change is neither an exact change in meaning, nor does it happen immediately. Instead, it involves altering, removing and adding meanings behind a word following two generalizations. The first is that meanings tend more towards negative than positive connotations. The second is that a word can change to be more subjective and towards the subjunctive mood. While not an officially accepted generalization, the words typically take on a more casual meaning with less intense emotion.
An example of a semantic shift is the word “terrible,” which originally meant “to inspire awe or awe-filled.” Over time, the meaning changed to “ugly enough to awe in a person” this then shifted to a more informal use of the word, meaning simply “bad”. This shift in meaning has taken hundreds of years to change, and may continue to do so.
Michel Bréal, a 19th-century French scholar interested in semasiology, or the study of the meaning behind words, attempted to discover the linguistic laws that dictated semantic change. This soon became the goal of linguists worldwide until the 1919s when it became apparent that no law seemed to govern meaning change. It was then that linguists finally agreed that the change was gradual and at the discretion of the public speaking community.
While there are no apparent laws in semantic change, many types of semantic change have been identified. The most general way to describe the change is with the term “semantic shift”. This only detects the slightest change. If the word is studied more closely, the semantic shift can also be classified into a more specific form of change.
The classification is done in two parts; the first is the general range of meaning, while the other is how speakers handle words. The first category is semantic expansion and restriction, worsening and improving. This also includes phono-semantic matching, although it can also fall into the second category. The other categories are as follows: metaphorical use, reanalysis and truncation. The first categories are accepted as the main forms of change.
The language is fluid and constantly evolving; words are created and completely disappear from use. The definitions and meanings behind the words have no fixed rules and are completely at the discretion of the company. This is what makes linguistics a fascinating subject. Linguists are particularly interested in semantic change, as it is the change in meaning that a word maintains over time.
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