Change of meaning

Word meaning is liable to change in the course of the historical development of a language. We should discriminate between the causes of semantic change, the results and the nature of the process of change of meaning.

Causes of Semantic Change

The factors accounting for semantic changes may be roughly subdivided into two groups: a) extra-linguistic and b) linguistic causes.

By extra-linguistic causes we mean various changes in the life of the speech community, changes in economic and social structure, changes in scientific concepts. Thus changes in the way of life of the English brought about changes in the meaning of the noun "hlaford". Originally it meant "хранитель хлеба", and later on "повелитель, лорд". Some changes of meaning are due to· purely linguistic causes, i.e. factors acting within the language system. The commonest form which this influence takes is the so-called ellipsis. In a phrase made up of 2 words one of these is omitted and its meaning is transferred to its partner. The verb to starve in OE was habitually used in collocation with the word hunger. The verb to starve meant "to die". In the 16th century the verb "to starve" itself acquired the meaning "to die of hunger".

Nature of Semantic Changes

A necessary condition of any semantic change is some connection, some association between the old meaning and the new one. There are two kinds of association involved in various semantic changes: a) similarity of meanings, and b) contiguity of meanings.

Similarity of meanings or metaphor may be described as a semantic process of associating two referents, one of which in some way resembles the other. The word "hand", e.g. acquired in the 16th century the meaning of "a pointer of a clock or a watch" because of the similarity of one of the functions performed by the hand (to point to smith) and the function of the clock pointer. Sometimes it is similarity of form or outline that underlies the metaphor. A metaphor is a hidden comparison.

Contiguity of meanings or metonymy may be described as the semantic process of associating two referents one of which makes part of the other or is closely connected with it. This can be illustrated by the use of the word "tongue" - "the organ of speech" in the meaning of "language" (as in "mother tongue"). The word "bench" acquired the meaning "judges" because it was on the bench that the judges used to sit in law courts. In all discussion of linguistic metaphor and metonymy it must be borne in mind that they are different from metaphor and metonymy as literary devices. When the latter are offered and accepted both the author and the reader are aware that this reference is figurative, that the object has another name. The poetic metaphor is the fruit of the author's creative imagination.

The stylistic device of metaphor is defined as the power of realising two lexical meanings simultaneously. In the metaphor “dear Nature is the kindest mother still” two meanings are realised: "the whole universe and every created, thing" and "female parent nursing and caring for her children". There is no true similarity between "nature" and "mother" but there is a kind of identification. The two concepts "mother" and "nature" are brought together in the interplay of their meanings. The image of nature is materialised into but not likened to the image of mother".

In a linguistic metaphor i.e. metaphor as a type of association involved in semantic changes, the thing named often has no other name. The comparison in a linguistic metaphor is completely forgotten. Thus by transference of meaning the word "grasp" has the derivative meaning of "understand''. Though the derivative meaning is metaphorical in origin, there is no stylistic effect because the primary meaning is no longer felt. The transferred meaning in a linguistic metaphor may be based upon different types of similarity: similarity of shape (head of a cabbage), similarity of function (a key to a mystery), similarity of position (foot of a page).

Linguistic metonymy as a change of meaning is conditioned by spatial, temporal, causal, symbolic, instrument-al, functional and other relations.

E.g., spatial relations are present when the name of the place is used for the people occupying it. Thus "the chair" may metonymically mean "the chairman". A causal relationship is obvious in the following development: Mod E "fear" (feeling caused by danger) developed from OE "fær" meaning "danger". Symbolic relations are obvious in the following metonymy: "the crown" means "a symbol of royal power" and "monarchy". Metonymy as a stylistic device reveals a quite unexpected substitution of one word for another, or one concept for another, on the ground of some strong impression produced by a chance feature of the thing. E.g. "Then they came in, two of them, a man with long fair moustaches and a silent dark man... Definitely, the moustache and I had nothing in common" (Doris Lessing).

In this case a feature of a man which catches the eye, i.e. his moustache stands for the man himself. The function of the stylistic device of metonymy here is to indicate that the speaker knows nothing of the man in question.