specialisation (narrowing, restriction) is the reduction in a word’s range of meanings, often limiting a generic word to a more specialised or technical use, e.g. lord ‘the master of the house, the head of the family’ > ‘a man of noble rank’; a disease ‘any inconvenience’ > ‘an illness’; to sell ‘to give’ > ‘to deliver for money’ etc.
Changes in the connotative component of meaning:
amelioration (elevation) of meaning occurs as a word loses negative connotations or gains positive ones, e.g. a knight ‘a boy, youth’ > ‘a noble, courageous man’; fond ‘foolish, silly’ > ‘loving, affectionate’; pretty ‘tricky, sly wily’ > ‘pleasing to look at, charming and attractive’ etc.;
pejoration (degradation) of meaning occurs as a word develops negative connotations or loses positive ones; it is frequently due to social prejudice and often involves words for women and foreigners, e.g. vulgar ‘common, ordinary’ > ‘coarse, low, ill-bred’; silly ‘happy’ > ‘foolish’. A word can have its meaning deteriorate in several directions at once, e.g. a cowboy – (in BrE) ‘an incompetent or irresponsible workman or business’ (cowboy plumbers); (in AmE) ‘a driver who does not follow the rules of the road’; ‘a factory worker who does more than the piece-work norms set by the union or fellow-workers’.
A euphemism (Gr. éu ‘well’, phēmi ‘speak, glorify’; euphēmia ‘a word or phrase used in place of a religious word or phrase that should not be spoken aloud’) is a vague or indirect reference to the taboo topics:
-death, e.g. to join the majority, to kick the bucket, pass away, to check out, to take a leave of life, to pay nature’s last debt, to be beyond the veil etc.;
-human weaknesses, e.g. to be tired and emotional, to be chemically affected (to be drunk), to have a weakness for horses (gambling) etc.;
-mental deficiency, e.g. to be intellectually challenged, to be thick in the head, funny farm etc.;
-pregnancy, e.g. to be eating for two, lady-in-waiting, in the family way, on the nest, in the interesting way, to have a bun in the oven etc;
-age, e.g. God’s waiting room, the golden age etc.;
- politics, e.g. less fortunate elements (the poor), the economic tunnel (the crisis) etc.
24. Transference of meaning.
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