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Semantic Syntactic Change

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Homework 3: Semantic, Lexical, and Syntactic Change
1. Broadening occurs when a word becomes less specific in meaning. For example, in (2) the original Latin word referred to a coin of a specific denomination, but in Spanish, the word can refer to money in general—a less specific meaning.
2. Metonymy is extension within the same semantic domain based on a sense of perceived similarity. In (10), for example, one body part, ‘hip,’ is likened to another body part, ‘thigh,’ and the former takes on the meaning of the latter.
3. Specialization (or narrowing) occurs when a word’s meaning becomes more specific. For example, in (13) the word ‘meat’ originally meant ‘food’ in general.
4. Pejoration occurs when a word becomes more negative in meaning. …show more content…

“I had a midterm yesterday, and I killed it.”
c. To kill, a verb with a very negative connotation, shows semantic amelioration in the context of this expression, as killing is equivalent to success in some endeavor. There seems also to be a sort of broadening in the sense that to kill it no longer simply means to succeed at making something die but to succeed in any endeavor.
d. The OED does list this sense of the word to kill, as well as the expression to kill it, as a draft addition dated June 2015. Their definition generally matches mine, though they also included the sense of not only “performing (something) impressively” but also “conclusively.”
e. Though Urban Dictionary does not list the expression to kill it in general, it does list killed it, which it defines both in the sense of “do[ing] something really well,” but also in the more traditional sense of ruining a moment.
(3) Basic
a. This adjective describes a vapid person who is devoid of any unique characteristics but instead follows societal trends.
b. “You refer to your friends as your ‘boys,’ you love bacon so much that you ruin it for everyone else, and your preferred topic of conversation is how much you drank last night…This is very serious, Gerald—very seriously …show more content…

– This has literally been the worst winter ever.
– Ugh, I can’t even!
- I Can’t, Saturday Night Live sketch
c. This expression involves some kind of ellipsis, though it’s not abundantly clear what exactly the speaker cannot even do.
d. This expression was not listed in the OED.
e. The Urban Dictionary does list this expression, and defines it basically as I did above, adding the sense of indicating that one is too emotionally overwhelmed (and not necessarily frustrated) to react in a coherent way.
(9) Low-key
a. This adverb is can mean kind of, or it can also mean secretly.
b. I’m low-key relieved that the test wasn’t cancelled so I could just get it over with.
c. As low-key has long been established as an adjective in the language, this new adverbial form does not involve an new word creation from scratch, but merely appears to be a conversion of the adjective (through a process of zero-affixation), which has a similar meaning.
d. The OED does not list low-key as an adverb.
e. The word low-key as an adverb (with the same definition as my own) is well represented on The Urban Dictionary.
(10) Ship
a. This verb indicates that one wishes for two other people to enter into a romantic

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