Shifting meanings, forgotten meanings: metaphor as a force for language change

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  • Kelly Holmquist Idaho State University

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language evolution, changes in meaning, metaphorical process

Resumo

All living languages are in a aconstant state of evolution. Metaphorical usage is an important driving factor in that process of evolution; the blending of concepts within metaphor leads to the diversification of the reference of words used metaphorically. It can occur that a metaphorical usage becomes conventionalized. This, in turn, leads dto shiftis in the meanings of those words. Metaphorical usage can occur in a variety of forms, including metonymy, synecdoche, and euphemism. The effects of metsphoricalusage-and the closely related figure, simile-can even be seen in the evolution of the grammatical structures of many languages. I present various examples which demonstrate the role of metaphorical usage in the evolution of word-meanings and grammatical structures from PIE to modern Indo-European languages.

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Publicado

2018-05-15

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Holmquist, K. (2018). Shifting meanings, forgotten meanings: metaphor as a force for language change. DELTA: Documentação E Estudos Em Linguística Teórica E Aplicada, 22(3). Recuperado de https://revistas.pucsp.br/index.php/delta/article/view/37324

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