Abstract: All languages are not static, but constantly changing, and English is no exception. This paper only talks about the changes of English word meaning from the perspective of words, and explains the reasons and effects of the changes. The meaning of words is relatively stable in a certain period of time. But after thousands of years, certain and even major changes will take place. A detailed analysis of the causes and types of word meaning evolution will help readers understand the essence of words. Understand the inevitable trend of word meaning evolution.
Keywords: reasons for the change of English word meaning
Just as everything in the world is constantly changing, the change of word meaning is an inevitable historical development trend. In language, the change of meaning is very common and necessary. With the development of human society to a certain stage, new concepts, new phenomena, new things and new ideas need different forms of expression, and the change of word meaning is a simple way to meet people's needs. So the meaning of every word we use today is slightly different from that of a century ago. A little longer, it may have different meanings. The change or disappearance of the old meaning of a word and the emergence of new meaning are closely related to the development and changes of human society, culture, science and technology and education, and are the external causes of the change of word meaning; At the same time, the change of language itself and people's psychological activities also have some influence on the change of word meaning, so it is of great significance to explore the factors that cause the change of word meaning.
I. Research status quo
Recently, the author selected 10 papers from the related papers (1987-2009) consulted by China Sci-tech Journals, and made an in-depth study on the factors leading to the changes of English word meanings. Among them, four articles explain the factors that lead to the change of English word meaning.
The evolution of word meaning does not occur in a closed state, but is influenced and restricted by society and history. The evolution of word meaning is closely related to social factors such as social development, social environment, social class, national feelings, racial feelings, gender differences and social values. Ren Libo and Zhang Donghong (2008) briefly discussed the factors and reasons of English word meaning changes as follows:
1. The development of society is the historical factor of the change of word meaning. The continuous development of human society will inevitably push everything from simple to complex, from primary to advanced. With the development of things, the words representing things, phenomena and behavior nouns will inevitably change, which is the historical reason for the change of meaning.
2. Civilization and progress are the social factors of word meaning change. Social factors refer to the influence of changes in political system, class relations, culture and science on word meaning.
3. Thinking expansion is the internal factor of word meaning change. Psychological state must be expressed through the use of language materials, which is the psychological reason that affects the change of words. The existence and development of taboo, euphemism and exaggeration are the language products of people's various psychological states.
4. Cultural development is the direct factor of word meaning change. The change of language structure not only changes the relationship between language components, but also often affects and promotes the change of word meaning, which belongs to the internal source of language.
5. The expansion of communication is a loanword factor in the change of word meaning. In 2009, Fu Zuoyu believed that the evolution of word meaning was not only due to social and historical reasons, but also related to the development of language itself. The phenomenon of loanwords between languages, the simplification of words and the analogy in languages often make the meaning of words evolve. These historical and cultural factors and language itself are the external causes of the evolution of word meaning, which can only explain the inevitability of language change; Its fundamental motivation comes from the continuous development and change of cognitive thinking of cognitive subjects.
Metaphor and metonymy of cognitive subject, prototype category theory and graphic background theory reveal the internal mechanism of word meaning evolution. Wang Weihua (20 10) made a study from two aspects: society and language, and thought that social causes included social development and changes in word meaning, social environment and word meaning, social class and word meaning, national and racial mood and word meaning, gender differences and word meaning changes. In terms of language, the change of word meaning is related to the development of language itself. The simplification of words often leads to the evolution of meaning, and the gradual simplification of language is a law of English development. For example, the original meaning of English is only "Englishman", but "English" was originally Englishlanguage, and "Englishman" was originally theEnglishpeople, which was gradually simplified into English, so the meaning of the word English expanded. In this case, the part of speech often changes, and the word English can be used as both a noun and an adjective.
Second, the research direction
In recent years, people have gradually found that the factors that cause the change of word meaning are not just external factors. Fu Zuoyu's (2009) semantic evolution can be explained by social, historical and linguistic factors, but these can only explain the inevitability of change. To reveal the internal mechanism and possibility of the evolution of word meaning, we must study it from the perspective of human cognition. Metaphor and metonymy cognitive model, prototype category theory and graphic background theory are cognitive approaches to reveal the motivation of word meaning evolution. Wang Huawei (20 10) In the long-term development of English vocabulary, the evolution of meaning can be classified from different aspects. In every war, there will be some people, and many people enter the vocabulary because of their different roles. The evolution of word meaning is often related to historical factors and social development. The meaning of words is not only closely related to the objective world and social practice, but also related to psychological factors, values and feelings among ethnic groups in social life.
To sum up, the change of English meaning means that the basic form of words remains unchanged, which causes the change of meaning. The factors that cause the change of word meaning are so complicated that it is difficult to list them one by one. But generally speaking, the change of reality and phenomenon, the development of people's understanding of reality and phenomenon, and the interaction between meanings will all cause the development and change of meanings. Because the tools for human beings to express and exchange ideas are constantly developing and changing, among many elements of language, the meaning of words changes fastest and most obviously, not only for the emergence of new words and the disappearance of original words, but also for adding new meanings by borrowing foreign words and original words. As far as the change of word meaning is concerned, in modern English, the fundamental reason for the change of word meaning is that human society has been constantly developing and changing, so with the progress of society, the change of word meaning in language also changes with the change of society, which is the general trend of human history and the development of human civilization.
Third, the value and significance
English words are usually rich in meaning, and conceptual meaning is just one of them. Many people tend to focus only on the conceptual meaning of words and ignore other meanings. If a word is given only one meaning, and this meaning needs to cover different meanings in different contexts, then the meaning given by this word must be general and abstract. In this way, there will be a situation where the contextual meaning of a word is far from the conceptual meaning, or even completely opposite. For example, the word "green" originally means green, but in the phrase "green power" (the power of money), its meaning is quite different. Therefore, it is of far-reaching significance for us to understand the factors of English word meaning change. And it is helpful to master vocabulary.
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