Adventures in English Word Change: Generalization and Narrowing

The history of words is a lot like a kaleidoscope with its endless variety of colors and patterns. Words, unlike their users, are not territorial: Their semantic fields, i.e. their domains of meaning, shift and change constantly. Sometimes a word meaning deteriorates (via semantic pejoration), like a vibrant color turned dull; sometimes the opposite happens, and a negative word meaning becomes positive and favorable (via semantic amelioration), like a moody hue turned bright and lustrous.

In much the same way, semantic fields expand or contract by the processes of semantic generalization and semantic narrowing respectively.

When a word undergoes semantic generalization, its meaning and application become broader: The word shifts from a specific to a general meaning.

For example, the words lord and lady used to have the very specific meanings of "guardian of the bread loaf" (for lord) and "kneader of the bread loaf" (for lady). Over the centuries, these meanings expanded to include any individual of high rank and power, regardless of his (or her) breadmaking skills.

The semantic history of the word thing could be the most notorious example of lexical generalization. The original meaning of thing was "stretch of time", deriving from the same Indo-European root that gave us English thin, tend, tenuous, and tension. From "extent of time" the meaning at first narrowed to "appointed time" and then "day of (legislative/judicial) assembly", before expanding to "item discussed by the assembly" and then, with a bold semantic leap, to "any matter, affair, or thing", i.e. anything! (A morsel of linguistic trivia: To this day the national parliament of Iceland is called Althing (or Althingi) < Alþingi; literally: "all-thing"; i.e. "general assembly".)

We saw that the history of thing went through a couple of stages of semantic narrowing on its way to its current overly general meaning. Narrowing of meaning is a very common process of lexical change in the history of English, much more common than generalization. The explanation for this lies mainly in the overwhelming influx into English of loanwords that had to be accommodated somehow. As a result, existing words had, so to speak, to scoot over to make room for the newcomers. The semantic fields of scores of older words shrank so that everyone, old and new alike, could find a fitting place in the hospitable landscape of English vocabulary.

One could fill volumes citing examples of semantic narrowing. A sampler should include the case of deer, which originally meant "non-human animal" (cf. modern German Tier). Then, between 1200 and 1400, the meaning of deer was gradually (and specifically) applied only to a ruminant mammal of the family Cervidae, probably because of the popularity of stag hunting at the time.

In a similar fashion, the meaning of girl shifted from "child of either sex" (yes, up to the mid-1300s a young boy wouldn't mind being called a gyrle) to "female child". Prior to the 15th century, a harlot (= thief of either gender) would commit unlawful acts, but was not necessarily female or unchaste. In the case of acorn, it was the superficial similarity with oak that triggered the semantic change from "fruit of the field" to "fruit of the oak": At some point it was (falsely) assumed that an acorn is the corn (kernel) of the oak tree (ac in Old English).

In word change, appearances can be (and very often are...) deceptive.

Sources:
Merriam-Webster Online: http://www.m-w.com
A Biography of the English Language by C.M. Millward (HBJ 1988)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Althing