Hyperbole, litotes, irony, euphemism, disphemism, taboo

Amelioration and pejoration of meaning

Changes in the connotational meaning may be subdivided into two main groups: ameliorative and pejorative development of meaning. These changes depend on the social attitude to the object named.

Ameliorative development of meaning or amelioration, or elevation is an improvement of the connotational component of meaning. It is a semantic shift undergone by words due to their referents coming up the social scale. For example, OE cwēn ‘a woman’ > MnE queen; OE cniht ‘a young servant’ > MnE knight. The meanings of these words have been elevated through associations with aristocratic life.

Pejorative development of meaning or pejoration, or degradation, or degeneration is a deterioration of the connotational component of meaning. It is the acquisition by the word of some derogatory emotive charge. It is a semantic shift undergone by words due to their referents coming down or the social scale, or lowering in the social scale connected with the appearance of scornful or disdainful emotive tone. For example, MnE knave < OE cnafa ‘a boy’, cf. Germ Knabe, then acquired the meaning ‘a servant’ and finally became a term of abuse and scorn.

Hyperbole as a linguistic but not rhetoric device is an overstatement or exaggerated statement not meant to be understood literally but expressing an intensely emotional attitude of the speaker to what he is speaking about. The emotional tone is due to the illogical character in which the direct denotative and the contextual emotional meanings are combined. For example, It’s a nightmare, Haven’t seen you for ages, A thousand pardons.

The most important difference between a poetic hyperbole and a linguistic one lies in the fact that the former creates an image, whereas in the latter the denotative meaning quickly fades out and the corresponding exaggerating words serve only as general signs of emotion without specifying the emotion itself. For example, such emphatic words as awfully!, lovely!

Litotes [' laItoutÖz] or understatement may be defined as expressing the affirmative by the negative or its contrary. For example, not half bad for good, no coward for brave. As a rule, litotes creates no permanent change in the semantic structure of the word concerned. The purpose of understatement is not to deceive but to produce a stronger impression on the hearer.

Irony is the expression of one’s meaning by words of opposite meaning, especially a simulated adoption of the opposite point of view for the purpose of ridicule. For example, You’ve got us into a nice mess. Here the adjective nice means bad.

euphemism is the substitution of words of mild connotations for rough or unpleasant expressions. For example, queer for mad, deceased for dead, perspiration for sweat.

From the semantic point of view euphemism is important because meanings with unpleasant connotations appear in words formerly neutral, as a result of their repeated use instead of other words that are for some reasons unmentionable.

euphemism has nothing to do with taboo of primitive peoples as a prohibition meant as a safeguard supernatural forces or taboo names of ritual objects or animals when their names were regarded as the equivalents of what was named. For example, the taboo name of the bear (whose name originally meant ‘brown’; cf. Russian медведь).

The term taboo in modern linguistics, especially in lexicology, is used to denote a vulgar connotation of the word which must not be used in a polite conversation. For example, the so-called ‘four-letter’ words are labeled vulgar.

Disphemism is the substitution of words of rough or unpleasant connotations for mild expressions. For example, to kick the bucket for to die, psycho or gaga for mad.

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