Differentiation (linguistics)
Encyclopedia
Differentiation in semantics
Semantics
Semantics is the study of meaning. It focuses on the relation between signifiers, such as words, phrases, signs and symbols, and what they stand for, their denotata....

 is defined by Löbner (2002) as a meaning shift reached by "adding concepts to the original concepts". His example is James Joyce is hard to understand, where understand is differentiated from "perceiving the meaning" to "interpret the text meaning".

A related meaning shift is metonymy
Metonymy
Metonymy is a figure of speech used in rhetoric in which a thing or concept is not called by its own name, but by the name of something intimately associated with that thing or concept...

, where one builds a new concept out of an element of the original concept. In the example mentioned, James Joyce most likely refers to "the work of James Joyce" and not to the author - a metonymical shift. If the name were to refer to the man, understand would be differently differentiated, perhaps one would read it as "interpret the speech articulation" or "comprehend the actions" of the person James Joyce.

Meaning shifts are very common among language users, and allow for great flexibility of word usage. It is not to be confused with lexical ambiguity though, words as uttered in a context may have perfectly precise meanings even though in varying contexts they may be used to express widely different meanings.
The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
x
OK