Semantic Change in the English Language

Abstract

The aim of the study is to identify the manifestations of semantic change in contemporary literature. This study is an extreme study of Semantic change in the English language using Paulo Coelho’s book “The Alchemist”. It is based on words that have undergone a change of meaning to a different concept. During the analysis of the text the words (N=92) were identified and categorized into 6 classifications. As a result, it was revealed that metaphorization was the most common. Furthermore, metonymization was identified as the type of classification that occurs the least. It was then decided to identify the frequently occurring parts of speech and find out the reason for this outcome. Out of all the types of speech, 3 types as noun, adjective and verb were encountered in the text. As a result, it turned out that the name of noun leads in terms of semantic change