Definitions
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun linguistics The mechanism of language change by which one
language replaces much or all of itslexicon with that of another language.
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
relexify + -ation
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Examples
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They look at language change from different linguistic angles, i.e. the system internal change of morphological structure and the change of the communicative function by partial relexification.
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According to Lutz, the (partial) relexification of English at the end of the Middle Ages was a more important change of the communicative system than the much earlier loss of inflections and the grammatical changes this entailed (Lutz 2002: 161).
she commented on the word relexification
e.g., "I am très impressed" incorporates relexification of the French "très" into English.
July 9, 2008