Semantic shifts of ‘coming out’ and ‘come out of the closet’
Abstract
Abstract
Juxtaposing lexicographic data with authentic corpora-excerpted contexts, this article investigates the semantic variance of coming out and come out of the closet in English and Polish. It discovers the linguistic sources of the LGBTQ+-related sense of coming out in English and focuses on the semantic shift from its sociolectal LGBTQ+-related usage towards nonsociolectal pragmatically marked uses, which result in extended collocability (e.g. Eng. coming out as an atheist; Pol. ateistyczny coming-out). The study contrasts English and Polish corpus data to see whether the nonsociolectal usage of Polish coming out can be argued to be contact-induced – that is, modelled on English. Language contact research shows that contact-induced innovations undergo semantic change through conscious and creative exploitation by recipient language speakers to realise their pragmatic needs. The cognitive-onomasiological theoretical framework, coupled with a usage-based methodology, allows investigation of how native and contact-induced phenomena are used by native and recipient language speakers.
Abstract (spa)
Mediante la yuxtaposición de datos lexicográficos y contextos auténticos extraídos de corpus, este artículo investiga la variación semántica de coming-out y salir del armario en inglés y polaco. Descubrimos las fuentes lingüísticas del sentido LGBTQ+ de coming-out en inglés, y nos centramos en el cambio semántico desde su uso sociolectal relacionado con la comunidad LGBTQ+ hacia usos no sociolectales marcados pragmáticamente, que dan lugar a una colocabilidad ampliada, por ejemplo, Eng. coming out as an atheist; Pol. ateistyczny coming-out. Contrastamos los datos recuperados de corpus ingleses y polacos para ver si el uso no sociolectal de coming-out en polaco puede considerarse inducido por contacto, es decir, modelado a partir del inglés. La investigación sobre el contact lingüístico demuestra que las innovaciones inducidas por contacto experimentan cambios semánticos a través de una explotación consciente y creativa por parte de los hablantes de la lengua receptora que se dan cuenta de sus necesidades pragmáticas. El marco teórico cognitivo-onomasiológico, junto con una metodología basada en el uso, nos permite investigar cómo los hablantes nativos y los hablantes de lenguas receptoras utilizan los fenómenos nativos e inducidos por contacto.
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Published In
Gender and Language
Volume 18 • Number 2 • 2020
Pages: 175 - 197
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© 2024, Equinox Publishing.
History
Published online: 23 August 2024
Published in print: 2020
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Gender and Language 2024 18:2, 175-197
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