Tags · Mechanism
Lexicalization
A phrase or paradigm cell frozen into a single stored word.
Topics with this tag
Pattern
How do languages say “I don’t have X”?
To express absence of possession, languages either negate a HAVE-verb, add a negative determiner to the object, or reframe the situation as one of non-existence or absence — with the possessor as topic, location, or dative.
ExistencePossessionNegationSuppletion +2
Non-possession →
Pattern
How do languages build the paradigm of someone, anyone, no one, and everyone?
Most often these words share one interrogative base (who?) plus a small particle — “also”, “every”, “some”, “any” — that sets the reading. A few languages, English among them, lexicalise the series instead.
NegationIndefinitenessQuantificationSyncretism +3
Indefinites & Quantifiers →
Pathway
How does “listen” come to mean “obey”?
Verbs of hearing and listening repeatedly grow a sense of obeying. The pattern recurs from Mandarin tīnghuà and Japanese iu koto o kiku to Latin oboedīre, built on audīre “to hear”, behind French obéir and English obey.
PerceptionObligationColexificationMetonymy +1
From hearing words to obedience →