Investigating Semantic Change of Arabic Loanwords in Turkish

Abstract

This study aims at tracking the various semantic changes of Arabic loanwords in Turkish (ALTs). The loanword data of the study were collected from a number of dictionaries including Sapan’s (2005) dictionary and Webster's Turkish-English Thesaurus Dictionary. Six types of semantic change are found at work in ALTs, the most frequent of which is radical semantic shift which represents more than 64% of the total loanword data followed by the processes of narrowing (20%) and widening (8%). The other three types have marginal roles to play in the semantic change process. Radical shifts involve some interesting cases which are peculiar to Turkish and are pertaining to the phenomenon of semantic replacement. The linguistic and extralinguistic factors like lexical need, the diachronic factor, the speaker’s miscomprehension and ignorance upon loanword incorporation are among the factors that lead to and affect the direction of semantic change of ALTs.