pejoration
(piːdʒəˈreɪʃən)
[ad. med.L. pējōrātiōn-em, n. of action from pējōrāre: see prec.]
a. A making or becoming worse, a worsening, deterioration; depreciation (of property).
| 1658 Phillips, Pejoration, a making worse. 1659 Gauden Tears of Ch. i. xiv. 131 Which pejorations, as to the piety, peace and honour of this Nation, no man..can behold, without sad and serious deploring. a 1734 North Lives (1890) III. 59 Everyone chose rather to pay for amelioration than receive for pejoration. 1831 Brougham in Wilson & Shaw Lords' Repts. V. 295 What ameliorations and what pejorations are to be taken into the account? |
b. Linguistics. The development of a less favourable meaning or of unpleasant connotations of a word.
| 1889 in Cent. Dict. 1939 L. H. Gray Foundations of Lang. ix. 259 Their [sc. words'] degeneration (technically termed pejoration;..) is often due to a selection and specialisation of some ethically lower connotation which may be implied in them. 1956 Archivum Linguisticum VIII. 74 And is not pejoration a general feature of semantic development? 1966 Word Study Dec. 7/1 Perhaps Walt Disney would be interested in the pejoration and ‘spread’ of the name for his major cartoon character to a word now so loosely defined that it might some day take three dictionary columns to list. 1975 Amer. Speech 1972 XLVII. 295 In the case of two English words, borrowing [in German] has resulted in pejoration. |