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| On the Development of Chinese Vocabulary from the Perspective of“Misusing and Misinterpreting” Idioms |
| LI Yun-Fu |
| School of Chinese Language and Literature, Beijing Normal University |
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Abstract The misuse and misinterpretation of idioms are much criticized, but they are still on the rise, the reason behind which needs to be probed. Our study shows that besides the few true misuses and misinterpretations, most of them are justified: they are either caused by semantic extension by enlarging, shrinking or transferring the scope of the original meaning, or attributed to the structure which itself is ambiguous and gives rise to different interpretations. Both of them fall in with the law of vocabulary development and thus are vigorous. They are seen as misuses and misinterpretations because “being true to the original meaning and usage” is taken as the only criterion, which is short of development and evolution view as well as rational analysis.
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