##  [Connotation and denotation](/hypergrammar-2/connotation-and-denotation)

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<a id="semantics">The relationship between words and meanings is extremely complicated and belongs to the field of semantics</a>. What you need to remember is that most words do not have single, simple meanings. Traditionally, grammarians have classified the meanings of words as follows:

<a id="denotation">**denotation**</a>  a literal meaning of the word  <a id="connotation">**connotation**</a>  an association (emotional or otherwise) that the word evokesFor example, both *woman* and *chick* have the denotation *adult female* in North American society, but *chick* has a somewhat negative connotation, while *woman* is neutral.

Consider the following:

**negative**  There are over 2,000 *vagrants* in the city.  **neutral**  There are over 2,000 *people with no fixed address* in the city.  **positive**  There are over 2,000 *homeless* in the city.All three of these expressions refer to exactly the same people, but they invoke different associations in the reader’s mind: a *vagrant* may be viewed as a public nuisance, while a *homeless* person may be seen as someone worthy of receiving aid. Presumably, someone writing an editorial in support of a new shelter would use the positive form, while someone writing an editorial in support of anti-loitering laws would opt for the negative form.

In this case, the dry legal expression *with no fixed address* quite deliberately avoids most of the positive or negative associations of the other two terms. A legal specialist will try to avoid connotative language altogether when writing legislation, often resorting to Latin or French terms that are not a part of ordinary spoken English and, thus, relatively free of strong emotional associations.

Many of the most obvious changes in the English language over the past few decades have had to do with the connotations of words that refer to groups of people. Since the 1950s, words like *Negro* and *crippled* have acquired strong negative connotations and have been replaced either by words with neutral connotations (e.g. *black*, *disabled*) or by expressions with deliberately positive connotations (e.g. *African-Canadian*, *person with a disability*).

##  Avis de droit d’auteur pour l’outil HyperGrammar 2

© Département d’anglais, Faculté des arts, Université d’Ottawa
Un outil mis en ligne par le Bureau de la traduction, Services publics et Approvisionnement Canada

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