desemanticize
desemanticize verb: to remove semantic content from; (especially) to cause to undergo desemanticization.
Verb
desemanticize (third-person singular simple present desemanticizes, present participle desemanticizing, simple past and past participle desemanticized)
- To remove semantic content from; (especially) to cause to undergo desemanticization.
- To lose semantic content; to undergo desemanticization.
- The purposive meaning desemanticizes and a new marker is drafted in to reinforce the purposive meaning.2011, Michael T. Putnam, Studies on German-Language Islands, John Benjamins Publishing, →ISBN, page 406
- […] that of preceding and modifying another word, and in gaining the new grammatical meaning of modification. They desemanticise, in losing the descriptive meaning that head nouns have in descriptive use, […]2011, Jim Feist, Premodifiers in English: Their Structure and Significance, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 232
Forms of desemanticize
| third-person singular present | desemanticizes |
|---|---|
| present participle | desemanticizing |
| past participle | desemanticized |
| past | desemanticized |
Questions about desemanticize
- What does desemanticize mean?
- Desemanticize means to remove semantic content from; (especially) to cause to undergo desemanticization.
- What part of speech is desemanticize?
- Desemanticize is a verb.
- What is the past tense of desemanticize?
- The past tense of desemanticize is desemanticized.
Words near desemanticize in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: desemanticize (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Cite this entry: “desemanticize.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/desemanticize. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.