Semantic Change and Semantic Stability: Variation is Key
This work addresses methodological challenges in computational linguistics for researchers studying language evolution, but it is incremental as it builds on existing survey and critique.
The paper surveys recent approaches to studying semantic change in lexicons across phylogenies, highlighting issues with temporally stratified word embeddings and using lexical cognate models in Pama-Nyungan to identify meaning classes suitable for lexical phylogenetic inference.
I survey some recent approaches to studying change in the lexicon, particularly change in meaning across phylogenies. I briefly sketch an evolutionary approach to language change and point out some issues in recent approaches to studying semantic change that rely on temporally stratified word embeddings. I draw illustrations from lexical cognate models in Pama-Nyungan to identify meaning classes most appropriate for lexical phylogenetic inference, particularly highlighting the importance of variation in studying change over time.