doxa.comunicación | nº 31, pp. 341-360 | 349
July-December of 2020
Lucia Ballesteros-Aguayo and Francisco Javier Escobar Borrego
ISSN: 1696-019X / e-ISSN: 2386-3978
Table 2. Exploratory approaches to normative linguistic variations for creating a possible language corpus pertaining to the COVID-19 pandemic
Exploratory approaches to normative linguistic variations for creating a possible language corpus pertaining to the COVID-19 pandemic
Periphrasis: ‘new normality’ to refer to the future, ‘peak of the pandemic’ to allude to its maximum level and ‘social distancing’ to designate separation.
Analogies with restrictions and mountaineering: ‘easing’ and ‘peak of the pandemic’.
Correlations with healthcare terminology: ‘peak of the pandemic’, ‘super-spreaders’ and ‘COVID-19’.
Designations akin to ethical universals such as freedom or salvation: ‘lifting’ and ‘Noah’s Arcs’.
Analogical correlations with mathematical variables: ‘flattening the curve’ and ‘exponential growth’.
Social media language, slogans and hashtags: #YoMeQuedoEnCasa (I’mStayingAtHome) #EsteVirusLoParamosUnidos (UnitedWeWillStopThisVirus)
Neologisms, COVID-19 and others with musical connotations, as in the composition of chords: ‘cluster’.
Source: own elaboration
The selection of the concepts analysed below (‘new normality’, ‘desescalada’ [lockdown easing] and ‘desconfinamiento’ [lockdown lifting]) was based on both their conclusive nature, pointing to a possible resolution of the public health crisis, and their paradigmatic value as models for other similar euphemistic terms.
4. Semantic-pragmatic analysis of paradigmatic terminal type-tokens: ‘new normality’, ‘desescalada’ (lockdown easing) and ‘desconfinamiento’ (lockdown lifting)
As already noted in the theoretical framework section, the approach proposed by Leech (1981 [1974]) is followed here to analyse the selected terms, first by resorting to their dictionary definitions and then by determining their pragmatic component.
For the purpose of confirming whether or not the terms under analysis have undergone some or other diachronic semantic evolution, recourse is had to the definitions appearing in two primary sources: on the one hand, the 1990 Diccionario enciclopédico universal and the 2014 edition of the Diccionario de la lengua Española (hereinafter DEL).
4.1. The expression ‘new normality’
With respect to the concepts of ‘new’ and ‘normality’ appearing in the print edition of the Diccionario Enciclopédico Universal (1990), the adjective ‘new’ is defined as follows:
1. That which is seen or heard for the first time.
2. Distinct or different from what there was before.
3. That which ensues or is added to something that existed before.
