Semantic change and the cultural significance of lexemes: a case study of "king" and "queen"

This study focuses on semantic change and the cultural significance of the lexemes king and queen. It aims to examine the process of semantic change that the lexemes king and queen are undergoing, whereby their meaning encapsulates several different concepts. The study also aims to prove that the most recent change, where the meaning of these lexemes changed from royalty to a concept closer to friend, bro, dude, or sister, sis, girl was specialization based on metaphorization. This study looks into those concepts and follows the change throughout the history of these lexemes, with a focus on the contemporary changes and use of the lexemes. In order to do this, data was collected from the social media platforms Twitter and Tumblr. The data contains 100 posts, 50 exemplifying the use of the lexeme queen in its specialized meaning, and 50 containing the use of the lexeme king in its specialized meaning. The data was categorized based on the purpose it was used for and analyzed using the concepts discussed in the theoretical framework