Semantic Change in Latvian under the Influence of English

The impact of English as a global language upon Latvian has been growing exponentially in the last 20 years. It results not only in traditional borrowing and loans, but affects also the sphere of semantics – native Latvian words and earlier loans modify and change their meanings under the influence of English. Latvian linguistics for about 100 years has preferred to ignore or condone semantic change, though it has always been rife. The paper views semantic change as reflected in new meanings, broadening and narrowing of meaning, connotational change, conceptual recategorization and idiom loans. The study is based on a corpus of around 800 lexical and phraseological units that have undergone a change in the last two decades. Though some of the change may seem unnecessary, redundant and even confusing, there seems to be no way resisting, as it is the result of a massive impact of language contact which envelops all layers of lexis and styles.