semantic

Etymology

Borrowed from French sémantique.

adj

1. Of or relating to semantics or the meanings of words.
2. (software design, of code) Reflecting intended structure and meaning.
3. (slang, of a detail or distinction) Petty or trivial; (of a person or statement) quibbling, niggling.

noun

1. (linguistics) In such writing systems as the Chinese writing system, the portion of a phono-semantic character that provides an indication of its meaning; contrasted with phonetic.
   Its semantic is polysyllabic, viz. it uses the word formations of spoken Chinese. 2005, Friedrich Alexander Bischoff, Yinglin Wang, San tzu ching explicated, the classical initiation to classic Chinese couplet I to XI, page 21
   In this particular case, the semantic is on the left of its host sinogram. 2013, William S-Y. Wang, Love and War in Ancient China: Voices from the Shijing, page 25
   The 亻(人) ren2 'person' semantic has been replaced by 氵(水) shui3 'water' semantic in浸, but帚 zhou3 'broom' has phonetically or semantically nothing to do with 浸 and is just a residue of 侵 after亻(人) ren2 'person' has been removed. 2017, Vladimir Skultety, Understanding Chinese Characters