Another meaning for the word Gay

Quite often words have more than one meaning. This sometimes is determined by the role they are given so for example the word FAST means QUICK as an adjective and as a verb it means TO ABSTAIN FROM FOOD. There are nevertheless words that have other types of meanings which are not part of their formal usage but come attached with significant informality. Then we say that a word is "loaded" because these other meanings are first used with an intention they did not have originally. So, words have denotations which are the formal meanings commonly used and accepted and that can be found in most dictionaries; but those  same words may have connotations that are precisely "those" meanings that are conferred by popular use. Connotations can become so strong that eventually they become also another denotation of the term in question and even its primary meaning. As an example there is the word GAY that originally meant HAPPY. This is so true that an old carol such as "Deck the Halls" includes a line that goes: "Don we now our gay apparel" when that word meant BRIGHT and SHOWY, or CAREFREE. It would be later on that GAY would acquire that connotation which is considered its primary meaning these days. 

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