conversion (n.)

A term used in the study of WORD-FORMATION to refer to the DERIVATIONAL process whereby an ITEM comes to belong to a new WORD-CLASS without the addition of an AFFIX, e.g. VERBS/NOUNS: smell/taste/hit/walk/bottle/ brake; ADJECTIVES/verbs: dirty/empty/lower. Some GRAMMARS distinguish between full conversion and partial conversion – the latter being cases where only some of the characteristics of the new word-class are adopted (e.g. the rich). Other terms used for this phenomenon, which is very common in English, include ‘ZERO derivation’ and ‘FUNCTIONAL shift’.