# Translating and Evolving: Towards a Model of Language Change in DisCoCat

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/1811.11041 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/1811.11041/

## Key facts

- Cited by 4 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- First posted on arXiv 8 Nov 2018.

## Built on by (most cited first, 4 of 4)

- [Lambek pregroups are Frobenius spiders in preorders](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2105.03038/) (2021)
- [An algebraic approach to translating Japanese](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.05834/) (2023)
- [Quantum Methods for Managing Ambiguity in Natural Language Processing](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2504.00040/) (2025)
- [Quantum NLP models on Natural Language Inference](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2510.15972/) (2025)

## Abstract (arXiv)

The categorical compositional distributional (DisCoCat) model of meaning developed by Coecke et al. (2010) has been successful in modeling various aspects of meaning. However, it fails to model the fact that language can change. We give an approach to DisCoCat that allows us to represent language models and translations between them, enabling us to describe translations from one language to another, or changes within the same language. We unify the product space representation given in (Coecke et al., 2010) and the functorial description in (Kartsaklis et al., 2013), in a way that allows us to view a language as a catalogue of meanings. We formalize the notion of a lexicon in DisCoCat, and define a dictionary of meanings between two lexicons. All this is done within the framework of monoidal categories. We give examples of how to apply our methods, and give a concrete suggestion for compositional translation in corpora.