On the appellativization of brand names

Abstract

On the appellativization of brand names  

Trademark, as a sort of intellectual property, is a legal institution which consists of a mark that is graphically representative and distinguishes the goods or services of the trademark holder from the goods or services of others; furthermore, it has originated from authority registration. Marks under legal protection mostly, but not necessarily, contain verbal parts. In everyday language this kind of mark is called a ‘brand’. In this case, a trademark is also functional as a name that is to be considered as an artificial proper name deriving from an authority source. There are, however, cases when trademarks, having distinctiveness at the time of registration, lose this distinctiveness over time, because of being used in a way, mostly in oral communication, that is no longer restricted in sense to the goods and services of the trademark holder. This phenomenon, called genericization or semantic broadening, is difficult to identify; in a legal sense it also requires an official procedure in order for the mark not to be used as a proper noun, but as a common noun without legal protection. The study interprets this phenomenon with illustrations of both Hungarian and foreign cases and also attempts to reveal the possible causes thereof.