后殖民主义自问世以来,迅即成为一个世界范围内的理论热点。然而,“后殖民主义”一词的涵义却模糊不清。要对其词义有一个全面的了解,就要对“后殖民主义”有无连字符的名称、是时间概念还是历史状况、以及与新殖民主义和后现代主义的相互关系进行梳理。对“后殖民主义”词的历史语义学考察表明,其词义由于多种因素的介入不断发生变化,充满了多义性、变异性和矛盾性。 Since the advent of post-colonialism, it has quickly become a theoretical hot spot in the world. However, the meaning of the term “post-colonialism” is vague. To have a complete understanding of the meaning of the word, we must sort out the existence of a hyphenated name of “post-colonialism”, whether it is a concept of time or history, and the relationship between neocolonialism and post-modernism. A historical semantic study of the word “post-colonialism” shows that its semantic meaning is constantly changing due to the intervention of many factors, full of ambiguity, variability and contradiction.