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Within the literature on grammaticalization (and degrammatilicalization), a central issue is assessing whether a linguistic change constitutes a real instance of grammaticalization, or whether it can be better captured within some alternative fields of analysis.

For example, degrammaticalization of the type (iii) (cf. Section 2.2.4), that is, the categorial reanalysis from grammatical to lexical, implies new entries in the lexicon. Thus, what is the point in differentiating between type (iii) of degrammaticalization and “lexicalization”, which, according to some definitions, includes any type of lexical enrichment (cf. e.g. Hopper & Traugott 1993: 127; van der Auwera 2002; Lightfoot 2011: 438ff.)?1 Thus, the first reason for ambiguity as regards the lexicalization is that, since the beginning of grammaticalization studies (Kuryłowicz 1975[1965]: 52), linguists have regarded lexicalization as the reverse of a grammaticalization. One way of distinguishing degrammaticalization of the (iii) type from lexicalization is emphasizing that degrammaticalization must mirror the same steps as those of grammaticalization in reverse order, while this is not true of lexicalization.

Moreover, as pointed out by Anttila (1989[1972]: 151), any new item entering the lexicon undergoes lexicalization, including those that instantiate developments whereby they increase their grammaticality (e.g. open-class noun > closed-class adverb). This observation somewhat anticipates the second reason for confusion between grammaticalization and lexicalization: the fact that most functionalist scholars recognize that lexicon and grammar are not two discrete categories, but rather they operate on a continuum (cf. Sections 2.1 and 2.2.3.2). Along this continuum, lexical words also contain grammatical information and, conversely, grammatical words also include some lexical meaning. In this view, both features of grammaticality and lexicality are gradual, and a certain form can be either more/less grammatical or more/less lexical (cf. e.g. Lehmann 2002; Hopper & Traugott 2003; Fischer 2008; Trousdale 2008a, 2008b).

In fact, more recent narrower definitions of lexicalization strongly emphasize the fact that lexicalization must also be understood as a sequential process, thus excluding items such as acronyms, conversions, and metatalk from the array of lexicalized items, due to their abrupt entry into the lexicon. This definition that regards gradualness as a crucial feature decisively complicated the whole picture (cf. Lehmann 1989; Wischer 2000; Brinton & Traugott 2005). Certainly, though, gradualness of development is not the only feature shared between lexicalization and grammaticalization. According to Lehmann (e.g. 1989) and Giacalone Ramat (1998: 121), for example, both processes entail a reductive component, understood as loss of autonomy and univerbation.

This theoretical chaos may be sorted out to some extent by highlighting the fact that the semantic developments undergone by grammaticalized and lexicalized items are in fact opposite. On the one hand, grammaticalization implies generalization, and consequent host-class expansion (i.e. grammaticalized items are promiscuous, and usually show high pattern and token productivity). On the other hand, lexicalization produces opacity (or fossilization, non-compositionality, idiosyncrasy), which results in host-class reduction (i.e. decrease in pattern productivity and possibly in token productivity) (cf. Brinton & Traugott 2005: 96–110; Haas 2007: 34). Thus, for example, the Old Irish perfective marker ro- and empty preverb no- are grammaticalized, in that they fairly systematically occur in certain morphosyntactic contexts (cf. Chapter 7). By contrast, there is no general consensus as to whether the development of Slavic preverbs into “bounder perfectives” (in Bybee, Perkins & Pagliuca’s 1994 terms) can be regarded as an actual grammaticalization: first, there is not a single marker of perfectivity; second, specific preverbs allegedly perfectivize verbs belonging to specific semantic classes (cf. Chapter 6).