36. Special literary vocabulary.

Special literary vocabulary abounds in terms. Terms are generally associated with a definite branch of science. They are characterized by a tendency to be monosemantic and have no emotional, expressive coloring. Terms are never used in figurative, transferred meanings. When used in newspaper style or in belles-lettres style terms acquire another function, a purely stylistic one: they either indicate the technical peculiarities of the subject dealt with, or make some reference to the occupation of a character whose language would contain special words and expressions (e.g. the use of medical terms in "The Citadel" by Cronin or "Say No to Death" by D. Cusack).

Terms may be divided into three main groups depending on the character of their origin:

1. Terms formed from Greek, Latin, French, German and other foreign sources: botany, anatomy, schedule (Greek); facade, renaissance, rendez votis (French); cobalt, quartz (German), etc.

2. Terms formed from the common word stock by means of semantic change: a/ tank, company, division (military); b/ wing (architectural); c/ jamming (radio).

3. Terms formed by means of special suffixes and prefixes: ultra-violet, transplant, etc.

Terms are frequently a concept or a notion in a concise form (e.g. genocide instead of "the mass extermination of population on racial, religious, political and other grounds").

Poetic words are used primarily in poetry. They include archaic words such as: lemon, yclept, whilom, etc. There is one means of creating new poetic words still recognized as productive - the use of a contracted form of a word (e.g. drear instead of dreary. Sometimes the reverse process takes place, that is when, for example, instead of vast the form vasty is used. Both devices are called forth by the requirement of the meter of the poem.

Poetic words sustain the special elevated atmosphere of poetry.

Archaic words reflect all the changes in the life of human society in general and of that linguistic community which uses them as means of intercourse in particular. Some words change their meanings and sometimes drop out of the language altogether, the others stay in the language a very long time and acquire new meanings. It is possible to distinguish three aging processes.

2. Obsolete words are those that have already gone completely out of use but are still recognized by the English speaking community: e.g. methinks, nay.

3. Archaisms proper are words which are no longer recognized in Modern English, words that were used in Old English and have either dropped out of the language entirely or have changed their appearance completely (e.g. troth (faith), a losel (a worseless lazy fellow).

Historical words can be called historical terms referring to definite stages in the development of society and cannot be neglected though the things and phenomena to which they refer no longer exist. Historical words have no synonyms in Modem English as compared to archaic words.

The words of all the four groups are used by writers for stylistic purposes; they serve to create a realistic background to historical novels. Archaic words and phrases can be found in official documents (e.g. aforesaid, therewith, herein, afternamed, etc.).

37. Special colloquial vocabulary.

In special colloquial vocabulary we distinguish the following groups of words:

Slang is the most extended and vastly developed subgroup of non-standard colloquial layer of the vocabulary. They are many definitions of slang, where it is represented both as a special vocabulary and a special language. It can be defined as the part of the vocabulary made by commonly understood and widely used words and expressions of humorous kind – intentional substitutes of neutral and elevated words and expressions. The psychological source of its appearance and existence is striving for novelty of expression. Many words and expressions now referred to slang originally appeared in narrow professional groups, since they have gained wide currency, they must be considered as belonging to slang. In slang we find expressions borrowed from written speech (‘yours truly’ – I).

Besides separate words slang includes also highly figurative phraseology. Slang occurs mainly in dialogue and serves to create speech characteristics of personages.

Jargonisms stand close to slang, also being substandard, expressive and emotive, but, unlike slang they are used by limited groups of people, united either professionally or socially. In distinction from slang, jargonisrns of both types cover a narrow semantic field: in the first case it is that, connected with the technical side of some profession. So, in oil industry, e. g, for the terminological "driller" (буровик) there exist "borer", "digger", "wrencher", "hogger", "brake weight"; for "pipeliner" (трубопроводчик), "bender", "cat", "old cat", "collar-pecker", "hammerman" etc. Professionalisms are formed according to the existing word-building patterns or present existing words in new meanings, and, covering the field of special professional knowledge, which is semantically limited, they offer a vast variety of synonymic choices for naming one and the same professional item.

Jargonisms proper are characterized by similar linguistic features, but differ in function and sphere of application. They originated from the thieves' jargon (argo, cant) and served to conceal the actual significance of the utterance from the uninitiated. Their major function thus was to be cryptic, secretive.

Professionalisms are the words used in a definite trade, profession: or calling by people connected by common interests both at work and at home. The main feature of a professionalism is its technicality. Professionalisms are linked to a common occupation and common social interests: (piper -a specialist who decorates pastry with the use of a cream-pipe; a midder case (a midwifery case); outer (a knockout blow). Professionalisms should not be mixed up with jargonisms. Professionalisms do not aim at secrecy. They fulfil a socially useful function in communication, facilitating a quick and adequate grasp of the message.

Vulgarisms are known as four-letter words the use of which is banned in any form of intercourse as being indecent. Vulgarisms are often used in conversation out of habit, without any thought of what they mean, or in imitation of those who use them in order not to seem old-fashioned or prudish. However, they will never acquire the status of standard English vocabulary and will always remain on the outskirts. The function of expletives is almost the same as that of interjections, that is to express strong emotions, mainly annoyance, anger, vexation and the like. Such intensifies as "bloody", "damned", "cursed", "hell of", formerly deleted from literature and not allowed in conversation, are not only welcomed in both written and oral speech, but, due to constant repetition, have lost much of their emotive impact and substandard quality. They are not to be found in any functional style of language except emotive prose, and here only in the direct speech of the characters.

Dialectal words are obviously opposed to the other groups of the non-literary English vocabulary and therefore their stylistic functions can be more or less clearly defined. Dialectal words are those which in the process of integration of the English national language remained beyond its literary boundaries, and their use is generally confined to a definite locality. In Great Britain four major dialects are distinguished: Lowland Scotch, Northern, Midland (Central) and Southern. In the USA three major dialectal varieties are distinguished: New England, Southern and Midwestern (Central, Midland). These classifications do not include many minor local variations.

Dialects differ on the phonemic level: one and the same phoneme is differently pronounced in each of them ('volk' (folk), 'vound' (found). They differ also on the lexical level, having their own names for locally existing phenomena and also supplying locally circulating synonyms for the words, accepted by the language in general. Some of them have entered the general vocabulary and lost their dialectal status (lass-'a girl or a ‘beloved girl', lad - 'boy or a young man').