5. Different varients of English

The variety of English spoken in the USA has received the name of American English. It cannot be called a dialect although it is regional variety, because it has a literary normalized form called Standard American whereas a dialect has no literary form.

An Americanisms may be defined as a word or set expression peculiar to the English language as spoken in the USA, e.g. cookie (a biscuit), guess (think), store (shop), etc. An American variant of the English language differs from British English in pronunciation, some minor features of grammar, but chiefly in vocabulary. Besides the American English there are Irish, Scottish, Australian, Canadian ones. Each of these variants has developed a literature of its own, and is characterized by peculiarities in phonetics, spelling, grammar and vocabulary. Thus, for example, Canadian English is influenced both by British and American English, but it also has some specific features of its own. Specifically Canadian words are called canadianisms, e.g. shack (a hut), to fathom out (to explain).There are some examples of Australian English: stockman (herdsman), bullock (to work hard), a puncher (the man who conducts a team of oxen) and some others.

Lexicography

1. Historical development of lexicography

2. The main types of modern dictionaries

3. Some of the main problems in lexicography

1. Historical development of lexicography

Lecicography is an important branch of applied linguistics which makes a study of compiling dictionaries. It has a common object of study with lexicology as both describe the vocabulary of a language. The essential difference between the two lies in the degree of systematization and completeness each of them is able to achieve. It aims at systematization revealing characteristic features of words. It cannot, however, claim any completeness as regards the units themselves, because the number of these units being very great, systematization and completeness couldn’t be achieved simultaneously. The province of lecicography, on the other hand, is the semantic, formal, and functional descripltion of all individual words. Lexicologists sort and present their material in a sequence depending upon their views concerning the vocabulary, whereas lecicographers have to arrange it most often according to a purely external characteristic, namely alphabetically. It goes without saying that these branches of linguistics couldn’t develop successfully without each other.Their relationship being essentially that of theory and practice dealing with the same objects of reality.

A need for a dictionary and glossary has been felt in the cultural growth of many civilized peoples at a fairly aerly period. The history of dictionary-making for the English language goes as far back as the Old English period where its first traces are found in the form of glosses of religious books with interlinear translation from Latin. Regular bilingual English-Latin dictionaries were already in existence in the 15^th century. The first unilingual English dictionary, explaining words by English equivalents, appeared in 1904. It was meant to explain difficult words occurring in books. Its title was “A Table Alphabeticall, containing and teaching the true writing and understanding of hard usuall English words borrowed from the Hebrew, Greeke, Latine or French”. The little volume of 120 pages explaining about 3000 words was compiled by Robert Cawdrey, a schoolmaster.

The first attempt at a dictionary including all the words of the language was made by Nathaniel Bailey who in 1721 published the first edition of his “Universal Etymological English Dictionary”. He was the first to include pronunciation and etymology.

The explanatory dictionary of the English language was published by Dr Samuel Jonson in 1755. The most important innovation of it was the introduction of illustrations of the meanings of the words “by examples from the best writers”. As to pronunciation, it wasn’t marked. Attention to it was turned later. The first pronouncing dictionary was published in 1780 by Thomas Sheridan.

The Golden Age of English lexicography began in the last quater of the 19^th century when the English Philological Society started work on compiling now known as the Oxford English Dictionary, originally named as “New English Dictionary on Historical Principles”. It is traced the development of English words from their form in Old English, the development of each meaning and its historical relation to other meanings of the same word. For words and meanings which have become obsolete the date of the latest occurrence is given. The first part of the Dictionary appeared in 1884 and the last in 1928. Another big dictionary was Joseph Wright’s English Dialect Dictionary.