MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND SCIENCE OF UKRAINE
National aerospace university “Kharkiv Aviation Institut”
Department of Applied Linguistics
Department 706
Introduction
As the process of borrowing is mostly connected with the appearance of new notions which the loan words serve to express, it is natural that the borrowing is seldom limited to one language. Expanding global contacts result in the considerable growth of international vocabulary. All languages depend for their changes upon the cultural and social matrix in which they operate and various contacts between nations are part of this matrix reflected in vocabulary. [Arnold ,260]
II. General idea of International words
It is often the case that a word is borrowed by several languages, and not just by one. The expression “international lexis” is called very often in lexicology and linguistics as an “internationalism”. The general definition of the term “internationalism” is given by I. V. Arnold, the euthor of the book in the English lexicology, who defines it as “words of identical origin that occur in several languages as a result of simultaneous or successive borrowings from one ultimate source are called international words”. [Arnold , 25]
The international words can be also less or more similar in pronunciation, orthography and in lexical meaning in several languages and they are easily and instantly memorized by learners of the languages, because they do not require any effort and attention in learning them or even swoting up.
Such words usually convey concepts which are significant in the field of communication (ef. Eng. telephone, organization , inauguration, consilium, Ukr. телефон,організація, інаугурація, консиліум).[Arnold ,25]
International words relate mainly to special terminology, various branches of science and technology. []
Many of them are of Latin and Greek origin. Most names of science are international, e.g. philosophy, mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology, medicine, linguistics, lexicology. There are also numerous terms of art in this group: music, theatre, drama, tragedy, comedy, artist, primadonna. The etymological source of this vocabulary reflect the history of word culture. Thus, for example , the mankind’s cultural debt to Italy is reflected in the great number of Italian words connected with architecture, painting and especially music that are borrowed into most European languages: allegro, andate, aria, arioso, barcarole, baritone (and other names for voices), concert, duet, opera (and other names for pieces of music), piano and many many more.
It is quite natural that political terms frequently occur in the international group of borowings: politics, policy, revolution, progress, democracy, communism, anti – militarism.
20th c. scientific and technological advances brought a great number of new international words: atomic, antibiotic, radio, television, sputnik.
The rate of change in technology, political, social and artistic life has been greatly accelerated in the last decade and so has the rate of growth of international wordstock. A few examples of comparatively new words due to the progress of science will suffice to illustrate the importance of international vocabulary: algorithm, antenna, antibiotic, automation, bionics, cybernetics, entropy, gene, genetic code, graph, microelectronics, microminiaturization, quant, quasars, pulsars, ribosome, etc. All these show sufficient likeness in English, French, Russian, Ukrainian and several other languages.
The international wordstock is also growing due to the influx of exotic borrowed words like anaconds, bungalow, kraal, orang – outang, sari, etc. These come from many different sources.
International words should not be mixed with words of the common Indo – European stock that also comprise a sort of common fund of the European languages.
Most of the international words are the result of parallel enrichment of new languages due to the vocabulary of the ancients, i.e. Latin and Greek (democracy, proletarian, philosophy, atom, satellite, synonym, rhythm). Another part of them comes modern languages: soviet, kolkhoz, sputnik (from Russia language); sonata, soprano, violoncello (from Italian language).
International relations do not include related congruences; words, the presence of which in a number of languages is a consequence of the kinship of these languages and their origin from one language - the basis:
eng. mother - germ. Mutter - ukr. мати;
eng. nose - germ. Nase - ukr. ніс;
eng. goose - germ. Hans - ukr. гусак. []