11.2. Learned words & official vocabulary

Learned Ws are mainly associated with the printed page. The term is not precise. A somewhat out-of-date term for the same category is bookish.

Learned Ws include several subdivisions of Ws: 1) Ws used in scientific prose, with dry, matter-of-fact flavour (comprise, compile, experimental, heterogeneous, homogeneous, conclusive, divergent); 2) officialisms (канцеляризмы), Ws of the bureaucratic language: assist (help), endeavour (try), proceed (go), approximately (about), sufficient (enough), attired (dressed), inquire (ask). You are authorized to acquire the work in question by purchase through the ordinary trade channels. In plain English, We advise you to buy the book in a shop; 3) literary / refined Ws, mostly polysyllabic Ws drawn from the Romance languages. Though fully adapted to the English phonetic system, some of them continue to sound foreign. They are associated with the lofty contexts: solitude, sentiment, fascination, fastidiousness, facetiousness, delusion, meditation, felicity, elusive, cordial, illusionary.

11.3. Poetic diction

There is no general poetic St in ME. The language a poet uses is closely connected with his outlook & experience, subject-matter & the message he wants to express. But there is in English vocabulary a set of Ws which contrast with all other Ws: having been traditionally used only in poetry, they have poetic connotations. These Ws are more lofty & as a rule more abstract in their denotative meaning than their neutral Syns. Ns: array :: clothes; billow :: wave; brine :: salt water; brow :: forehead; gore : blood; main :: sea; steed :: horse; woe :: sorrow. Vs: behold :: see; deem :: think; hearken :: hear; slay :: kill; trow :: believe. Adjs: fair :: beautiful; hapless :: unhappy; lone :: lonely; murky :: grim; uncouth :: strange. Advs: anon :: presently; nigh :: almost; oft :: often; whilom :: formerly. PrNs: thee :: thou; aught :: anything; naught :: nothing. Conjs: albeit :: although; ere :: before.

Sometimes not the W is poetic but only one of its variants. It may be semantic: the Ws fair, hall, flood etc. have among their meanings a poetical one. It may be also a phonetic variant: e’en :: even; morn :: morning; oft :: often.

11.4. Colloquial words & expressions

The term colloquial is old enough: Dr Johnson, the great English lexicographer. With him it had a derogatory ring. Late 19^th century, linguists began to study the vocabulary that people actually use & not what they may be justified in using. Now Coll does not always mean ‘slangy’ / ‘vulgar’; slang & vulgar vocabulary are part of Coll vocabulary.

The term literary Coll denotes the vocabulary used by educated people in the ordinary conversation / writing letters to intimate friends.

Familiar Coll is more emotional, free & careless than literary colloquial. It is characterised by a great number of jocular / ironical expressions & nonce-Ws.

Low Coll is a term for illiterate popular speech. It is very to establish the boundary between low Coll & dialect: in actual communication they are often used together. The basis of distinction between low Coll & the 2 other types of Coll is social. The chief peculiarities of low Coll concern grammar & pronunciation. The vocabulary contains more vulgar Ws, sometimes elements of dialect.

Other vocabulary layers below the level of standard educated speech are slang & argot. They have only lexical peculiarities. Slang: a special vocabulary & idioms, used by a particular social / age group, especially by the underworld. Its main point is to be unintelligible to outsiders. Argot is mostly professional vocabulary.

Gesture, tone, voice & situation are almost as important in an informal act of communication as Ws are → a careful choice of Ws plays a minor part. The same PrNs, prop-Ws, auxiliaries, postpositives are used again & again, conveying a great number of different meanings. Only a small fraction of English vocabulary is put to use. Thing, business, do, get, go, fix, nice, really, well etc. characterised by a high rank of frequency are used in all types of informal intercourse conveying a great variety of denotative & emotional meanings & fulfilling a lot of different functions. The utterances abound in imaginative phraseology, ready-made formulas of politeness & tags, standard expressions of assent, dissent, surprise, pleasure, gratitude, apology etc. “An Inspector Calls” by J.B. Priestley:

BIRLING: There you are! Proof positive. The whole story’s just a lot of moonshine. Nothing but an elaborate sell. Nobody likes to be sold as badly as that – but – for all that – (He smiles at them all.) Gerald, have a drink.

GERALD: Thanks. I think I could just do with one now. …

GERALD: Well, you see, while I was out of the house I’d time to cool off & think things out a little.

BIRLING: Yes, he didn’t keep you on the run as he did the rest of us. I’ll admit now he gave me a bit of a scare at the time. But I’d a special reason for not wanting any public scandal just now. Well, here’s to us. Come on, Sheila, don’t look like that. All over now.

The Colls: whole formulas: there you are, you see, here’s to us; set expressions: a lot of moonshine, keep sb on the run, for all that, cases of semi-conversion / typical W-groups: have a drink (not drink), give a scare (not scare), Vs with postpositives: cool off, think things out, come on; particles just, well. Colloquial style is usually rich in figures of speech: a bit of a scare, I could just do with one (understatement).

Substantivised Adjs are very frequent in Coll speech: constitutional ‘a walk’, daily ‘a woman who comes daily to help with household chores’, greens for ‘green leaf vegetables’, woollies ‘woollen clothes’.

A lot of new Ws ← a process combining composition & conversion & having as prototypes Vs with postpositives: carry-on ‘way of behaving’, let-down ‘an unexpected disappointment’, make-up ‘cosmetics’.

1 of the most modern developments frequent in Coll St: CW coined by back-formation: to baby-sit (from baby-sitter).

Coll English is very emotional. Emotions find their lexical expression in: emphatic Advs & Adjs (awfully, divine); interjections including swear Ws; other lexical intensifiers.

In all the groups of Colls, in familiar Coll especially, Ws easily acquire new meanings & valency. Do in I could do with one ‘I would like to have (a drink)’. Make do means ‘to economise’; peculiarities of valency: do a museum, do for sb ‘to act as a housekeeper’. Verbs with postpositives are used in preference to their polysyllabic synonyms.

Intensifiers absolutely, fabulous / fab, grand, lovely, superb, terrific, combinations with dead (dead sure, dead easy, dead right, dead slow, dead straight) are apt to lose their denotative meaning & keep only their intensifying function.