American English and other varieties

Also significant beginning around 1600 AD was the English colonization of North America and the subsequent creation of American English. The American dialect also served as the route of introduction for many native American words into the English language – words raccoon, tomatoe, canoe, etc. Spanish has also been great influence on American English. Mustang, canyon, ranch, stampede, and vigilante are all examples of Spanish words that made their way into English through the settlement of the American West. A lesser number of words have entered American English from French and West African languages. Likewise dialects of English have developed in many of the former colonies of the British Empire. There are distinct forms of the English language spoken in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India and many other parts of the world.

 Global English

English has now inarguably achieved global status. English is used in over 90 countries as an official or semi-official language. English has without a doubt become the global language.

7. Lexicology

Lexicology is a science which deals with words and word combinations. The term lexicology is composed of two Greek components: lexis, which means word, phrase; and logos, which denotes a sphere of knowledge. So, the subject matter of this branch of linguistic science gives a general notion of lexicology. It is connected with other branches of language science: phonetics, grammar, stylistics. Lexicology as a branch of linguistics has its own aims and methods of scientific research: its basic task is to study (of the) a systematic description of the vocabulary in respect to its origin, development and current use. So, lexicology investigates words, morphemes, word-groups, word equivalents on its historic and current use. Language is an objective social phenomenon, connected with thinking and with the social life of human society. There are 2 principal approaches to the study of language, named synchronic and diachronic. The synchronic approach is concerned with the vocabulary of a language as it exists at the present time. The diachronic approach deals with the changes and the development of the vocabulary in the course of time. There are two levels of the language: syntagmatic and paradigmatic. On the syntagmatic level, the semantic structure of the word is analyzed in the linear relationships with neighboring words in connected speech. In other words, the semantic characteristics of the word are observed, described and studied on the basis of its typical contents. On the paradigmatic level, the word is studied in its relationships with other words in the vocabulary system. So a word may be studied in comparison with other words of similar meaning (a work -a labour; to refuse – to reject- to decline), of opposite meaning (busy-idle; to accept-to reject), of different stylistic characteristics (man-chap-bloke-guy).

8. Etymology

An important distinctive feature is the origin of words. According to this feature the word-stock may be subdivided into 2 main groups. The elements of the first are native; the elements of another are borrowed. Native word is a word, which belongs to the original English stock, as known from the earliest manuscripts of the old English period. A lane word or borrowing is a word taken over from another language and modified in phonetic shape, spelling or meaning, according to the standards of the English language. The native words are subdivided into Indo-European Stock and Common Germanic origin. The words of Indo-European stock fall into definite semantic groups: 1) father, mother, brother and so on; 2) the most important objects and phenomena: son, moon, star, water, wood, tree and others; 3) names of birds and animals: bull, cat, cow, wolf and others; 4) parts of the human body: arm, ear, eye, foot, heart and others.

Some of the most frequent verbs are also of Indo-European stock (come, sit, stand …). Words, belonging to the subsets of the native word-stock are characterized by a wide range of lexical and grammatical valiancy and a developed polysemy. They often show great word-building power and enter a number of set expressions. The part, played by borrowing in the vocabulary depends upon the history of each given language. The source, the scope and the semantic sphere of lone words are all dependent upon historical factors. The term source of borrowing should be distinguished from the term origin borrowing. The firs should be applied to the language from which the lone word was taken into English. The second, on the other hand, refers to the language to which the word may be traced. With lone words proper we distinguish translation lones and semantic lones. Translation lones are words and expressions formed from the material existing in the English language, but according to patterns taken from another language (wall-newspaper). The term ‘semantic lone’ is used to denote the development in the English word a new meaning, due to the influence of the related word in another language (pioneer means explorer and one who is among the first; and now, under the influence of the Russian word «пионер», it means a member of the young pioneers organization).