16. General characteristics of English Vocabulary (borrowed words, etymological doublets, hybrids; international words; neologisms; shortening; lexical and graphic abbreviations; acronyms).

- Linguostylistics discerns the following lexico-stylistic layers of the English vocabulary: 1. Stylistically neutral words; 2. Literary-bookish words; 3. Colloquial words.

- Stylistically neutral layer, which is the living core of the vocabulary, consists of words mostly of native origin though it also comprises fully assimilated borrowings. Such words are devoid of any emotive colouring and are used in their denotative meaning, e.g. table, street, move, easy, never, etc. In groups of synonyms neutral words fulfil the function of the synonymic dominant. The words belonging to the common core of the language: Pronouns: she, it, you, my, , this, these, somebody, nothing, which, why; Prepositions and articles: a, the, in, at, for, if; Nouns: man, boy, bird, Terms of kinship: mother, sister, daughter; Parts of the body: arm, leg, neck, eyes; Nature: moon, sky, field, river, sea etc; Household items: house, bed, plate; Food: meat, fish, bread; Verbs: to be, can, must, , to see, to hear, to eat, , to make, to do, to put; Adjectives: good, bad, strong, big, short, low, white, yellow;

- Literary-bookish words belong to the formal style. The so-termed learned words are used in descriptive passages of fiction, scientific texts, radio and television announcements, official talks and documents, business correspondence, etc. As a rule, these words are mostly of foreign origin and have polymorphemic structure, e.g. cordial, paternal, comprise, exclude, miscellaneous, thereby, herewith.

Terms are words or nominal groups which convey specialized concepts used in science, technology, art, etc., e.g. phoneme, radar, knee-joint, periodic table, still life, choreography, etc. As a rule terms are devoid of any emotional colouring and are not used in transferred meaning.

Barbarisms are words or expressions borrowed without (or almost without) any change in form and not accepted by native speakers as current in the language, e.g. ad libitum, entre nous, table d'hote, coup d'Etat,.

Poetic words with elevated, "lofty" colouring are traditionally used only in poetry. Most of them are archaic and have stylistically neutral synonyms, e.g. lone ("lonely"), woe ("sorrow"), array ("clothes"), behold ("see"), oft ("often"), ere ("before"), etc.

Archaisms are obsolete names for existing things, actions, phenomena, etc. All of them can be replaced by neutral synonyms, e.g. deem ("think"), glee ("joy"), nigh ("near"). Among archaisms the so-called Grammatical archaisms are singled out which represent obsolete grammatical forms: thee, thy; he goeth, thou knowest, etc. Among archaic words one should distinguish historical words that denote no-longer existing objects, e.g. mail, archer, fletcher, galleon, arbalernt, etc. Historical words have no neutral synonyms in Modern English.

- Colloquial words are characteristic of the informal style of spoken English. Informal style is relaxed, free-and-easy, familiar and unpretentious. The choice of words is determined in each particular case not only by an informal situation, but also by the speaker’s educational and cultural background, age group. One should distinguish between literary (standard) colloquial words as units of Standard English and non-literary colloquialisms that belong to sub-standard English vocabulary. Literary colloquial words are used in everyday conversations both by cultivated and uneducated people and are also met in written literary texts. As for their etymology and syllabic structure, literary colloquial words are closer to neutral words than to literary-bookish units, but, as a rule, have stronger emotional colouring. They are formed on standard word-formative patterns, some of them being particularly frequent: old chap, I’ve got, granny, disco, baby-sit, chopper, make-up.

The informal style of spoken English is also characterized by extensive use of occasional words, qualifiers, responsives, pragmatic phraseological units, evaluative attributes and predicatives, e.g. Oscarish, awfully glad, dead right, there you are, what next?, smart kid.

- Non-literary (sub-standard) colloquial words include slang, jargonisms, professionalisms and vulgarisms. Slang comprises highly informal words not accepted for dignified use. Such words are expressive sub-standard substitutes for current words of standard vocabulary. As a rule, their meanings are based on metaphor and have a jocular or ironic colouring, e.g. bob, attic ("head"), beans ("money"), governor ("father"), to leg /it/ ("to walk"). Slang words are easily understood by all native speakers, because they are not specific for any social or professional group (cf. with Ukrainian просторіччя, e.g. баньки /"очі"/, макітра /"голова"/, поцупити / "вкрасти"/ etc.). Informal words peculiar for a certain social or professional group should be considered as jargonisms. Such words are usually motivated and, like slang words, have metaphoric character, e.g. walkie-talkie (воен.), to cut a lesson (школ.); astronauts' jargon/; Mae West ("pneumatic vest") /military jargon/; grass, tea, weed ("narcotic") /drug addicts' jargon/, etc. Among social jargons cant or argot (thieves' jargon) stands somewhat apart. Cant (argot) words are non-motivated and have special "agreed-upon", secretive meanings, e.g. book ("life sentence"), splosh ("money"), to rap ("to kill"), altar room (toilet)etc. Professionalisms are sub-standard colloquial words used by people of a definite trade or profession. Such words are informal substitutes for corresponding terms, e.g. identikit ("photorobot"), Hi-Fi ("high fidelity"), smash-up ("accident"), ack-ack gun ("anti-aircraft gun"), and the like. Vulgarisms include: a/ expletives and swear words of abusive character, like damn, goddam, bloody, etc.; b/ obscene (or taboo) words which are highly indecent mug, boozer, to shoop.

- It is interesting to point out also that phraseological units, like words, belong to stylistically neutral, literary-bookish and colloquial layers. In most cases, phraseological collocations (standardized phrases) are stylistically neutral: to make friends, to make haste; to go to bed, all of a sudden. Among literary-bookish phraseological units one can find barbarisms: ad verbum (Lat.), a la lettre (Fr.), a propos (Fr.), etc.); archaic and poetic units (a heart of oak, the apple of discord, to fall from grace, etc.). A great number of phraseological units are literary colloquial e.g. bag and baggage, like water off duck's back, to be at sixes and sevens, to be on the carpet, etc.

Non-literary (sub-standard) colloquial phraseological units are subdivided into:

a) slang units, e.g. to have a crush on smb., to get (to go) bananas, to buy the farm, what’s cooking (I wonder what is going to happen), The million dollar question (The question that everybody would like to know the answer to), a hen party (a party to which only women or girls are invited),etc. b) jargonisms, e.g. to put to bed (jur-); to lay an egg (a bomb) (theatr.); to sell one's back (sport); rough stuff (sport.); to go into the drunk, sleeping partner (a person who invested capital in business, but plays no part in managing it), a glass jaw (a weakness which renders a person extremely vulnerable to attack – used in boxing),etc. c) professionalisms, e.g. to hit the ground (av.); to ride the beam (av.); to fall into a caldron (mil.); to ride a desk (mil.); to hit the headlines (jour.), to send smb down (to send smb to prison), d) vulgarisms, e.g. to hand smb. crap to have a boob, a baby snatcher (a woman who has a boy-friend much younger than herself), use your loaf (use your brain, think), sugar daddy (an old rich man who gives money for young women for sex).

- Taboo language. When a lexeme is highly charged with connotation we commonly refer to it as “loaded”. The language of politics and religion is full of such loaded expressions: capitalist, radical, federalism, democracy, politician, priest, dogma, sect, etc. The language of science and law, on the other hand, attempts to avoid vocabulary which is highly connotative. In general, the more a domain or topic is controversial, the more it will contain loaded vocabulary. A few dozen lexemes comprise the special category of taboo language – items which people avoid using in polite society, either because they believe them harmful or feel them embarrassing or offensive. The Concise Oxford Dictionary (1996) defines taboo (borrowed into English from the Tongan language) as:' 1. a system or the act of setting a person or thing apart as sacred, prohibited, or accursed; 2. a prohibition or restric­tion imposed on certain behaviour, word usage, etc., by social custom.' Taboo subjects or words may often be of a religious or cultural nature, the name of God, for example; or men may be prohibited from mentioning certain things associated with women. In lexicology, the label 'taboo' is usually applied to words that would be extremely offensive if spoken in most contexts. Indeed, many dictionaries no longer use the label 'taboo' for these kinds of word: Collins Electronic Dictionary (1992) still does, but the Longman Dictionary of the English Language (LDEL) (1991) uses 'vulgar', and the Concise Oxford Dictionary (1996) uses 'coarse slang'. This is perhaps a recognition that such words, which would at one time have been almost unmentionable and even excluded from diction­aries, can now be found to a large extent in popular fiction and even in daily newspapers. Taboo words in English are largely concerned with non-technical words for parts of the human anatomy associated with sex and excretion and for the act of sexual intercourse — some eighteen such terms labelled 'coarse slang' in The Concise Oxford Dictionary (1996).

There are various ways of avoiding a taboo item. One is to replace it by a more technical term, as commonly happens in medicine. Another, common in older writing, is to part-spell the item (bl – ). The everyday method is to employ an expression which refers to a taboo topic in an indirect way – a euphemism. English has thousands of euphemistic expressions, of which these are a tiny example: under the weather (ill), not all there (mentally subnormal), be economical with the truth (to lie).

Jargon is itself a loaded word. One dictionary defines it neutrally as “the technical vocabulary or idiom of a special activity or group”, but this sense is almost completely overshadowed by another: “obscure and often pretentious language marked by a roundabout way of expression and use of long words”.

For most people, it is this second sense which is at the front of their minds when they think about jargon. Jargon is said to be a bad language, something to be avoided at all costs. No one ever describes it in positive terms. Nor does one usually admit to using it oneself: the myth is that jargon is something only other people employ. It is interesting to note that the reality is that everyone uses jargon. It is an essential part of the network of occupations and pursuits which make up society. All jobs present an element of jargon, which workers learn as they develop their expertise. All hobbies require mastery of jargon. All sports and games have their jargon. Each society grouping has its jargon. The phenomenon turns out to be universal – and valuable. It is the jargon element which, in a job, can promote economy and precision of expression, and thus help make life easier for the workers [Crystal p.174].

Clichés. In clichés we see fragments of language apparently dying, yet unable to die. Clichés emerge when expressions outlive their usefulness as conveyors of information. Such phrases as at this moment, every Tom, Dick and Harry have come to be so frequently used that they have lost their power to inform, to enliven, to mean. And yet they survive, in a kind of living death, because people continue to use them, despite criticism. They are, in effect, lexical zombies [Crystal p. 186]. To use expressions which have been largely emptied of meaning implies that the user is someone who cannot be bothered to be fresh, clear, careful, or precise, or possibly someone who wishes to avoid clarity. The suggestion is that such people are at best lazy or unimaginative. In the case of learned clichés, perhaps they want also to impress, to show of. But clichés have their defenders who point out that many of the expressions have a value, and their value is the ability to avoid saying anything precise. Such clichés are commonplace, because it is not possible to be fresh and imaginative all the time. Life is full of occasions when a serious conversation is simply too difficult and clichés can fill a gap in conversation. In such circumstances, clichés are an admirable lexical life jacket. The passing remarks as people recognize each other in the street but with no time to stop, the politeness of strangers on train, the interactions at cocktail parties: these are the kinds of occasion which give cliché right to be. On the one hand, they are “comfortable”, on the other hand they “stop us thinking of nothing”. But whether we like them or not, one thing is certain: “they are highly contagious, and there is no known immunity, except possibly silence… and even that only conceals the infection…”[Crystal p.186].