7. Special literary vocabulary: poetic words, archaic words, terms, foreign words and barbarisms, literary coinages.
Special Literary Vocabulary.
Now we shall examine, in a very general manner, word-groups singled out by traditional lexicology and their stylistics functions.
Poetic words
Poetic words form a rather insignificant layer of literary vocabulary. Their main function is to sustain the special elevated atmosphere of poetry.
e.g. Whilomen ( at some past time ) in Albion’s isle ( the oldest name of Britain ) there dwell a youth, …
Poetic tradition has kept alive such archaic words as quath ( p. t. ) to speak; eftsoon – again, soon after – which are used even by modern ballad-mongers. Poetic words in an ordinary environment may have a satirical effect.
Archaic words
Archaic words are rarely used highly literary words which are aimed at producing an elevated effect. Lexical archaisms ( archaisms proper ) are obsolete words replaced by new ones ( e.g. anon – at once; haply – perhaps; befall – happen etc; historical words / material archaisms – they have gone out of use with the disappearance of concepts and phenomena ( e.g. hauberk – кольчуга, yeoman – иомен, свободный крестьянин, falconet – фальконет (лёгкая пушка), knight, etc. ); morphological archaisms – thou, thee, ye etc.
The function of archaisms is to recreate the atmosphere of antiquity; if used in an inappropriate surrounding archaisms cause a humorous effect.
e.g. Prithee, do me the favour, as to inquire after my astrologer, Martinus Galioty, and send him to me hither presently.
Archaisation of the text is achieved by insertion of separate words and not by the use of the language of some past epoch.
e.g. The situation in which the archaism is not appropriate to the context. In B. Shaw’s play ‘How he Lied to her Husband’ a youth of 18, speaking of his feelings towards a female of 37, expresses himself in a language which is not in conformity with the situation.
“Perfect love casteth off fear”.
Archaisms may have other functions found in other styles. They are frequently found in the style of official documents; and in all kinds of legal documents one can find obsolescent (obsolete) words which would long have become obsolete if it were not for that special use.
e.g. aforesaid, hereby, therewith, hereinafternamed.
The function of archaisms in official documents is terminological in character.
Terms
Terms are mostly used in special works dealing with the notions of some branch of science. But they may as well appear in other styles; when used in fiction, they may acquire a stylistic function – either to indicate stylistic peculiarities of the subject dealt with, or to make some reference to the occupation of the character whose speech would naturally contain special words and expressions.
e.g. Andrew Manson’s speech – ‘Citadel’ by Cronin.
Martin’s speech – ‘Martin Eden’ by J. London.
Foreign words and Barbarisms
Barbarisms are words originally borrowed from a foreign language and usually assimilated into the native vocabulary, so as not to differ from its units in appearance or in sound. Most of them have corresponding English synonyms: chic – stylish; bon mot – a clever witty saying; en passant – in passing.
We should distinguish between barbarisms and foreign words for purely stylistic purposes. Foreign words do not belong to the English vocabulary, they are not registered in English dictionaries. Barbarisms are.
Both barbarisms and foreign words are widely used in various styles with various aims. One of these functions is to supply local colour.
e.g. ‘Vanity Fair’by Thakeray. (A German town where a boy with a good appetite is made a focus of attention.)
‘The little boy, too, we observed had a famous appetite, and consumed schinken (окорок), and braten (жаркое), and kartoffeln, and cranberry jam … with a gallantry that did honour to his nation’.
Foreign words may also have the function of conveying the idea of the foreign origin or cultural and educational status of the personage.
Literary coinages
The coining of new words is dictated by the need to indicate new concepts as a result of the development of science. It may also be the result of a search for a more economical, brief form of utterance for expressiveness.
The first type of newly coined words may be named terminological coinages. The second i.e. words coined for expressiveness, may be named stylistic coinages.
New words are usually coined according to productive models for word-building. But new words of literary bookish type may be formed with the help of non-productive affixes and they will be immediately recognized because of their unexpectedness.
e.g. –ize moisturize, pedestrianize, villigize etc.
-ee interrodatee, enrollee, amputee etc.
-ship showmanship, supermanship
-ese translatese, Johnsonese
There is still another means of word-building in English - blending of two words into one.
e.g. avigation ( aviation + navigation )
brunch ( breakfast +lunch )
Usually newly coined words are heavily stylistically loaded, their major stylistic function being the creation of the effect of laconism, terseness and implication of witty humour and satire.
8. Special Colloquial Vocabulary: common colloquial words, slang, jargonisms, professionalisms, dialect words, vulgar words, colloquial coinages.
The colloquial layer of words as qualified in most English and American dictionaries is not infrequently limited to a definite language community or confined to a special locality when it circulates.
Slang. Slang is part of the vocabulary consisting of commonly understood and widely used words and expressions of humorous and derogatory character – intentional substitutes for neutral or elevated words and expressions. Slang never goes stale, it is replaced by a new slangism. The reason of appearance of slang is in the aspiration of the speaker to novelty and concreteness.
Slang is not homogenious stylistically. There are many kinds of slang, e.g. Cockney, public-house, commercial, military, theatrical, parliamentary and others. There is also a standard slang, the slang common to all those who though using received standard English in their writing and speech, also use an informal language.
Here are more examples of slang. Due to its striving to novelty slang is rich in synonyms.
FOOD: chuck, chow, grub, hash;
MONEY: jack, tin, brass, oof, slippery stuff.
Various figures of speech participate in slang formation.
UPPER STOREY for ‘head’ – metonymy
KILLING for ‘astonishing’ – hyperbole
SOME for ‘excellent’ or ‘bad’ – understatement
CLEAR AS MUD – irony
Jargonisms. Jargon words appear in professional or social groups as informal, oftenhumorous replacers of words already existing in neutral or superneutral vocabulary. The use of jargon implies defiance, a kind of naughtiness in lingual behavior.
Jargon words can be roughly subdivided into two groups. One of them consists of names of objects, phenomena, and processes characteristic of the given profession – not the real denominations, but rather nicknames, as apposed to the official terms used in this professional sphere.
Thus we may say that jargon words are either non-terminological, unofficial substitutes for professional terms (sometimes called ‘professionalisms’), or official terms misused deliberately, to express disrespect.
Examples of the first group: in soldiers’ jargon picture show is battle; sewing machine means machine-gun; put in a bag – killed in action.
Examples of the second group are: - big gun means an important person, GI –‘Government Issue; dug-out – a retired soldier returned to active service.
Many jargon words have entered the standard vocabulary: kid, queer, fun, bluff, fib, humbug, they have become dejargonized.
Professionalisms . Professionalisms are words used in a definite trade, profession or calling by people connected by common interests both at work and at home. They are close to terms. Professional words name anew already existing concepts, tools or instruments, and have the typical properties of special code. The main feature of a professionalism is its technicality. Professionalisms are used in emotive prose to depict the natural speech of characters. The skillful use of a professional word will show not only the vocation of the character, but also his education, breeding, environment and sometimes even his psychology.
Dialectal words. Dialectal words are those which in the process of the intergration of the English language remained beyond its literary boundaries and their use is
generally confined to a definite locality.
There is sometimes a difficulty in distinguishing between dialectal words and colloquial words. Some dialectal words have become so familiar in good colloquial or standard colloquial English that they are universally recognized as units of standard colloquial English. To these belong: lass – a girl or a beloved girl; a lad – a boy or a young man; daft from the Scottish and the Northern dialect – of unsound mind, silly; fash (Scottish) – trouble, cares. Still they have not lost their dialectal associations.
Vulgar words or vulgarisms. This stylistically lowest group consists of words which are considered too offensive for polite usage. Objectionable words may be divided into two groups: lexical vulgarisms and stylistic vulgarisms.
To the first group belong words expressing ideas considered unmentionable in civilized society. Among lexical vulgarisms are various oaths. Quite unmentionable are the so called ‘four-letter words’ (practically every word denoting the most intimate spheres of human anatomy physiology consists of four letters).
The second group – stylistic vulgarisms – are words and phrases the lexical meaning of which has nothing indecent about them. Their impropriety in civilized life is due to their stylistic value – to stylistic connotations expressing a derogatory attitude of the speaker towards the object of speech.
Colloquial coinages. Colloquial coinages ( nonce-words ), unlike those of a bookish character, are spontaneous and elusive.. Colloquilialisms include:
a) colloquial words proper ( colloquial synonyms of neutral words ): chap (‘fellow’),
chunc (‘lump’), sniffy’(disdainful’), or such that have no counterpart in the neutral or literary sphere: molly-doddle (‘an effeminate man or boy’), drifter (‘a person without a steady job’). To this group belong ‘nursery’ words: mummy (‘mother’), dad (‘father’), tummy (‘stomach’), gee-gee (‘horse’).
b) phonetic variants of neutral words: gaffer (‘grandfather’), baccy (‘tobacco’), feller (‘fellow’); a special place is taken by phonetic contractions of auxiliary and modal verbs: shan’t, won’t, don’t, ‘ve, ‘d,’ll, etc. c) diminutives of neutral ( or colloquial ) words: granny, daddy, lassie, piggy; of proper names: Bobby, Polly, Becky, Johnny, etc. d) colloquial meanings of polysemantic words: spoon (‘a man of low mentality’), a hedgehog ( ‘an unmanageable person’). Pretty (‘good-looking’) is neutral; pretty ‘fairly’ (pretty good, pretty quick) is colloquial. e) most of interjections: gee! , eh! , well, why. Oh is a universal signal of emotion, used both in low and high spheres of communication.
8. Phraseology and its stylistic use.
What was said above concerning the vocabulary is more or less applicable to the English phraseology: set phrases possess properties of individual words. Some of them are elevated: an earthly paradise; to breath one’s last; the sword of Damocles. Some are below neutral: to rain cats and dogs; to be in one’s cups (to be drunk); big bug (‘important official’); small fry (‘unimportant people’). Even what might be called neutral phrases produce a certain stylistic effect. Idioms and set expressions impart local colouring to the text; besides, they have not lost their metaphoric essence, hence they are more expressive than unidiomatic statements.
A very effective stylistic device often used by writers consists in violating the traditional norms of the use of set phrases. E.g. He had been standing there nearly two hours, shifting from foot to unaccustomed foot. (Galsworthy). The phrase ‘shifting from foot to foot’ is altered by inserting an additional component. Another way of violation of the phraseological unit is its prolongation: ‘Little Jon had been born with a silver spoon in his mouth which was rather curly and large.’(Galsworthy) Adding the attributive clause to ‘mouth’, Galsworthy revives the primary meaning of the word and freshens up the whole expression.
On the basis of the ancient admonition, spare the rod and spoil the child (= if you do not punish your offspring, you will spoil him) the view point of the educational trend at the beginning of the twentieth century is thus summarized by Galsworthy: ‘Parents had exalted notions of giving their offspring a good time. They spoiled their rods, spared their children, and anticipated the results with enthusiasm.’ As we have seen, the violation of phraseological units is in achieving humourous effect. This stylistic device is used not only in belles-lettres style. Here are some instances from newspapers illustrating the stylistic use of proverbs, sayings and word-combinations. A newspaper editorial once had the following headline: ‘Proof of the Pudding’ (from ‘The proof of the pudding is in the eating’). Here is a recast of a well known proverb used by an advertising agency: ’Early to bed and early to rise, No use – unless you advertise.’ (From ‘Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise’). A dealer in the window blinds slightly alters the well known saying – ‘Love is blind’, advertising his merchandise thus: ‘Our Love is Blinds’.All similar cases of using phraseology, which disclose the inner form of speech clichés, render the speech vividness and expressiveness.
499
107 189 
