11. Newspaper Style (media linguistics)

Medialinguistics deals with the problem of mediatexts in the Mass Media language.

Functional Stylistics is a branch of linguistics which studies linguistic varieties of a literary l-ge, determined by definite spheres & situations of communication. L-ge developed a number of Functional Styles. Some linguists say ther are as many of them as there are situations in real life: official, non-official, neutral (Halliday). Some linguists distinguish btw. formal & informal l-ge. Galperin: 1) belles-lettres (художественная литература ), 2) newspaper style, 3) publisistic style, 4) scientific prose style, 5) style of official documents.

Newspaper (NP) style was the last of the literary English styles to be recognized as a specific form of writing. Early E. NPs (17^th, 18^th century) were the vehicle of info. Commentary as a regular feature appeared later. Only by the 19^th E. NP has developed in a system of l-ge media, forming a separate functional style.

Aim of style – to inform & influence public opinion

Newspaper style – system of interrelated lexical, phraseological & grammatical means, which is perceived by the community as a separate linguistic unity that serves the purpose of informing & instructing the reader. NP is conveyed through: a) brief news items, b) press reports – parliamentary, court), c) articles purely informative in character, d) advertisements & announcements.

Basic NP features: 1) brief news items (Function – inform, give non-emotional facts without explicit comment, Vocabulary: 1. special political & economic terms  socialism, constitution, president; 2. non-term political vocabulary,  public, people, peace, 3. newspaper clichés  (stereotyped expressions, commonplace phrases – prevent ambiguity, prompt associations) vital issue, danger of war; 4. abbreviations,  (names of orgs) UNO [junou]– United Nations Org.; 5. neologisms (NPs quickly react to development),  ice-up (freezing over water), sing-in (audience joins in the singing).

Grammatical parameters of brief news items: a) complex sentences with clauses, b) verbal constructions (infinitive, participial, gerundival), verbal noun  the planned axing of jobs, c) complexes, esp. Nominative + Infinitive (to avoid mentioning the source of info)  the event is believed to have been held with the help of… d) attributive noun groups  national income & expenditure figures, e) specific word-order (more or less fixed): Subj.+Predicate+Obj.+Adv.mod. of reason/manner+Adv.mod. of place+Adv.mod. of time.

2) advertisements (объявление) & announcements (Function – to inform, 2 types of As & As: a) classified (various kinds of info are arranged according to subj.-matter into sections,  The Times – Births, Marriages, Personal, b) non-classified (variety of l-ge form & subj. is so strong that hardly any common feature can be singled out) – the readers attention is attracted by every possible means: typographical, graphical, stylistic, etc.,

3) headline – a part of a larger whole (Function – to inform briefly of what the text is about; often shows attitude to the reported fact), should be short & catching to arose curiosity, attract attention. Headline writers resort to deliberate breaking, expressions, deformation of terms  Cakes & BITTER Ale

Syntactical classification of headlines: a) full declarative sentences  Allies now look to London, b) interrogative sentences  Do you love war?, c) nominative sentences  Gloomy Sunday, d) elliptical sentences Still in danger, e) with articles omitted Fire kills 15, f) with verbals (inf, gerund, participle)  To get US aid, g) questions in the form of statement  the worse the better? h) complex sentences, i) with direct speech The Queen: “My deep distress”

4) editorial – comments on events of the day, appeals to the mind & FEELINGS (Function – to influence by giving interpretation of certain facts, Purpose – to give the correct editor’s opinion).  The long-suffering British housewife needs a bottomless purse to cope with this scale of inflation.

12. Old English Grammar. A General Survey.

O.E. was a synthetic language. By “synthesism” we understand “simplicity”(but this is only an outward simplicity). It refers to grammatical forms which are used to form grammatical meanings. Here a parallel between O.E. and Russian is distinctly drawn.

e.g. писал – one grammatical morpheme can stand for many grammatical meanings- 3^rd person, singular, Past tense.

So, O.E. had a very well developed system of prefixes, suffixes and endings, which were employed to make up grammatical forms. The main methods of building grammatical forms were as follows:

1. Grammatical prefixes, suffixes and endings

2. Vowel alternation

3. Suppletive formation (or suppletion- супплетивизм)