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Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv Institute of Philology Department of English Philology and Intercultural Communication
Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv Institute of Philology Department of English Philology and Intercultural Communication
Institute of Philology
Course paper
of Bachelor’s programme
Bezuhla Tetiana
Supervised by
Olena Popivniak, PhD
Kyiv – 2022
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION……………………………………………………………………….
CONCLUSION…………………………………………………………………………..
REFERENCES…………………………………………………………………………..
INTRODUCTION
Language is a gift that only people can use, and the benefit of which for the
development of cultures and nations cannot be overestimated. This is a living structure,
the development of which has always attracted more and more researchers and
scientists. In recent years, it has begun to develop at an even faster rate than ever. Every
year, a huge number of new words are added to the dictionaries of many languages of
the world. Among them, abbreviations, acronyms, and other types of abbreviations have
long been present. For example, in English, the word "doh" that was made famous by
Homer Simpson on The Simpsons became an official word in the Oxford English
Dictionary, "used to comment on a foolish or stupid action, especially one's own." The
same situation happened with the abbreviation "Give me the 411", which the online
dictionary "Urban dictionary" translates as "Give me information"[17]. Undoubtedly, all
abbreviations, like the language itself as a whole, make it possible to better understand
both the culture of the people and their traditions.
It is worth noting that "Abbreviations and letter symbols are used to save space
and to avoid distracting the reader by use of repetitious words or phrases." [10; p. 222].
But it is important not to forget that it was the development of the Internet that pushed
society to create a "separate" language for communication in it. Therefore, we can also
say that using acronyms and abbreviations in everyday speech makes communication
easier and faster. Because it takes less time to say or write the first initial of each word
or an abbreviated form of the full word than to spell out every single word.
The object of the research is abbreviations and acronyms in Modern English.
The subject of this work is specific features of formation and usage of abbreviations
and acronyms in modern English slang. The objective of the research is to study the
concepts of abbreviations and acronyms, their diversity, classification; to analyze the
structural features of the formation of abbreviations and acronyms, and their usage in
modern English slang.
Given the fact that abbreviations and acronyms in wide use in the language began
to appear only in the middle of the 20th century, quite few authors covered this topic.
This is why every new work that explores the use and classification of these linguistic
structures is of great value for the study of language development in general. That is
why the subject of this work is of great relevance today.
Research methods are based on the method of critical analysis of theoretical
works of various scientists, descriptive, comparative and generalizing methods. The
novelty of the research lies in the study of the formation of abbreviations and acronyms
and the determination of the prerequisites for the formation of one or another of their
classifications. Supporting material for the work will be taken from popular Internet
sites, the subject of which is the study of the spread of Internet slang around the world,
the study of the mechanisms of origin of certain abbreviations or acronyms. Dictionaries
and books will also serve as material for the work for the correct definition of terms.
Also as supporting material for this work the examples from the movie universe of Star
Wars, thematic encyclopedias, books, and the slang language of heroes from films,
comics and games were selected.
In today's world, many things change at a very fast rate. All new inventions are
driving progress in the age of technology. On the basis of this, the language lives and
develops. Every year, more and more new words, terms, definitions, as well as new
abbreviations and acronyms are introduced into the language. Today, each language has
its own slang abbreviations, but, probably, English is one of the richest in this regard.
New words in English appear so quickly that they sometimes clog up the language. And
the age of technology and rapid development contributes to an increase in the number of
abbreviations in the language.
It is worth noting that one of those inventions that changed the course of language
development was the Internet. But the internet is not the only technological
phenomenon that has changed the way we talk. Radio, television, and telephones have
introduced their fair share of new words and phrases into our lexicon over the last
century. But as people spend more time online, they spend less time listening to the
radio and watching TV - and smartphones have blurred the line between phone and
internet. At this point, the internet is likely the most prevalent influence on our day-to-
day dialogue.
It is believed that the language itself changes rather slowly. But it is precisely the
Internet trends, mass media, radio and television that are the strongest driver of the
rapid development of the language. As David Crystal, honorary professor of linguistics
at the University of Bangor said BBC News: "Language itself changes slowly, but the
internet has sped up the process of those changes so people notice them more quickly."
Abbreviation is now trending in some languages. People use abbreviation as they
do not have any word to show a concept of some words in other languages. Moreover,
people need the effectiveness of a long phrase. People, for example, tend to use ASEAN
for Association of South East Asian Nation. It is easier to say the abbreviation than the
origin words or phrase.
Very little has been written on research into the use of acronyms and
abbreviation, but Kakoli Majumder writes: "Abbreviations are shortened forms of words
and phrases and are a common occurrence in research manuscripts as they can help
make highly complex technical writing more concise and easier to read." [8] In his work
Eline Rozaliya Winarto defines the abbreviation as: "Abbreviation is a process of one or
more lexeme removal or combining lexemes into a new word" [11, p. 55]. For the
designation of this concept, it is also worth referring to the online dictionary "Merriam-
webster", which defines this term as "An abbreviation is a shortened form of a written
word or phrase."[15].
By examining different definitions of the term abbreviation, it can be concluded
that an abbreviation is an abbreviated form of a written word or phrase in order to make
complex text more concise and easier to read by moving one or more lexemes or
combining lexemes into a new word.
There are no difficulties in understanding the meaning of an abbreviation because
people use it in their daily life. People will find the difficulties only when the
abbreviation is used only for specific community as their jargon. That is why it is worth
adhering to certain rules for the use of abbreviations, so that there are no incidental
situations in everyday life. These 4 rules for the use of abbreviations in written text
were developed by Kakoli Majumder [8]:
1. At the first mention, the abbreviation should be deciphered. This is especially true for
communication using slang English, since a large number of new such abbreviations
appear at a very high speed. And accordingly, not every person is able to know all of
them.
2. Many written texts, especially in popular genres such as magazines, newspapers or
any online resources, have their own rules for the use of abbreviations and abbreviations
of different types. For example, in some magazines, the rules of use state that an
abbreviation for a concept can be replaced only if it is used more than three times. Other
online resources or newspapers may have a separate list of which abbreviations can be
used without special decoding. Slang abbreviations of any kind are often included in
such lists.
3. It is also important to adhere to the general accepted style of use. For example, in
some written sources, the rules contain recommendations not to start a paragraph or a
sentence with abbreviations. This paragraph also includes the fact that a persone need to
pay attention to whether abbreviations should be used in lower or upper case letters.
4. It is also worth paying special attention to the use of abbreviations such as "eg", "ie"
and "et al." Incorrect dot placement or spelling in the wrong case can be considered a
serious error.
Acronym is used in almost each language. The usage of acronym is for the
reason of effectiveness. People, recently, are in a hurry in doing their activities. They
tend to shorten everything, thus acronym exists. R. S. Ginzburg states in his work that
"Acronyms are regular vocabulary units spoken as words."[3, p. 189].
In his work, can be also seen the statement that acronyms and letter abbreviations
are lexical abbreviations of a phrase, among them there are different types, but there is
no consensus among scientists whether all of them can be considered regular
vocabulary units. Nevertheless, it seems logical to distinguish between acronyms and
letter abbreviations [3, p.189].
It is also worth noting that the Oxford Online Dictionary gives roughly the same
definition: "Acronym is a word formed from the first letters of the words that make up
the name of something, for example 'AIDS' is an acronym for 'acquired immune
deficiency syndrome' "[16].
There is also the definition from the Cambridge Online Dictionary: "An acronym
is an abbreviation consisting of the first letters of each word in the name of something,
pronounced as a word"[12].
Despite the fact that the definitions of acronyms and abbreviation are seemed
similar, there are several differences between them. It is worth noting that the concept
of abbreviation is used by linguists not only in the meaning mentioned above, but also
in its narrower meaning. An abbreviation in the broad sense of the term is a shortened
form of a word or phrase formed using a variety of methods. However, the abbreviation
in the narrower sense of the term is a subspecies of the abbreviation, formed from the
first letters of words, which is used mainly in writing. It is called lexical abbreviation.
From the above, we can also conclude that an acronym is also a subspecies of the broad
concept of an abbreviation, but still has one main difference. They also consist of initial
letters or sounds, but unlike abbreviations, they are pronounced together, like a normal
word.
A description of this difference is given by the online dictionary "Merriam-
webster" [15]. An acronym is a kind of abbreviation. Abbreviations can be shortened
forms of any kind. For example, appt is an abbreviation of appointment, and ASAP is
an abbreviation of as soon as possible. ASAP, however, also qualifies as an acronym
because it is made up of the initial letters of the phrase it comes from: as soon as
possible."
Also, the same dictionary describes the difference between an acronym and
initialism, a subspecies of the broad concept of an abbreviation. "Both acronyms and
initialisms are made up of the first letter or letters of the words in a phrase. The word
acronym typically applies when the resulting thing can be read as a word; for example,
radar comes from "radio detection and ranging" and scuba comes from "self-contained
underwater breathing apparatus." The word initialism only applies when the resulting
thing is read as an abbreviation; for example DIY, which comes from "do it yourself," is
pronounced by saying the names of the letters. Note that the word acronym is also
sometimes used to mean "initialism."
SUPPORTING MATERIALS