Stylistic Classification of the English Vocabulary

1. General considerations. In order to get a more or less idea of the word stock of any language, it must be presented as a system, the elements of which are interconnected, interrelated and yet independent. The word stock of a language may be represented as a definite system in which different aspects of words may be singled out as interdependent. A special branch of linguistic science-lexicology - has done much to classify vocabulary. For our purpose, i. e. for linguistic stylistics, a special type of classification, stylistic classification is the most important.

Anaccordance with the division of language into literary and colloquial, we may represent the whole of the word stock of the English language as being divided into three main layers: the literary layer, the neutral layer and the colloquial layer. The literary and the colloquial layers contain a number of subgroups each of which has a property it shares with all the subgroups within the layer. This common property, which unites the different groups of words within the layer may be called its aspect. The aspect of the literary layer is its markedly bookish character. It is this that makes the layer more or less stable. The aspect of the colloquial layer of words is its lively spoken character. It is this that makes it unstable, fleeting.

The aspect of the neutral layer is its universal character. That means it is unrestricted in its use. It can be employed in all styles of language and in all spheres of human activity. The literary layer of words consists of groups accepted as legitimate members of the English vocabulary. They have no local or dialectal character. The colloquial layer of words as qualified in most English or American dictionaries is not infrequently limited to a definite language community or confine to a special locality where it circulates. The literary vocabulary consists of the following groups of words: 1) common literary; 2) terms and learned words; 3) poetic words; 4) archaic words; 5) barbarisms & foreign words; 6) literary coinages including nonce words.

The colloquial vocabulary falls into the following groups: 1) common colloquial words; 2) slang; 3) jargonisms; 4) professional words; 5) dialectal words; 6) vulgar words; 7) colloquial coinages.

The common literary, neutral and common colloquial words are grouped under the term standard English vocabulary.

4.Semasiological expressive means of the English language (figures of quality).

Figures of speech,ortropes (the terms used by Yu. M. Skrebnev), rhetorical figures (the term used by Edgar V. Roberts), or stylistic means of a language (the term used by I. R. Galperin, V. A. Kukharenko, and other Soviet linguists (see Bibliography) dealing with stylistics) are particular patterns and arrangements of thought that help to make literary works effective, persuasive, and forceful.

American and British stylists do not divide figures of speech, or, as they call them, rhetorical figures, into any classes or groups.

I. R. Galperin, V. A. Kukharenko, and other Soviet scholars classified all stylistic means of the English language into stylistic devices (SDs) and expressive means(EMs).

They defined stylistic devices as generative models, intentionally intensifying some property of a language unit in an unpredictable and original way. Overuse makes SDs lose their originality, become trite, and, sometimes, be fixed in dictionaries.

Expressive means are defined as language forms used for emotional or logical intensification. They are fixed in the grammars and dictionaries.

I. R. Galperin subdivided stylistic means into the following groups:

a)phonetic SDs(alliteration, assonance, onomatopoeia, rhyme, and rhythm);

b)lexical SDs and EMs

1) based on the interaction of the dictionary and contextual meanings(metaphor and its subtype (personification), metonymy and its subtypes (antonomasia, synecdoche), and irony);

2) based on the interaction of primary and derivative logical meanings(polysemy, zeugma, and pun);

3) based on the interaction of logical and emotive meanings (interjections, oxymoron, and epithet);

4) based on the interaction of logical and nominative meanings(simile, periphrasis, euphemism, hyperbole, and understatement);

c)syntactical SDs and EMs(climax, anticlimax, antithesis, attachment, asyndeton, polysyndeton, break-in-the-narrative, chiasmus, detachment, ellipsis, enumeration, litotes, parallel constructions, question-in-the-narrative, represented speech, rhetorical questions, suspense, inversion, and repetition).