The notion of the functional style of the language

Key Problems of the Lecture

Basic Notions

Stylistic Differentiation of the English Language

Lecture 8

1. The notion of the functional style of the language.

2. Deductive and inductive approaches to stylistic stratification of the English language.

3. I. Galperin's classification of the FS of the English language.

4. O. Morokhovsky's classification of the FS of the English language.

5. Main peculiarities of the FS of the English language.

A Functional Style of language is a system of interrelated language means which serves a definite aim in communication (I. Galperin).

Belles-letters style is the style of imaginative literature whose unique task is to impress the reader authentically (V. Kukharenko).

The Publicistic Style is the style which is characterized by explicit pragmatic function of persuasion directed at influencing the reader and shaping his views, in accordance with the name of the corresponding genre and its practitioners (V. Kukharenko).

The Newspaper Style is the style of informative materials, characteristic of newspaper only and not found in other publications (V. Kukharenko).

The Scientific Prose Style is the style which is characterized by the abundance of terms denoting objects, phenomena and processes characteristic of some particular field of science and technique. It is known for its precision, clarity and usage of cliches (V. Kukharenko).

The Official Document Style is the most conservative one, it preserves cast-iron forms of structuring and use of syntactical constructions and words long known as archaic and not observed anywhere else. Emotiveness and subjective modality are completely banned out of the official style (V. Kukharenko).

Functional style is defined by the Russian linguist I. Galperin as a patterned variety of literary text characterized by the greater or lesser typification of its constituents, supra-phrasal units, in which the choice and arrangement of interdependent and interwoven language media are calculated to secure the purport of the communication [10: 249].

Functional style is to be regarded as the product of a certain concrete task set by the sender of the message. As for the usage of functional styles, they appear mainly in the literary standard of the language.

We should also point out the flexibility of style boundaries: the borders within which a style presumably functions are not rigid and allow various degrees of overlapping and melting into each other. It is not accidental that rather often we speak of intermediate cases such as the popular scientific style which combines the features of scientific and belles-lettres style, or the style of new journalism which is a combination of publicist, newspaper and belles-lettres styles etc [17: 119].

Each FS is a relatively stable system at the given stage in the development of the literary language, but it changes, and sometimes considerably, from one period to another. Therefore functional style of language is a historical category. The development of each style is predetermined in the norms of standard English.

FS is also greatly influenced by changing social conditions, the progress of science and the development of cultural life in the country [10: 250].

Functional styles are not homogeneous and fall into several variants all having some central point of resemblance.

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