New Words New Words New PhrasesNew PhrasesChanging English in

the Twenty-first Century

Raymond Hickey English LinguisticsEssen University

Structure of presentation

1) Resources for the structure of and change in the vocabulary of English

2) The framework of the presentation

3) Some generalisations about English vocabulary,e.g. alliteration and rhyming phrases

4) A classification of semantic change

5) Conclusion

Overviews of English vocabulary

Books on New Words

What does the the Oxford English Dictionary say?

Available corpora for investigating semantic change in present-day

English

The Bank of English

project at the University of Birmingham

The framework of this presentation

The framework of this presentation

n The developments to be presented here have been taking place in English in major anglophone countries with first-language populations, e.g. Britain, USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, etc. They do not arise in the strongly vernacular varieties in these countries but rather appear in the supraregional forms of English (more or less standard English), much as do other phenomena such as quotative ‘like’, a feature of informal registers of standard English.

The framework of this presentation

n The forms which are quoted here stem from a collection of data gathered over a number of years (beginning in 2001) from media sources, chiefly BBC radio and television, supplemented by data from USA media sources (CNN, NBC, FoxNews).

Trends in society and semantic changeOne obvious source for new words in present-day English lies in the

renaming mania which is found throughout the anglophone world (and not just there) and which has its roots in ‘political correctness’which demands that things be renamed to make them more publically acceptable and seem more positive than the older terms.

So one now has flight attendants for air hostesses (this has the advantage of gender neutrality),

old-age pensioners are now senior citizensdustmen are now waste collectors (and sanitation engineers is

sometime used, though this is actually something else)developmental aid is now economic co-operation

Some renamings are seemingly unmotivated. It is hard to see howprotection officers is an improvement on the previous body guards.

Note that the older term may often be more common in colloquial speech.

Typical features of English vocabulary

Alliterative constructions

n The present-day language is very productive in this sphere. The rapid rise of new alliterative constructions continues a tradition already quite established in English (bed and breakfast).

n new formations appear frequently more or less spontaneously (too posh to push ‘increasing frequency of unnecessary Caesarian sections among middle class women’).

n gas-guzzlern gender gap (orthographic alliteration)n loony leftn mean machine ‘high-performance sports team’n canteen culturen cardboard city (orthographic)n lager loutn lollipop ladies ‘wardens guiding children across roads’n mattress moneyn road ragen cold calling ‘unsolicited calls on prospective customers’n lava lamp ‘lamp with transparent viscous liquid’n carry the can ‘take responsibility’(OED: 1929)

Alliterative constructions

n in some instances the semantics is bent somewhat to fit the phonetics (reformers and wreckers ‘supporters and opponents of change’)

n a more common situation is where the exact interpretation of the alliterative construction must be known to the hearer or derivable from the speech context:

n web-wise ‘able to use the internet’n free and fair elections

Alliterative constructions

n meeting of minds n from plough to platen pension pot ‘the money accrued in a pension fund’n metric martyrs ‘people who suffer legal

consequences from their refusal to use metric measurements’

n pay with plastic, flexible friends ‘credit cards’n rural rebels ‘people opposed to the hunting ban’n digital divide ‘gap between individuals/sections of

society with regard to informational technology’

Alliterative constructions

Rhyming constructions

n Second only to alliteration is the use of rhyme as a device for achieving a prosodic link between two words in a phrase.

n dream teamn easy peasy ‘ridiculously simple’n pay and display n name and blame/name and shame n pooper-scooper ‘shovel for gathering dogs’ excrement’n sagbag ‘large beanbag used as seat’n happy-clappy ‘show emotion at church services’n gender-bender ‘person who adopts manners and dress

of opposite sex’n snail-mail n toy-boyn barmy army ‘eccentric group of older individuals’n no gain without pain

n occasionally, adaptations of existing rhyming constructions are made (more spinned against that spinning (with reference to the dismissal of a well-known spin doctor in the English government) on the analogy of more sinned against than sinning.)

n A few of the phrases to be found are only semi-rhymes, for instance where only the vowel is common to the two words of the couplet as in squeaky clean.

Productivity of alliteration and rhyme

n Alliterative or rhyming combinations are common in contemporary English and indeed extend to nonce formations as in the following case:

n Vouchers will go, but they will probably just be replaced by some funny money scheme.

n As with all nonce creations, the essential requirement is that they be readily interpretable to hearers. This sets bounds on productivity here but the range within these limits is nonetheless considerable.

Binomials

n Binomials are two nouns which are treated as a pair in a phrase and linked by the conjunction and.

n Oft they are alliterative or rhyming as in meeter and greeter.

n Instances of two nouns together such as canteen culture, lager lout or road rage are not binomials but juxtaposed nouns in which the first is a qualifier, i.e. has the function of an adjective or the first element of a compound.

Binomials

n There is also a small residue of formations, functional compounds or binomials which are neither rhyming nor alliterating:

n kiss and tell ‘sexually engaging someone and then betraying him (her?)’

n movers and shakers ‘people who get things done efficiently’

n park and ride ‘splitting a journey into a city between a car and a bus or a train’

A classification of semantic change

Increase in semantic range

The semantic range of words can be increased by taking specific connotations and using them more generally.

(i) golden (‘financially rewarding; decisive’)golden handshake (original); golden handcuffs, golden hello, golden parachute; golden goal

(ii) granny (‘referring to senior citizens’) granny dumping, granny flat

(iii) designer (‘referring to film and fashion; made-to-measure’)designer suits, designer stubble, designer drug, designer baby

(iv) potato (‘someone passive and lacking in energy’) couch potato, mouse potato ‘someone excessively engaged in computing’

Noun re-duplication

n He’s a linguist’s linguist.n It’s a job job ‘It's a full-time job’n He’s like a man man ‘He is a real man’

The re-duplication to be seen here has the effect of reinforcing the statement made, just as is the case with re-duplicating adjectives. This is probably the origin of the structure.

Motivated semantic shifts

The close connection between process and result, a metonymic relationship, is often the source of semantic shift. This connection is what links the meanings of chase and catch in English, both ultimately form the same Romance source.

Another type of motivated semantic shift is embodied in the relationship between an action and the instrument for performing it and can be seen in present-day English This is the 3.45 service to Cambridge.

Change in verb complemention: Shift to direct object

n He reported (to) me the following day.n To appeal (against) this decision.n The first to protest (about) the idea were the

LibDems.n He recommended (to) me reporting it to the chief

officer.

Change in verb complemention: Shift to direct object

This does have a certain pedigree and there are instances attested in recent centuries. For instance the verb scold ‘chide, reproach’ previously a preposition complement with at. Here are the early attestations from the OED:

1673 I told her I came to be merry and not to be scolded at. 1722 I scolded heartily at him when he came back. 1822 All women love to be married, were it only for the sake of having somebody to scold at.

The switch from noun to verb: Conversion

The plant has been mothballed since the very beginning.Can you fax me the form?to mailshot the electorateto resource them betterCan you pause the machine?We overnighted in Athlone.We need to ring-fence the funding of arms to the rebels.I’ll text her a message when I get home.She bikes to the department every day.We towelled after the swim.There is no evidence that Al-Qaida is headquartered in that country.We must be properly resourced for the job.

Verbal phrase to noun or adjective

It’s a must-have item.It was such a put-down.There’ll be no let-up in the fight against terrorism.the planned Israeli pull-outa pull-up for our companythe run-up to the electionThere was time for a run-through that afternoon.a get-out clausea push-over, several lay-offsjoined-up action/thinking

Compound adjectives

The building of this road was part-financed by an EU grant.The service is grant-maintained.If you are time-rich but cash-poor.I just wanted to say that I am work-ready in case anything turns up.The parcels were tamper-evident.

Conversion via the gerund

Noun > Gerund > Finite Verb

vacation, holiday > vacationing, holidaying > to vacation, holiday

It will change the way we holiday/ vacation in future

Adjective from verbal, prepositional or adverbial phrase

The better suburbs constitute a gated community. <The better suburbs constitute a community which lives behind gates.

You´re dealing with receipted childminders. <You´re dealing with childminders who issue receipts.

You see, I’m a separated father. <You see, I’m a father separated from his children.

The dress she had on was very last season.That’s really up-front of him.

When is a change a change?

OED has trash as a verb (esp. informal North American English):He got trashed for making that statement in public.

Both OED and Merriam-Webster have critique as a transitive verb (with inanimate object) dating from mid 18th century. However, in the following instance we have an extension to an animate object.This is not the time to critique the administration for what they have done.

Neither the OED or Merriam-Webster has the verb cheapshot which derives from to take a cheapshot at someone.They’re just looking for an opportunity to cheapshot the president.

Conclusion

What can we conclude form the types of changes listed above?

1) English has a predilection for alliteration andrhyming structures.

2) There is a tendency in English to increasingly use compactsyntactic structures; this is ‘permissible’ give the analytic natureof its grammar.

Conclusion

It is true that many of the new structures are typical of media language use (journalese, headlinese) but they can diffuse, and have to a certain extent diffused, into general usage and thus become established as characteristic of the language as a whole.

The compaction and conversion which can be observed at present are in fact a continuation of tendencies already present in the language and are thus in keeping with the typology of English as a whole.

Raymond Hickey 2006. ‘Productive lexical processes in present-day English , in: Mair, Christian, Reinhard Heuberger and Josef Wallmannsberger 2006. Corpora and the History of English. A Festschrift for Manfred Markus. Heidelberg: Winter, 2006, pp. 153-168.

Thank you for your attention.

Raymond HickeyEnglish LinguisticsUniversity of Duisburg and Essen

raymond.hickey@uni-due.de