XI Международная студенческая научная конференция Студенческий научный форум - 2019

English newspaper writing dates from the 17^th century. The first of any regular English newspapers was the Weekly News, which first appeared in May 23, 1622. The early English newspaper was principally a vehicle of information. Commentary found its way into the newspapers later.

It lasted for some twenty years till in 1641 it ceased publication. The 17th century saw the rise of a number of other news sheets, which, with varying success, struggled on in the teeth of discouragement and restrictions imposed by the Crown. With the introduction of a strict licensing system many such sheets were suppressed, and the Government, in its turn, set before the public a paper of its own—The London Gazette, first published on February 5, 1666. The paper was semi-weekly and carried official information, royal decrees, news from abroad, and advertisements.

But as far back as the middle of the 18^th century the British newspaper was very much like what it is today, carrying foreign and domestic news, advertisements, announcements and articles containing comments.

The first English daily newspaper—the Daily Courant— was brought out on March 11, 1702. The paper carried news, largely foreign, and no comment, the latter being against the principles of the publisher, as was stated in the first issue of his paper. Thus, the early English newspaper was principally a vehicle of information. Commentary as a regular feature found its way into the newspapers later.

The rise of the American newspaper, which was brought onto American soil by British settlers, dates back to the late 17th, early 18th centuries.

It took the English newspaper more than a century to establish a style and a standard of its own. And it is only by the 19th century that newspaper English may be said to have developed into a system of language media, forming a separate functional style.

The specific conditions of newspaper publication, the restrictions of time and space, have left indelible mark on newspaper English. For more than a century writers arid linguists have been vigorously, attacking "the slipshod construction and the vulgar vocabulary" of newspaper English. The very term newspaper English carried a shade of disparagement.

Not all the printed matter found in newspapers comes under newspaper style. The modern newspaper carries material of an extremely diverse character. On the pages of a newspaper one finds not only news and comment on it, press reports and articles, advertisements and announcements, but also stories and poems, crossword puzzles, chess problems and the like. Since the latter serve the purpose of entertaining the reader, they cannot be considered specimens of newspaper style.

Information in the English newspaper is conveyed, in the first place, through the medium of:

brief news items;

press reports (parliamentary, of court proceedings, etc.);

articles purely informational in character;

advertisements and announcements.

The newspaper also seeks to influence public opinion on political and other matters. Elements of appraisal may be observed in the very selection and way of presentation of news, in the use of specific vocabulary, such as allege and claim, casting some doubt on the facts reported, and syntactic constructions indicating a lack of assurance on the part of the reporter as to the correctness of the facts reported or his desire to avoid responsibility. The headlines of news items, apart from giving information about the subject-matter, also carry a considerable amount of appraisal (the size and arrangement of the headline, the use of emotionally coloured words and elements of emotive syntax), thus indicating the interpretation of the facts in the news item that follows. But, of course, the principal vehicle of interpretation and appraisal is the newspaper article and the editorial in particular. Editorials (leading articles or leaders) are characterized by a subjective handling of facts, political or otherwise. They have much in common with classical specimens of publicistic writing and are often looked upon as such. However, newspaper evaluative writing unmistakably bears the stamp of newspaper style. Thus, it seems natural to regard newspaper articles, editorials included, as coming within the system of English newspaper style. But it should be noted that while editorials and other articles in opinion columns are predominantly evaluative, newspaper feature articles, as a rule, carry a considerable amount of information, and the ratio of the informative and the evaluative varies substantially from article to article.

To understand the language peculiarities of English newspaper style it will be sufficient to analyze the following basic newspaper features:

brief news items;

advertisements and announcements;

the headline;

the editorial.

Newspaper style has its specific vocabulary features and is characterized by an extensive use of:

special political and economic terms (president, election);

non-term political vocabulary (nation, crisis, agreement, member);

newspaper clichés (pressing problem, danger of war, pillars of society);

abbreviations (NATO, EEC);

neologisms.

Thus, English newspaper style may be defined as a system of interrelated lexical, phrase logical and grammatical means, which is perceived by the community as a separate linguistic unity that serves the purpose of informing and instructing the reader.

Newspaper style should not be confused with publicist style. Not everything found in a newspaper should be included in newspaper style such as publicist essays and feature articles. Znamenskaya distinguishes certain features, which are typical for newspaper style:

Morphological features - frequent usage of non-finite verb forms; omission of articles, link verbs, auxiliaries, pronouns;

Syntactical features - use of impersonal sentences, elliptical constructions, interrogative sentences, infinitive complexes and attributive groups;

Lexical features - newspaper clichés and set phrases; terminological variety; abbreviations and acronyms; numerous proper names;

Compositional features - carefully selected vocabulary; variety of topics; wide use of quotations.

Newspaper is a very important thing in our life. Reading of newspapers has become a habit for most of us. A good newspaper is useful for everyone. They have a greater value for all, especially in a democracy. They keep us well informed. They increase our general knowledge. They tell us what is happening around us. They are the world’s mirrors. Newspaper style has its specific features, which distinguish it from other styles. And that is why newspaper style is studied as a separated type of functional style in English stylistic.

References:

Гальперин И.Р. Стилистика английского языка / И.Р. Гальперин. – М.: Высшая школа, 1981;

Знаменская Т.А. Стилистика английского языка / Основы курса. Учебное пособие. – М.: 2016;

https://www.academia.edu;

https://studfiles.net.

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