Analysis of borrowings from the Scandinavian and French languages

Among others one can find brochure, au pair, chauffeur, genre, semantics. In this respect French can be regarded as the most influential language on the vocabulary of English.4 Native speakers’ attitude towards borrowingsAs it is commonly known, English has borrowings from almost every European language as well as some Asian languages: Latin, Scandinavian, Celtic, Dutch, Low German, Greek, Arabic, Persian, etc. Because of it there are controversial views on the matter of borrowings in the English language because of the constant struggle between the concepts of lexical affluence of a language, and its purity.Those, who are against loanwords, claim that borrowings diminish the original language as well as eliminate the imagination and make the mind lazy and decadent [5]. However, abandoning loanwords would mean turning back to Old English, which, on the whole, used to be relatively pure in this respect.On the one hand, borrowing gives a language lexical enrichment. There is a variety of synonyms and antonyms all thanks to the phenomenon of borrowing. However, at some point, as it is in English, the amount of borrowed words can overcome the number of original words and that can lead to overcrowding and the loss of individuality of a language. This problem is exactly what purists have been fighting against.The purists speak mostly against the French borrowings in Middle English. Although French enlarged the English vocabulary by thousands of words, it also substituted almost all of the original words. Therefore it caused the forthcoming of doublets and in a way “renamed” almost all items in everyday life, except for farming vocabulary, which was used by servants, who continued to speak English. Until the standardization began, the process of lexical borrowing had been uncontrolled.Notwithstanding, borrowing still couldn’t be done without. During the period of Renaissance a lot of Latin woks were translated. As the English vocabulary didn’t have so many words in abundance to describe some vital thoughts or notions, the translators usually turned to borrowing the foreign words. The purists, in turn, expressed their strong objections to the matter, as the found these borrowings strange and called them ‘inkhorn terms’. They claimed that this method would only harm the general understanding and interpretation of a text[5].In spite of the numerous protests borrowings from different continued to come into English, and by the seventeenth century there were loanwords from more than fifty languages of the world. Thus in the nineteenth century the refusal of borrowed words was on its peak. Every word in print was considered according to its etymology, many words were rejected, such as gentlemanly, influential, execute. During Romanticism the tendency towards cultural revival was established, and all borrowed words were replaced with the original ones. However, that attempt proved unsuccessful since English, being prone to borrowings for a long time, lost its lexical and grammatical facilities.By the twentieth century English had acquired loanwords from nearly every language of the world. Linguists claim that there was no necessity in borrowing so many foreign words. They also suggest that semantic gaps can be filled by means of English itself and there is no need in further borrowings [5].Needless to say, that with the development of science and technology English itself became a language of borrowings as well as a global language.CONCLUSIONTo sum up, the loanwords of Scandinavian and French languages are extremely frequent in English. In fact, they are used so often and have such complicated etymology, that some of them can hardly be recognized.Comparing these two sources of loanwords, Scandinavian language, being more related to English, affected not only the vocabulary, but also a sufficient part of grammar, whereas French mostly influenced the lexical facilities of the English language.Chronologically Old Norse influenced Old English, whilst French borrowings have been appearing until now.Apart from Scandinavian and French English has borrowed words from Latin and Germanic Languages, as well as other European and Asian languages. One of the reasons is the speakers’ bilingualism, hence the integration of words. Another reason is the lack of lexical means when it comes to describing certain realia, especially ones related to other cultures and specific fields.As for the attitude of the native speakers towards the phenomenon of borrowings into the English language, it appears to be mostly negative. Despite enriching the language vocabulary and enabling variation of means of lexical expression, borrowing gives English more harm than enhancement. It means that the language itself does not develop but only uses words, expressions and even grammar structures borrowed from other languages.All things considered, the present-day English cannot do without loanwords, especially those, which have long been integrated into its linguistic system. It would lead to a great loss of linguistic properties that English has acquired throughout history. However, further borrowings can and should be restricted to an essential minimum, if not avoided at all, so that English does not lose its linguistic identity in the course of globalization.BIBLIOGRAPHYBaugh, A. & T. Cable. A History of the English Language/ London, New York: Routledge, 2007.Deutschmann, Mats A (Very) Brief History of English/ Mid Sweden University, 2003.Ferm Nicole Borrowings in the English Language English C/ Special Project/ Mid Sweden University, 2006.Millward, C. M. A Biography of the English Language/ Chicago: Holt, Rinehart, Winston, Inc., 2007.Ojeda, Juan R.G. Attitudes of English People towards Lexical Borrowing// GLOSAS DIDACTICAS №11/ PRIMAVERA, 2009 – 219-223 p.Oxford Online Dictionary/http://www.oxforddictionaries.com