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4.1 The notion of style in functional stylistics
The notion of style has to do with how we use the language under specific circumstances for a specific purpose. The notion of using English, for instance, involves much more than using our knowledge of its linguistic structure. It also involves awareness of the numerous situations in which English can be used as a special medium of communication with its own set of distinctive and recognizable features. The various branches of linguistics that investigate the topic, such as sociolinguistics, psycholinguistics, pragmatics, discourse analysis, textlinguistics, and stylistics present a remarkable range of methodologies and emphases. We'll be interested in how stylistic research treats of the subject.
Linguistic literature gives various definitions of the notion 'style' that generally boil down to the following three meanings of this term:
A variety of the national language traditionally used in one of the socially identifiable spheres of life that is characterised by a particular set of linguistic features, including vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation. These are chiefly associated with the social and regional varieties, such as educated, colloquial, low colloquial, dialectal, uneducated, etc. From this point of view the most broad and well known subdivision in many national languages today usually describes these varieties as neutral, literary (high) and colloquial (low): e.g. Cockney, upper-class, educated English.
Generally accepted linguistic identity of oral and written units of discourse, such as public speech, a lecture, a friendly letter, a newspaper article, etc. Such units demonstrate style not only in a special choice of linguistic means but in their very arrangement, i. e. composition of a speech act, that creates a category of text marked by oratory, scientific, familiar or pubhcist style.
Individual manner of expression determined by personal factors, such as educational background, professional experience, sense of humour, etc.: e.g. personal style of communication, the style of Pushkin's early poetry.
Style is our knowledge how language is used to create and interpret texts and conversational interactions. It involves being aware of the range of situations in which a language can be used in a distinctive and predictable way and of the possibilities available to us when we want to produce or respond to creative uses of the language.
Stylistic features relate to constraints on language use that may be only temporary features of our spoken or written language. We often adopt different group uses of language as we go through our day; we may use a different style speaking with our children in the family, reporting to our boss at work or practicing sports. We change our speaking or writing style to make a particular effect: imitating somebody's accent when telling a story, giving a humorous account of events in an informal letter and so on. Style is first and foremost the result of our choice of content of our message and the appropriate range of language means to deliver the message effectively.
Uses of English in numerous situations that require definite stylistic features are studied by the theory of functional styles.
This theory involves consideration of such notions as norm and function in their relation to style.
4.2 Correlation of style, norm and function in the language
Any national language uses the notion of 'correct language' which involves conformity to the grammatical, lexical and phonetic standards accepted as normative in this society. The favoured variety is usually a version of the standard written language, especially as encountered in literature or in the formal spoken language that most closely reflects litterary style. It is presented in dictionaries, grammars and other official manuals. Those who speak and write in this way are said to be using language 'correctly', those who do not are said to be using it 'incorrectly'. Correct usage is associated with the notion of the linguistic norm. The norm is closely related to the system of the language as an abstract ideal system. The system provides and determines the general rules of usage of its elements, the norm is the actual use of these provisions by individual speakers under specific conditions of communication.
Individual use of the language implies a personal selection of linguistic means on aU levels. When this use conforms to the general laws of the language this use wiU coincide with what is called the literary norm of the national language.
However the literary norm is not a homogeneous and calcified entity. It varies due to a number of factors, such as regional, social, situational, personal, etc.
The norm will be dictated by the social roles of the participants of communication, their age and family or other relations. An important role in the selection of this or that variety of the norm belongs to the purpose of the utterance, or its function. Informal language on a formal occasion is as inappropriate as formal language on an informal occasion. To say that a usage is appropriate is only to say that it is performing its function satisfactorily. We shall use different 'norms' speaking with elderly people and our peers, teachers and students, giving an interview or testimony in court. This brings us to the notion of the norm variation.
The norm of the language implies various realisations of the language structure that are sometimes called its subsystems, registers or varieties.
I. V. Arnold presents these relations as a system of oppositions:
Structure : : norm : : individual use National norm : : dialect
Neutral style : : colloquial style : : bookish style Literary correct speech : : common colloquial
Functional styles are subsystems of the language and represent varieties of the norm of the national language. Their evolution and development has been determined by the specific factors of communication in various spheres of human activity. Each of them is characterised by its own parameters in vocabulary usage, syntactical expression, phraseology, etc.
The term 'functional style' reflects peculiar functions of the language in this or that type of communicative interaction. Proceeding from the generally acknowledged language functions Prof. I. V. Arnold suggested a description of functional styles based on the combination of the linguistic functions they fulfil.
|
Function Style |
intellectual communicative |
pragmatic |
emotive |
phatic |
aesthetic |
|
|
oratorical |
+ |
+ |
+ |
+ |
+ |
|
|
colloquial |
+ |
+ |
+ |
+ |
- |
|
|
poetic |
+ |
- |
+ |
- |
+ |
|
|
publicist and newspaper |
+ |
+ |
+ |
- |
- |
|
|
official |
+ |
+ |
- |
- |
- |
|
|
scientific |
+ |
- |
- |
- |
- |
|
The table presents functional styles as a kind of hierarchy according to the number of functions fulfilled by each style, oratorical and scientific being almost complete opposites.
Language varieties: regional, social, occupational
However not all texts have boundaries that are easy to identify in the use of distinctive language. For example, the oratorical style has a lot. of common features with the publicist one, which in its turn is often comparable with the style of humanities, such as political science, history or philosophy.
The point of departure for discerning functional styles is the so-called neutral style that is stylistically non-marked and reflects the norms of the language. It serves as a kind of universal background for the expression of stylistically marked elements in texts of any functional type. It can be rarely observed in the individual use of the language and as Skrebnev remarked, perhaps, only handbooks for foreigners and primers could be qualified as stylistically neutral (47, p. 22).
4.4 An overview of functional style systems
As has been mentioned before there are a great many classifications of language varieties that are called sublanguages, substyles, registers and functional styles that use various criteria for their definition and categorisation. The term generally accepted by most Russian scholars is functional styles. It is also used in this course. A few classifications of the functional styles in modern English will be considered in this chapter.
Books by I. R. Galperin on English Stylistics (1958, 1971, 1977) are among most acknowledged sources of stylistic research in this country.
Galperin distinguishes 5 functional styles and suggests their subdivision into substyles in modern English according to the following scheme:
1. The Belles-Lettres Style:
a) poetry;
b) emotive prose;
c) the language of the drama.
2. Publicist Style:
a) oratory and speeches;
b) the essay;
c) articles.
3. Newspaper Style:
a) brief news items;
b) headlines;
c) advertisements and announcements;
d) the editorial.
4. Scientific Prose Style.
5. The Style of Official documents:
a) business documents;
b) legal documents;
c) the language of diplomacy;
d) military documents.
Prof. Galperin differs from many other scholars in his views on functional styles because he includes in his classification only the written variety of the language. In his opinion style is the result of creative activity of the writer who consciously and deliberately selects language means that create style. Colloquial speech, according to him, by its very nature will not lend itself to careful selection of linguistic features and there is no stylistic intention expressed on the part of the speaker. At the same time his classification contains such varieties of publicist style as oratory and speeches. What he actually means is probably not so much the spoken variety of the language but spontaneous colloquial speech, a viewpoint which nevertheless seems to give ground for debate. As we pointed out in sections two and three of this chapter individual speech, oral variety included, is always marked by stylistic features that show the
speaker's educational, social and professional background. Moreover we always assume some socially determined role and consciously choose appropriate language means to perform it and achieve the aim of communication.
Scholars' views vary on some other items of this classification. There is no unanimity about the belles-lettres style. In fact Galperin's position is not shared by the majority. This notion comes under criticism because it seems rather artificial especiaUy in reference to modern prose. It is certainly true that many works of fiction may contain emotionally coloured passages of emotive writing that are marked by special image-creating devices, such as tropes and figures of speech. These are typically found in the author's narrative, lyrical digressions, expositions, descriptions of nature or reflections on the characters' emotional or mental state.
At the same time many writers give an account of external events, social life and reproduce their characters' direct speech. Sometimes they quote extracts from legal documents, newspapers items, advertisements, slogans, headlines, e. g. K. Vonnegut, J. Dos Passos, etc. which do not belong to beUes-lettres style in its traditional meaning.
As a matter of fact, in modern works of fiction we may encounter practicaUy any functional speech type imaginable. So most other classifications do not distinguish the language of fiction as a separate style.
In 1960 the book "Stylistics of the English Language" by M. D. Kufc-netz and Y. M. Skrebnev appeared. The book was a kind of brief outline of stylistic problems. The styles and their varieties distinguished by these authors included:
1. Literary or Bookish Style:
a) publicist style;
b) scientific (technological) style;
c) official documents.
2. Free ("Colloquial") Style:
a) literary colloquial style;
b) familiar colloquial style.
As can be seen from this classification, both poetry and imaginative prose have not been included (as non-homogeneous objects) although the book is supplied with a chapter on versification.
Next comes the well-known work by I, V. Arnold "Stylistics of Modern English" (decoding stylistics) published in 1973 and revised in 1981. Some theses of this author have already been presented in this chapter (i. e. those that concern the notions of norm, neutrality and function in their stylistic aspect). Speaking of functional styles, Arnold starts With the a kind of abstract notion termed 'neutral style'. It has no distinctive features and its function is to provide a standard background for the other styles. The other 'real' styles can be broadly divided into two groups according to the scholar's approach: different varieties of colloquial styles and several types of literary bookish styles.
1. Colloquial Styles:
a) literary colloquial;
b) familiar colloquial;
c) common colloquial.
2. Literary Bookish Styles:
a) scientific;
b) official documents;
c) publicist (newspaper);
d) oratorical;
e) poetic.
This system presents an accurate description of the many social and extralinguistic factors that influence the choice of specific language for a definite communicative purpose. At the same time the inclusion of neutral style in this classification seems rather odd since unlike the others it's non-existent in individual use and should probably be associated only with the structure of the language.
One type of sublanguages suggested by Arnold in her classification - publicist or newspaper - fell under the criticism of Skrebnev who argues that the diversity of genres in newspapers is evident to any layman: along with the "leader" (or editorial) the newspaper page gives a column to political observers, some space is taken by sensational reports; newspapers are often full of lengthy essays on economics, law, morals, art, etc. Much space is also given to miscellaneous news items, local events; some papers publish sequences of stories or novels; and most papers sell their pages to advertising firms. This enumeration of newspaper genres could go on and on. Therefore, Skrebnev maintains, we can hardly speak of such functional style at all.
Of course Arnold is quite aware of the diversity of newspaper writings. However what she really means is the newspaper material specific of the newspaper only: political news, police reports, press reviews, editorials.
In a word, newspaper style should be spoken of only when the materials that serve to inform the reader are meant. Then we can speak of distinctive style - forming features including a special choice
of words, abundance of international words, newspaper cliches and nonce words, etc.
It should be noted however that many scholars consider the language of the press as a separate style and some researchers even single out newspaper headlines as a functional style.
One of the relatively recent books on stylistics is the handbook by A. N. Morokhovsky and his co-authors O. P. Vorobyova, N. I. Lik-nosherst and Z. V. Timoshenko "Stylistics of the English language" published in Kiev in 1984. In the final chapter of the book "Stylistic Differentiation of Modern English" a concise but exhaustive review of factors that should be taken into account in treating the problem of functional styles is presented. The book suggests the following style classes:
1. Official business style.
2. Scientific-professional style.
3. Publicist style.
4. Literary colloquial style.
5. Familiar colloquial style.
Each style, according to Morokhovsky has a combination of distinctive features. Among them we find oppositions like 'artistic - non-artistic', 'presence of personality - absence of it', 'formal - informal situation', 'equal - unequal social status' (of the participants of communication), 'written or oral form'. Morokhovsky emphasizes that these five classes of what he calls "speech activity" are abstractions rather than realities, they can seldom be observed in their pure forms: mixing styles is the common practice.
On the whole Morokhovsky's concept is one of the few that attempt to differentiate and arrange the taxonomy of cardinal linguistic notions. According to Morokhovsky's approach language as a system includes types of thinking differentiating poetic and straightforward language, oral and written speech, and ultimately, bookish and colloquial functional types of language. The next problem is stylistics of 'speech activity' connected with social stereotypes of speech behaviour. Morokhovsky defines this in the following way: "Stereotypes of speech behaviour or functional styles of speech activity are norms for wide classes of texts or utterances, in which general social roles are embodied - poet, journalist, manager, politician, scholar, teacher, father, mother, etc." (15, p. 234).
The number of stereotypes (functional styles) is not unlimited but great enough. For example, texts in official business style may be administrative, juridical, military, commercial, diplomatic, etc. Still further differentiation deals with a division of texts into genres. Thus military texts (official style) comprise 'commands, reports, regulations, manuals, instructions'; diplomatic documents include 'notes, declarations, agreements, treaties', etc. In addition to all this we may speak of 'the individual style' with regard to any kind of text.
In the same year (1984) V. A. Maltzev published a smaller book on stylistics entitled "Essays on English Stylistics" in Minsk.
His theory is based on the broad division of lingual material into "informal" and "formal" varieties and adherence to Skrebnev's system of functional styles.
Prof. Skrebnev uses the term sublanguages in the meaning that is usually attributed to functional styles. The major difference in his use of this term is that he considers innumerable situational communicative
products as sublanguages, including each speaker's idiolect. Each act of speech is a sublanguage. This makes the notion of functional style somewhat vague and difficult to define. At the same time Skrebnev recognizes the major opposition of 'formal' and 'informal' sphere of language use and suggests "a very rough and approximate gradation of subspheres and their respective sublanguages" (47, p. 200).
The formal sublanguages in Skrebnev's opinion belong exclusively to the written variety of lingual intercourse. He avoids the claim of inconsistency for including certain types of speeches into this sphere by arguing that texts of some of the types can be read aloud in public.
His rough subdivision of formal styles includes:
a) private correspondence with a stranger;
b) business correspondence between representatives of commercial or other establishments;
c) diplomatic correspondence, international treaties;
d) legal documents (civil law - testaments, settlements; criminal law - verdicts, sentences);
e) personal documents (certificates, diplomas, etc.).
The informal colloquial sphere includes ah types of colloquial language - literary, non-literary, vulgar, ungrammatical, social dialects, the vernacular of the underworld, etc. This cannot be inventoried because of its unlimited varieties.
Of course formal and informal spheres do not exist in severely separated worlds.
The user of the first speech type is fully aware of his social responsibility. He knows the requirements he has to meet and the conventions he
must observe. But the same person may change his lingual behaviour with the change of the environment or situation. Sometimes he is forced to abide by laws that are very different from those he regularly uses: speaking with children, making a speech before parliament or during an electoral campaign.
The first type of speech - 'formal' - comprises the varieties that are used in spheres of official communication, science, technology, poetry and fiction, newspaper texts, oratory, etc. It's obvious that many of these varieties can be further subdivided into smaller classes or sublanguages. For example, in the sphere of science and technology almost each science has a metalanguage of its own. The language of computer technology, e. g., is not so limited to the technological sphere as at the time of its beginnings - 'to be computer-friendly' has given rise to many other coinages like 'media-friendly', 'market-friendly', 'envhonmentally friendly', etc.
In the informal type of speech we sh n't find so many varieties as in the formal one, but it is used by a much greater number of people. The first and most important informal variety is colloquial style. This is the language used by educated people in informal situations. These people may resort to jargon or slang or even vulgar language to express their negative attitude to somebody or something.
Uneducated people speak "popular" or ungrammatical language, be it English or Russian.
There is also a problem of dialects that would require special consideration that cannot be done within this course. Dialects are not really "ungrammatical" types of a national language, some scholars hold, but a different language with its own laws. However
it may have been true in the last century but not now. And what Skrebnev writes on this problem seems to be argumentative enough.
"Dialects are current in the countryside; cities are nearly untouched by them. In the 19th century England some of the aristocracy were not ashamed of using their local dialects. Nowadays owing to the sound media (radio, cinema and TV) non-standard English in Britain is nearly, as in this country, a sure sign of cultural inferiority, e. g. the status of Соскnеу." (47, p. 198).
In his classification of functional styles of modern English that he calls language varieties the famous British linguist D. Crystal suggests the following subdivision of these styles: regional, social, occupational, restricted and individual. (33, 34)
Regional varieties of English reflect the geographical origin of the language used by the speaker: Lancashire variety, Canadian English, Cockney, etc.
Social variations testify to the speaker's family, education, social status background: upper class and non-upper class, a political activist, a member of the proletariat, a Times reader, etc.
Occupational styles present quite a big group that includes the following types:
a) religious English;
b) scientific English;
c) legal English;
d) plain (official) English;
e) political English;
f) news media English further subdivided into:
newsreporting;
journalistics;
broadcasting;
sportscommentary;
advertising.
Restricted English includes very tightly constrained uses of language when little or no linguistic variation is permitted. In these cases special rules are created by man to be consciously learned and used. These rules control everything that can be said. According to Crystal restricted varieties appear both in domestic and occupational spheres and include the following types:
a) knitwrite in books on knitting;
b) cookwrite in recipe books;
c) congratulatory messages;
d) newspaper announcements;
e) newspaper headlines;
f) sportscasting scores;
g) airspeak, the language of air traffic control;
h) emergencyspeak, the language for the emergency services;
i) e-mail variety, etc.
Individual variation involves types of speech that arise from the speaker's personal differences meaning such features as physique, interests, personality, experience and so on. A particular blend of social and geographical backgrounds may produce a distinctive accent or dialect. Educational history, occupational experience, personal skills and tastes, hobbies or literary preferences will foster the use of habitual words and turns of phrase, or certain kinds of grammatical construction.
Also noticeable will be favourite discourse practices - -a tendency to develop points in an argument in a certain way, or an inclination for certain kinds of metaphor. Some people are 'good conversationalists', 'good story-tellers', 'good letter-writers', 'good speech-makers'. What actually makes them so is the subject of stylistic research.
There are also a number of cases where individuality in the use of English - a personal style - is considered to be a matter of particular importance and worthy of study in its own right. Such is the study of the individual style of a writer or poet: Shakespeare's style, Faulkner's style, and the like.
4.5 Distinctive linguistic features of the major functional styles of English
A description of five major functional styles given in this section is based on their most distinctive features on each level of the language structure: pnonetical (where possible), morphological, syntactical, lexical and compositional. A peculiar combination of these features and special emphasis on some of them creates the paradigm of what is called a scientific or publicist text, a legal or other official document, colloquial or formal speech.
4.5.1 Literary colloquial style
Phonetic features
Standard pronunciation in compliance with the national norm, enunciation.
Phonetic compression of frequently used forms, e.g. it's, don't, Fve.
Omission of unaccented elements due to the quick tempo, e. g. you know him ?
Morphological features
Use of regular morphological features, with interception of evaluative suffixes e. g. deary, doggie, duckie.
Syntactical features
Use of simple sentences with a number of participial and infinitive constructions and numerous parentheses.
Syntactically correct utterances compliant with the literary norm.
Use of various types of syntactical compression, simplicity of syntactical connection.
Prevalence of active and finite verb forms.
Use of grammar forms for emphatic purposes, e. g. progressive verb forms to express emotions of irritation, anger etc.
Decomposition and ellipsis of sentences in a dialogue (easily reconstructed from the context).
Use of special colloquial phrases, e.g. that friend of yours. Lexical features
Wide range of vocabulary strata in accordance with the register of communication and participants' roles: formal and informal, neutral and bookish, terms and foreign words.
Basic stock of communicative vocabulary - stylistically neutral.
Use of socially accepted contracted forms and abbreviations, e. g. fridge for refrigerator, ice for ice-cream, TV for television, CD for compact disk, etc.
Use of etiquette language and conversational formulas, such as nice to see you, my pleasure, on behalf of, etc.
Extensive use of intensifiers and gap-fillers, e.g. absolutely, definitely, awfully, kind of, so to speak, I mean, if I may say so.
Use of interjections and exclamations, e. g. Dear me, My God, Goodness, well, why, now, oh.
Extensive use of phrasal verbs let sb down, put up with, stand sb up. Use of words of indefinite meaning like thing, stuff. Avoidance of slang, vulgarisms, dialect words, jargon. Use of phraseological expressions, idioms and figures of speech.
Compositional features
Can be used in written and spoken varieties: dialogue, monologue, personal letters, diaries, essays, articles, etc.
Prepared types of texts may have thought out and logical composition, to a certain extent determined by conventional forms (letters, presentations, articles, interviews).
Spontaneous types have a loose structure, relative coherence and uniformity of form and content.
4.5.2 Familiar colloquial style
Represented in spoken variety.
Phonetic features
Casual and often careless pronunciation, use of deviant forms, e. g. gonna instead of going to, whatcha instead of what do you, dunno instead of don't know.
Use of reduced and contracted forms, e.g. you're, they've, I'd.
Omission of unaccented elements due to quick tempo, e.g. you hear me?
Emphasis on intonation as a powerful semantic and styUstic instrument capable to render subtle nuances of thought and feeling. -
Use of onomatopoeic words, e.g. whoosh, hush, stop yodelling, yum, yak.
Morphological features
Use of evaluative suffixes, nonce words formed on morphological and phonetic analogy with other nominal words: e. g. baldish, mawkish, moody, hanky-panky, helter-skelter, plates of meet (feet), okeydoke,
Extensive use of collocations and phrasal verbs instead of neutral and literary equivalents: e.g. to turn in instead of to go to bed.
Syntactical features
Use of simple short sentences.
Dialogues are usually of the question-answer type.
Use of echo questions, parallel structures, repetitions of various kinds.
In complex sentences asyndetic coordination is the norm.
Coordination is used more often than subordination, repeated use of conjunction and is a sign of spontaneity rather than an expressive device.
Extensive use of ellipsis, including the subject of the sentence e.g. Can't say anything.
Extensive use of syntactic tautology, e. g. That girl, she was something else!
Abundance of gap-fillers and parenthetical elements, such as sure, indeed, to be more exact, okay, well.
Lexical features
Combination of neutral, familiar and low colloquial vocabulary, including slang, vulgar and taboo words.
Extensive use of words of general meaning, specified in meaning by the situation guy, job, get, do, fix, affair.
Limited vocabulary resources, use of the same word in different meanings it may not possess, e. g. 'some' meaning good: some guy! some game! 'nice' meaning impressive, fascinating, high quality: nice music.
Abundance of specific colloquial interjections: boy, wow, hey, there, ahoy.
Use of hyperbole, epithets, evaluative vocabulary, trite metaphors and simile, e.g. if you say it once more I'll kill you, as old as the hills, horrid, awesome, etc.
Tautological substitution of personal pronouns and names by other nouns, e.g. you-baby, Johnny-boy.
Mixture of curse words and euphemisms, e. g. damn, dash, darned, shoot.
Compositional features
Use of deviant language on all levels.
Strong emotional colouring.
Loose syntactical organisation of an utterance.
Frequently little coherence or adherence to the topic. No special compositional patterns.
4.5.3 Publicist (media) style
Phonetic features (in oratory)
Standard pronunciation, wide use of prosody as a means of conveying the subtle shades of meaning, overtones and emotions.
Phonetic compression. Morphological features
Frequent use of non-finite verb forms, such as gerund, participle, infinitive.
Use of non-perfect verb forms.
Omission of articles, link verbs, auxiliaries, pronouns, especially in headlines and news items.
Syntactical features
Frequent use of rhetorical questions and interrogatives in oratory speech.
In headlines: use of impersonal sentences, elliptical constructions, interrogative sentences, infinitive complexes and attributive groups.
In news items and articles: news items comprise one or two, rarely three, sentences.
Absence of complex coordination with chain of subordinate clauses and a number of conjunctions.
Prepositional phrases are used much more than synonymous gerundial phrases.
Absence of exclamatory sentences, break-in-the narrative, other expressively charged constructions.
Articles demonstrate more syntactical organisation and logical arrangement of sentences.
Lexical features
Newspaper cliches and set phrases.
Terminological variety: scientific, sports, political, technical, etc. Abbreviations and acronyms.
Numerous proper names, toponyms, anthroponyms, names of enterprises, institutions, international words, dates and figures.
Abstract notion words, elevated and bookish words.
In headlines: frequent use of pun, violated phraseology, vivid stylistic devices.
In oratory speech: words of elevated and bookish character, colloquial words and phrases, frequent use of such stylistic devices as metaphor, alliteration, allusion, irony, etc. Use of conventional forms of address and trite phases. Compositional features
Text arrangement is marked by precision, logic and expressive power. Carefully selected vocabulary. Variety of topics.
Wide use of quotations, direct speech and represented speech.
Use of parallel constructions throughout the text.
In oratory: simplicity of structural expression, clarity of message, argumentative power.
In headlines: use of devices to arrest attention: rhyme, pun, puzzle, high degree of compression, graphical means.
In news items and articles: strict arrangement of titles and subtitles, emphasis on the headline.
Careful subdivision into paragraphs, clearly defined position of the sections of an article: the most important information is carried in the opening paragraph; often in the first sentence.
4.5.4 The style of official documents
Morphological features
Adherence to the norm, sometimes outdated or even archaic, e. g. in legal documents.
Syntactical features
Use of long complex sentences with several types of coordination and subordination (up to 70 % of the text).
Use of passive and participial constructions, numerous connectives.
Use of objects, attributes and all sorts of modifiers in the identifying and explanatory function.
Extensive use of detached constructions and parenthesis.
Use of participle I and participle II as openers in the initial expository statement.
A general syntactical mode of combining several pronouncements into one sentence.
Information texts are based on standard normative syntax reasonably simplified.
Lexical features
Prevalence of stylistically neutral and bookish vocabulary.
Use of terminology, e. g. legal: acquittal, testimony, aggravated larceny; commercial: advance payment, insurance, wholesale, etc.
Use of proper names (names of enterprises, companies, etc.) and titles.
Abstraction of persons, e. g. use of party instead of the name. Officialese vocabulary: cliches, opening and conclusive phrases.
Conventional and archaic forms and words: kinsman, hereof, thereto, thereby, ilk.
Foreign words, especially Latin and French: status quo, force majeure, persona поп grata.
Abbreviations, contractions, conventional symbols: M. P. (member of Parliament), Ltd (limited), $, etc.
Use of words in their primary denotative meaning.
Absence of tropes, no evaluative and emotive colouring of vocabulary.
Seldom use of substitute words: it, one, that. Compositional features
Special compositional design: coded graphical layout, clear-cut subdivision of texts into units of information; logical arrangement of these units, order-of-priority organisation of content and information.
Conventional composition of treaties, agreements, protocols, etc.: division into two parts, a preamble and a main part.
Use of stereotyped, official phraseology.
Accurate use of punctuation.
Generally objective, concrete, unemotional and impersonal style of narration.
4.5.5 ScientificIacademic style Morphological features
Terminological word building and word-derivation: neologism formation by affixation and conversion.
Restricted use of finite verb forms.
Use of 'the author's we' instead of I.
Frequent use of impersonal constructions.
Syntactical features
Complete and standard syntactical mode of expression.
Syntactical precision to ensure the logical sequence of thought and argumentation.
Direct word order.
Use of lengthy sentences with subordinate clauses. Extensive use of participial, gerundial and infinitive complexes. Extensive use of adverbial and prepositional phrases. Frequent use of parenthesis introduced by a dash. Abundance of attributive groups with a descriptive function.
Preferential use of prepositional attributive groups instead of the descriptive of phrase.
Avoidance of ellipsis, even usually omitted conjunctions like 'that' and 'which'.
Prevalence of nominal constructions over the verbal ones to avoid time reference for the sake of generalisation.
Frequent use of passive and non-finite verb forms to achieve objectivity and impersonality.
Use of impersonal forms and sentences such as mention should be made, it can be inferred, assuming that, etc.
Lexical features
Extensive use of bookish words e. g. presume, infer, preconception, cognitive.
Abundance of scientific terminology and phraseology.
Use of words in their primary dictionary meaning, restricted use of connotative contextual meanings.
Use of numerous neologisms.
Abundance of proper names.
Restricted use of emotive colouring, interjections, expressive phraseology, phrasal verbs, colloquial vocabulary.
Seldom use of tropes, such as metaphor, hyperbole, simile, etc.
Compositional features
Types of texts compositionally depend on the scientific genre: monograph, article, presentation, thesis, dissertation, etc.
In scientific proper and technical texts e.g. mathematics: highly formalized text with the prevalence of formulae, tables, diagrams supplied with concise commentary phrases.
In humanitarian texts (history, philosophy): descriptive narration, supplied with argumentation and interpretation.
Logical and consistent narration, sequential presentation of material and facts.
Extensive use of citation, references and foot-notes.
Restricted use of expressive means and stylistic devices.
Extensive use of conventional set phrases at certain points to emphasise the logical character of the narration, e.g. as we have seen, in conclusion, finally, as mentioned above.
Use of digressions to debate or support a certain point,
Definite structural arrangement in a hierarchical order: introduction, chapters, paragraphs, conclusion.
Special set of connective phrases and words to sustain coherence and logic, such as consequently, on the contrary, likewise.
Extensive use of double conjunctions like as... as, either... or, both... and, etc.
Compositionally arranged sentence patterns: postulatory (at the beginning), argumentative (in the central part), formulative (in the conclusion).
Distinctive features described above by no means present an exhaustive nomenclature for each type. A careful study of each functional style requires investigation of the numerous types of texts of various genres that represent each style. That obviously cannot be done in the framework of this course. It is also one of the reasons why the style of literature has not been included in this description. It is hardly worthwhile trying to make any generalizations about the sphere of belles-lettres style, which includes such an array of genres whether in prose, or poetry, or drama, let alone the peculiar styles of separate authors.