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UNIVERSIDAD TÉCNICA PARTICULAR DE LOJA
La Universidad Católica de Loja
ESCUELA DE CIENCIAS DE LA EDUCACIÓN
MENCIÓN INGLÉS
MODALIDAD ABIERTA Y A DISTANCIA
A DESCRIPTIVE ANALYSIS OF ANGLICISMS
USED IN ECUADORIAN NEWSPAPERS
Research done in order to achieve
the Bachelor’s Degree in Teaching
English as a Foreign Language
AUTORA:
TAY LEE SUN LING
DIRECTORA:
MGS. PINZA ELIANA
CENTRO REGIONAL QUITO
2010
CERTIFICATION
Eliana Pinza Tapia
CERTIFIES THAT:
This research study has been thoroughly revised by the graduation
committee. Therefore, authorizes the presentation of this thesis, which
complies with all the norms and internal requirements of the Universidad
Técnica Particular de Loja.
Loja, September, 2010
…………………………………….
THESIS ADVISOR
CONTRATO DE CESIÓN DE DERECHOS
DE TESIS DE GRADO
“Yo, SUN LING TAY LEE declaro ser autora del presente trabajo y eximo
expresamente a la Universidad Técnica Particular de Loja y a sus
representantes legales de posibles reclamos o acciones legales.
Adicionalmente declaro conocer y aceptar la disposición del Art. 67 del
Estatuto Orgánico de la Universidad Técnica Particular de Loja que en su
parte pertinente textualmente dice: “formar parte del patrimonio de la
Universidad la propiedad intelectual de investigaciones,
trabajos
científicos o técnicos y tesis de grado que se realicen a través, o que el
apoyo
financiero,
académico
o
institucional
Universidad”.
…………………………………………
Sun Ling Tay Lee
AUTORA
(operativo)
de
la
AUTHORSHIP
The thoughts, ideas, opinions and the information obtained through this
research are the only responsibility of the author.
Loja, September, 2010
………………………………………..
Sun Ling Tay Lee
AUTHOR
DEDICATION
This final study is dedicated with all my love to my family Fernando and
Daniela, both of them, my major blessings. Only with their
unconditional support, love and patience I have been able to achieve this
new step of my life.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
To God, Great Architect of the Universe, to Universidad Técnica
Particular de Loja, its authorities and to my advisor Mgs. Eliana Pinza
Tapia, the ideal advisor, for her invaluable guidance to fulfill this
research.
CONTENTS TABLE
Certification
i
Contrato de Cesión de Derechos
ii
Authorship
iii
Dedication
iv
Acknowledgment
v
Abstract
1
Introduction
3
Methodology
7
Results
11
Discussion
Theoretical Background
27
Description, Analysis and Interpretation of Results
59
Conclusions
99
Bibliography
Annexes
102
Abstract
The following thesis has as theme “A descriptive analysis of
anglicisms used in Ecuadorian newspapers”.
It basically looks for understanding the variation in language
usage in newspapers regarding the expressions containing anglicisms at
the same time identifying which are the really necessary ones among
them.
It took place in Quito, based on a bibliographic method for
gathering
the
scientific
material
necessary
for
the
theoretical
background. Then the Analytic and Descriptive methods were used in
order to fulfill the field investigation, as well as to do the descriptive and
statistical analysis, and the interpretation of the data gathered through
the field research.
The research was applied considering the sample which consisted
of three newspapers: El Comercio, Ultimas Noticias and El Extra, with
their sections: News, Ads, Reports, Social and Sports.
Moreover as
techniques we used selection of written material, note-taking to collect
bibliographic information and interviews to linguists, journalists and
readers.
This methodological design was completed with the use of
instruments like interview and charts forms.
This paper provides a linguistic, semantic-syntactic, morphologic
analysis of the chosen thirty anglicisms; we also add appropriate
equivalents which could avoid the excess of redundant borrowed terms.
After
doing
the
cited
analysis
including
comparative
and
sociological ones we found that the subvariables with highest frequency
of anglicisms
use
do not
differ from
one
variable
to
another.
Furthermore, anglicisms are well accepted by a certain group of readers
and neglected by others, who consider them unnecessary due to the
richness our language. Undoubtedly languages are dynamic and, as a
consequence, they are continuously changing. Language borrowings are
evidence of such a change.
Introduction
Languages are dynamic and as a result they are continuously
changing.
This
phenomenon
is
nowadays
observed
in
a
widely
acknowledged upsurge in anglicisms.
In our country, especially in its two major cities Quito and
Guayaquil, we find a huge influence of English. This influence is clearly
observed in the more usual loan of English words in one field: their
newspapers. This upsurge is due to factors such as the arrival of workers
from English speaking countries, immigration, and subsequent economic
and political involvement, and during the last years the denomination of
Ecuador as a touristic destiny.
Besides, we can not forget the cited
phenomenon
spurred
of
commercialism,
globalization
and
specially
the
on
by
development
North
and
American
access
to
communication media such as: cable television, and movies which are
showed almost at the same time as they are in United States, Internet,
press and magazines.
All these factors have conducted to the bigger
importance anglicisms acquired everyday as part of our speech.
Sensitive to the need for a deeper linguistic analysis of anglicisms
use in Ecuadorian newspapers, which has unfortunately been an
unexplored area, the University has settled the theme “A descriptive
analysis of anglicisms used in Ecuadorian newspapers” as the final
research before obtaining our degree.
In this way the University, and
specifically we, the students, have the great opportunity to present new
information which will be used for further analysis. We have the
challenge to give to the community material that has already been
studied in other countries, but not in ours.
One important part of our work is the theoretical background
which is based on information taken from different bibliographical
sources.
At this point we can mention the utility of previous studies
about our topic.
them.
However it was quite a difficult assignment to find
What we found were studies made in Spain, Argentina and
Venezuela about topics referred to anglicisms but not to their direct use
in newspapers, such as: economic anglicisms, anglicisms in Buenos
Aires Spanish and lastly English borrowings in Venezuelan Spanish in
their order. Nevertheless, they were not about our specific topic, they
were extremely useful for the development of our work.
Besides this limitation, we had another one when referring to the
articles to be read in order to find out anglicisms use. Fortunately it was
solved by reading almost all of the information in each newspaper.
In order to understand the importance of this research we cite its
Specific Objectives as follows:
•
To identify syntactic and lexical anglicisms more commonly used in
newspaper material in Ecuador.
Through the exhaustive reading of the newspapers chosen as sample, we
could identify those anglicisms more commonly used in there. We found
more than 50 anglicisms with a total repetition of more than 500 times
as a whole.
• To do a deep analysis of the anglicisms found in Ecuadorian
newspapers
regarding
etymological,
syntactic-semantic
and
morphological aspects.
With the help of both dictionaries, one from the Royal Academy of
Spanish Language and Merriam’s Webster it was quite an unproblematic
objective to fulfill.
Fortunately these dictionaries had the complete
information, which was very useful to do the requested analysis.
•
To determine the written sections of Ecuadorian newspapers in
which anglicisms are mostly used.
With the conscious reading of the newspapers, and the clear directions
given by our teachers, to do the charts and statistic data, it was possible
to determine the sections in our newspapers in which anglicisms are
mostly used.
•
To know the level of acceptance that Ecuadorians have on the use
of anglicisms in newspapers.
Because the chosen linguists were specialized in Spanish language, we
could have a clear idea about the opinions this group of professionals
has around anglicisms use. It was interesting to hear their reluctance to
foreign loans and the reasons for this disapproval.
On the other hand
we had readers’ opinions, who have a more opened attitude towards
anglicisms. About this point I would like to point out that my research
would be more complete and accurate if as part of the instruments I
would have applied surveys to a more extent sample. However, with the
collected information I could achieve this objective in a satisfactory way.
It
can
be
concluded that anglicisms are
constantly being
incorporated to our daily speech. They are accepted by the population,
and they are not only part of specific jargons, they are starting to be
incorporated to many other fields. To be able to understand them in a
professional way it is extremely important to consider English in a global
context, which at least indirectly, influences the borrowing of one or
several words elements into other languages.
This research is expected
to help its readers to have a clear view about anglicisms penetration,
their use and level of acceptance in our written media press.
Methodology
To fulfill our research, we have followed some clear and very
important steps. Noticing that the topic to be carried out is “A descriptive
analysis
of
anglicisms
undeniably basic
used
in
Ecuadorian
newspapers”
it
was
to set up the information required for the further
processing, presentation, analysis, description, and interpretation of the
data that will be collected once the Field Research was done.
To gather the information in order to support the Theoretical
Background, many sources were consulted, including a variety of books,
magazines and internet pages.
The amount of information for this part
was so huge that one of the most difficult assignments was to compile
this information into the scheme requested by the University, trying to
use only the most relevant and supporting opinions, facts, definitions,
specific data, etc.
After the theoretical background was presented and approved by
the group in charge of the graduation program the next step was to
present the results obtained from the field investigation.
In order to carry out this practical research the sample was
selected based on the capability to collect it. Thus, the sample consisted
in newspapers which have circulation in Quito. They were collected
through seven consecutive days, however Sunday November 29th was not
considered because that day not all the newspapers had circulation in
the city. In other words the dates went from November 24th 2009 to
December 1st 2009.
The chosen sample, also considered as our variables are: El
Comercio (newspaper with national circulation), Ultimas Noticias (local
newspaper) and Extra (tabloid or sensationalist newspaper). At the same
time, the sections taken into account to fulfill the research and which are
our subvariables are: News, Ads, Social and Culture pages, Reports and
Sports.
The three cited newspapers were chosen because I consider they
are the most representative of their kind and constitute a good sample to
develop this investigation.
After collecting the newspapers, the next step consisted in a deep
and conscious reading of them in order to find out as many anglicisms as
it was possible. Once the anglicisms were located we had to continue
with their organization. To achieve this, the information was classified
day by day, and is showed through 15 charts. In each of them, the
information is presented considering the Variable, Subvariable and the
context where they appear plus the number of repetition it presents. On
the other hand, Charts 16, 17 and 18 present the frequency of
anglicisms use in the Subvariables of each newspaper. Finally Chart 19
presents the most frequent anglicisms used in our sample newspapers.
To do the charts basic statistical tools, such as frequency and
percentages were used.
One problem that could appear during the process was the
selection of the articles taken into consideration for anglicisms search,
due to this reason I read almost the whole newspaper, at least an 80% of
each one.
Only in this way I found enough amount of interesting
anglicisms to develop this work.
After the acceptance of the field research, the next step was the
analysis of our results. To fulfill this step the methodology applied was a
field
diagnostic-descriptive
investigation
with
the
correspondent
statistical analysis.
In other words, 30 anglicisms were chosen among
the three variables.
After that, each anglicism was analyzed from a
linguistic view, which at the same time included etymological, syntacticsemantic and morphologic analysis. Here we used tools like English and
Spanish Dictionaries and the opinion of linguists, readers as well our
own thoughts.
The opinions which helped to carry out the analysis were from
two linguists and two frequent newspapers readers.
They were asked to
answer a short questionnaire about their opinions facing anglicisms use.
It is important to state that the two linguists are specialized in Spanish.
I chose them because I considered essential and attention-grabbing to
know the opinions from people who are not connected to English
language.
Their opinions are summarized in the sociological analysis.
Also the opinion of a radio journalist was included. This section is
completed with the interviews made to five frequent readers. Two youngmiddle aged readers (-25 years old), two adults (35-50 years old) a senior
adult reader (76 years old). Their opinions have constituted an important
element for the analysis.
As a summary of the followed methodology it can be said that the
most accurate and appropriate methods to do our investigation were:
bibliographic method for gathering the scientific material necessary for
the theoretical background, analytical and descriptive methods
to
complete the proposal in order to perform the descriptive and statistical
analysis, and the interpretation of the data.
The techniques used were: note taking at the moment of collecting
bibliographic information, direct observation to gather newspapers data,
interviews and conversations with linguists and readers.
These
techniques had the support of questionnaires and charts. The formats of
these two instruments, as well as the charts’ are included in the Annex
section.
Results
CHART ONE
Variable: National Newspaper El Comercio
Subvariable: News
ANGLICISM EXAMPLE
TIMES TITLE OF THE ARTICLE
DATE
flex
2
24-11-09
LED
Se ven restos de
espuma flex
Tecnología LED
exprés
Secuestro exprés
3
fuel oil
Como fuel oil, nafta
o bunker
Show de Méndez
Stands de la Plaza
de las Américas
La flogger más
famosa de Argentina
Ubicadas en ranking
Un round más duro
para Uribe
Una laptop por niño
2
Allá no hay ranking
Que puedo hacer en
mi notebook
La voz en off decía
3
2
En este round
Colombia pudo
Este test de
confianza
Abastecer su stock
3
Ironizó desde su
blog
Es el portal web
Fuimos con mapas y
GPS
La primera pareja
gay
3
show
stand
flogger
ranking
round
laptop
ranking
notebook
off
round
test
stock
blog
web
GPS
gay
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
2
2
1
1
1
2
6
2
2
2
1
1
1
Estudiantes del Montúfar
no usan puente
Venezuela dará 5.1.
millones de focos
Pichincha registra 13
secuestros exprés
19 proyectos eléctricos a
paso lento
Show de Méndez y de Liga
El chofer elegido, en
vigencia
El tema de la imagen se
analizó en la Feria del Libro
La universidad, en la mira
Canciller de Colombia no
llega a cita
Uruguay dice sí a una
laptop por niño
Evaluación polémica
Uruguay dice sí a una
laptop por niño
María Caridad, la nueva
reina de Quito
Colombia gana un round a
Venezuela
El estado de excepción se
ampliará
La huelga de ERCO
encarece llantas
Mujica, nuevo presidente de
Uruguay
Punto de enlace
El ejército buscó a Solarte
en Opuno
La primera boda gay se
suspende
24-11-09
25-11-09
25-11-09
26-11-09
26-11-09
26-11-09
26-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
28-11-09
28-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
01-12-09
01-12-09
01-12-09
CHART TWO
Variable: National Newspaper El Comercio
Subvariable: Ads
ANGLICISM
EXAMPLE
Ipod,DVD,LCD
penthouse
stock
El Ipod,DVD, las
1
pantallas LCD, las
aplicaciones
Se arrienda suite
8
amoblada
Se vende auto full
8
equipo
Aproveche la garage 1
sale
Con los más altos
1
estándares de calidad
Hasta agotar stock
1
Parrilla light y
1
vegetariana
No al GPS
1
Este poderoso SAV
1
Cabina simple
1
semifull
Parrilla light y
1
vegetariana
Mi Email es más fácil 3
Conexión a Internet 2
dial up
Parrilla light y
1
vegetariana
Con luces LED
1
Arena VIP
1
Hasta agotar stock
2
Volkswagen full
5
equipo
Marca líder de
2
segmento premium
Penthouse de venta 3
Hasta agotar stock
1
minisuite
Minisuite amoblada
suite
full
garage sale
estándar
stock
light
GPS
SAV
semifull
light
Email
Internet dial
up
light
LED
VIP
stock
full
premium
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
TIMES
2
TITLE OF THE ARTICLE
DATE
Gran Atlas de la Ciencia
24-11-09
Bines Raíces
24-11-09
Vehículos
24-11-09
Mercaderías
24-11-09
Nuevos Alup
25-11-09
DePrati promociones
Secretos de la parrilla
25-11-09
25-11-09
Placer es el nuevo BMWX1
Placer es el nuevo BMWX1
Mazda BT-50 2900 4x2
26-11-09
26-11-09
26-11-09
Secretos de la parrilla
27-11-09
Nokia connecting people
Telecsa escogió a CANTV
como socio
Secretos de la parrilla
27-11-09
27-11-09
Salón de Navidad
Plaza de Toros Belmonte
Megamaxi promociones
Vehículos
27-11-09
27-11-09
28-11-09
28-11-09
Audi, número uno en
Ecuador
Bienes Raíces
Adriana Hoyos, super
colección
Bienes Raíces
30-11-09
27-11-09
30-11-09
01-12-09
01-12-09
CHART THREE
Variable: National Newspaper El Comercio
Subvariable: Social and Culture Pages
ANGLICISM
EXAMPLE
TIMES
TITLE OF THE ARTICLE
DATE
blog
¿Se puede escribir
ficción en un blog?
Disney anunció
hará un remake
En su blog se
encuentran datos
El premio al film
más taquillero
Para tener la
realización del film
Encontrará trailers
de películas
Mucha promoción y
merchandising
Ritmos hasta el
latin jazz
El film aumenta la
tensión
El segundo film de
la saga
2
Seis días dedicados a la
cultura
“High School Musical”
tendrá version China
“Kito kon k “es la ciudad
que salió
“El secreto de sus ojos”
gustó en Quito
Todos en algún momento
hacemos canalladas
Punto de enlace
24-11-09
Amor adolescente con sed
de sangre
IMC band de la USFQ
27-11-09
27-11-09
3
“Perro come perro: la
estética de la violencia”
Amor adolescente con sed
de sangre
En esta web
encontrará
Cómo hacer un
best seller
Digno del mayor
rock star
Cuatro filmes
chilenos
Para arena VIP
1
Punto de enlace
27-11-09
2
Meyer, juega con el héroe
romántico
Berlusconi es el rock star
del año
Películas chilenas brillan
28-11-09
30-11-09
Performance de
Marcelo Evelin
El premio de post
producción
En la página web
2
Festival taurino con fines
benéficos
Un performance de
Marcelo Evelin
Películas chilenas brillan
Aurelio Valdez, reconocido
en Bolivia
01-12-09
remake
blog
film
trailers
merchandising
Latin jazz
film
web
best-seller
rock star
film
VIP
performance
post
web
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
1
2
2
1
2
1
1
2
3
2
1
1
3
24-11-09
25-11-09
24-11-09
26-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
28-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
CHART FOUR
Variable: National Newspaper El Comercio
Subvariable: Reports
ANGLICISM
EXAMPLE
TIMES
TITLE OF THE ARTICLE
DATE
flex
Se ven restos de
espuma flex
Tecnología LED
2
24-11-09
mall
En el mall no hay
cortes de luz
3
web
Nos remitamos a la
pagina web
Las radios repiten
hits extranjeros
Tendrá fans que lo
impulsen
Empaques tipo
sachet
Estábamos en
shock
Prefiere bailar al
ritmo del DJ
Combustible entre
diesel y fuel oil
El ranking mundial
de universidades
Y yo reenvío los
mails
Un check list, que
se les daba
La investigación es
el plus
Trámites legales,
marketing
A través de su blog
2
El llamado
secuestro express
Ocupó el sexto
lugar en el ranking
Este boom del
emprendimiento
2
Los estudiantes del
Montúfar no usan puente
Venezuela dará 5.1.
millones de focos
Con los apagones creció la
afluencia de gente en el
centro comercial
Con la nueva ley será
imposible la investigación
La producción nacional se
incentivará por obligación
La producción nacional se
incentivará por obligación
41 sabores de pulpa se
ofertan
El delito desborda a la
reforma penal
Las fiestas de Quito
cumplen 50 años
Los subsidios crecerán
con apagones
La investigación le dio “A”
a la Espol
La investigación le dio “A”
a la Espol
La investigación le dio “A”
a la Espol
La investigación le dio “A”
a la Espol
El emprendedor busca
capacitación
Estrellas muestran su
faceta verde
El rey de copas
Los emprendedores se
transformaron
La prensa escrita incubó a
nuevos emprendedores
01-12-09
LED
hit
fan
sachet
shock
DJ
fuel oil
ranking
mail
check list
plus
marketing
blog
express
ranking
boom
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
2
2
2
2
1
2
2
3
2
1
1
2
2
2
2
24-11-09
25-11-09
25-11-09
26-11-09
26-11-09
26-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
28-11-09
28-11-09
30-11-09
01-12-09
CHART FIVE
Variable: National Newspaper El Comercio
Subvariable: Sports
ANGLICISM
EXAMPLES
TIMES
TITLE OF THE ARTICLE
DATE
ticket
El ticket permitió a
los aficionados
Ganó en dos sets
Actúe como pívot
Apeló al slogan
Promociona un
slogan
Boom petrolero
El ringtone de su
Nokia
La directiva del
club decidió
4
24-11-09
2
2
1
Liga puso a la venta
28.000 localidades
Dos equipos buscan cupo
La estrategia de Fossati
Solo falta esta copa
1
1
1
Gloria Paz, la terapeuta
Lupe de Ureña, se desvela
Lupe de Ureña, se desvela
27-11-09
3
Barcelona revisa 55
contratos
25-11-09
El hat trik de
Edison Méndez
En un charter
En la suite que
pertenece
Empleados de su
spa a la final
El top five de la
semana
Para que el club
logre
Equipos que
jugarán los play off
Hin chat
Los clubes tienen
las armas
Ganó el másters de
tenis
Concluir sus tres
bolas de break
En dos sets
En dos sets
No. uno del ranking
Jugadores top
Jugaba con su look
de surfista
En el tercer set
Cada tour cuesta
US$1400
Saldrán los charter
1
26-11-09
2
4
Méndez y el equipo
estuvieron prendidos
Albos no usarán titulares
Gloria Paz, la terapeuta
3
Gloria Paz, la terapeuta
27-11-09
1
Gloria Paz, la terapeuta
27-11-09
4
Cuenca retiene a 10
campeones
Torneo de ascenso
continúa en
Participa de nuestro chat
La sociedad anónima no
es garantía
Davydenko ganó el
Másters de tennis
Davydenko ganó el
Másters de tennis
Davydenko ganó Másters
Irvin destronó a Villaflora
Nadal en baja potencia
Nadal en baja potencia
Nadal en baja potencia
28-11-09
01-12-09
01-12-09
¿Está bien
conectado el DVD?
5
Williams será suspendida
Fluminense confía en
golear a Liga
Fluminense confía en
golear a Liga
Xavier Burbano el espía
digital
set
pívot
slogan
boom
ringtone
Club
hat trik
charter
suite
spa
top five
club
play off
chat
club
másters
break
set
ranking
top
look
set
tour
chárter
DVD
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
2
2
7
3
2
2
2
3
2
2
2
3
2
24-11-09
24-11-09
25-11-09
25-11-09
25-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
28-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
01-12-09
01-12-09
CHART SIX
Variable: Local Newspaper Ultimas Noticias
Subvariable: News
ANGLICISM
EXAMPLE
TIMES
TITLE OF THE ARTICLE
DATE
web
Mensajes recorren
la web
Secuestro exprés
Era el show de la
Feria
Huele a pollo y no
es broster
Que abrieron el
show
Túneles llenos de
smog
El test da confianza
2
La prensa marcha contra
nueva ley
Quito, ¿secuestro exprés?
Los niños cuenteros
24-11-09
26-11-09
2
En la Pampa están hartos
de las plumas
Será la reina de los niños
2
Más que unos túneles
27-11-09
1
28-11-09
Participan a través
de su blog
En su blog se
describe
Por prácticas de
dumping
El ringtone de su
celular
2
Estado de excepción por
un mes más
Otra marcha en dos
semanas
Latigada por culpa de
corta minifalda
Acusan a China de
dumping
Desapareció y fue hallado
muerto
exprés
show
broster
show
smog
test
blog
blog
dumping
ringtone
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
5
2
1
2
2
1
25-11-09
25-11-09
27-11-09
28-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
01-12-09
CHART SEVEN
Variable: Local Newspaper Ultimas Noticias
Subvariable: Ads
ANGLICISM
EXAMPLES
TIMES
TITLE OF THE ARTICLE
full
rent a car
VHS
cyber
marketing
Laptop
Web,WAP
Chat
CD
full
burguer
DJ
Laptop
Polo full extras
En V y V rent a car
Se arreglanTV, VHS
Se vende cyber café
Domine marketing
Laptops nuevas
Correo movistar,
Web, WAP y Chat
CD móvil
Daewoo full equipo
Vendo burguer
Contrate DJ
Laptops,
computadoras
Laptops nuevas
Televisores LCD
Optra full
4
2
2
2
1
3
1
Vehículos
Vehículos
Mercadería
Negocios
10 claves para mi negocio
Mercadería
Movistar te regala
DATE
24-11-09
24-11-09
24-11-09
24-11-09
24-11-09
25-11-09
25-11-09
1
3
2
2
2
Negocios
Vehículos
Negocios
Servicios
Mercadería
26-11-09
27-11-09
28-11-09
28-11-09
30-11-09
2
2
2
Mercadería
Mercadería
Vehículos
01-12-09
01-12-09
01-12-09
Laptop
LCD
full
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
CHART EIGHT
Variable: Local Newspaper Ultimas Noticias
Subvariable: Social Pages
ANGLICISM
EXAMPLE
TIMES
TITLE OF THE ARTICLE
fans
Las fans de Sandro
2
cheerleaders
Bastoneras,
cheerleaders,
La realización del
film
Se roba el show
Un show antológico
Labrando el futuro
del rock
El heavy metal de
Resistencia
Muchas opciones
en la web
Disfrute el show
Las fans se
emocionaron
2
Sandro con corazón y
pulmón nuevos
Se prende fiesta quiteña
film
show
rock
heavy metal
web
show
fan
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
DATE
24-11-09
25-11-09
26-11-09
2
5
3
Todos en algún momento
somos canallas
Ríase de los desamores
Metal europeo, el fuerte
Metal europeo, el fuerte
6
La resistencia del heavy
27-11-09
2
Opciones de farra
30-11-09
2
2
Celebremos las fiestas
Artistas cantan a Quito
01-12-09
01-12-09
2
27-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
CHART NINE
Variable: Local Newspaper Ultimas Noticias
Subvariable: Reports
ANGLICISM
EXAMPLE
TIMES
TITLE OF THE ARTICLE
DATE
web
En la web mire una
galería de fotos
Escríbanos un mail
Más en la web
Me conecté a la
web
Ellos les llaman
crews
Además les presta
un infocus
Aquel tipo de
pantalones jeans
Vendía Cds y
periódicos
Rossi arte y hobby
Aplique una buena
cantidad de glitter
Una banda de rock
gótico
Y los mails
enviados
Seguir una dieta
light
1
María Francisca Paz y
Miño
Una pesadilla de película
Tu palabra
El testimonio de aquellos
días
Arte, color y cultura
urbana
Arte, color y cultura
urbana
Lo asaltaron y venció el
miedo
Lo asaltaron y venció el
miedo
Un decorativo reno
Un decorativo reno
24-11-09
27-11-09
2
Solo la prensa fue más
allá en el caso Factory
Él pone de pie a los narcos
1
Que no se deshidrate
01-12-09
mail
web
crews
Infocus
jeans
CD
hobby
glitter
rock
mail
light
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
1
1
2
2
1
2
1
1
2
3
24-11-09
25-11-09
25-11-09
25-11-09
25-11-09
25-11-09
25-11-09
26-11-09
26-11-09
30-11-09
CHART TEN
Variable: Local Newspaper Ultimas Noticias
Subvariable: Sports
ANGLICISM
EXAMPLES
Tour
charter
Hay tours privados
Charteando
aviones
Se coronó campeón
master
Fitness: si le gusta
estar bien
Reclamó por un off
side
El club brasilero
Organizando varios
tours
Directivos de otros
clubes
primera parte de
los play off
Déficit económico
Dentro del ranking
de la COSAT
Todo está en el blog
En el ranking de la
COSAT
Software, matriz o
lo que sea
Ganó en dos sets 62 y 6-2
El charter de Tame
A través del mail se
comunican
master
fitness
off side
Club
Tour
club
play off
deficit
ranking
blog
Ranking
software
set
Charter
mail
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
TIMES
3
1
2
1
2
3
4
2
2
2
2
2
3
2
2
3
1
TITLE OF THE ARTICLE
DATE
AKD, fin de la chirez
AKD, fin de la chirez
24-11-09
24-11-09
Etica Profesional se llevó
título
¿Pie plano? El ejercicio
ayuda
Liga, un carnaval que hizo
delirar
No se puede pedir más
Los tours se alistan a
viajar
Ya están en la Copa
24-11-09
Liga va al Guayas sin
Méndez
Hay en quien apoyarse
Mañana arrancará la
quinta Copa
Flu salió del descenso
Se inició Quito Junior
Open
Nueva dirigencia, nuevos
cerebros
Se inició el Quito Junior
Open
Las peripecias en Río
Los chullas no están
confiados
27-11-09
24-11-09
26-11-09
26-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
01-12-09
01-12-09
CHART ELEVEN
Variable: Tabloid Extra
Subvariable: News
ANGLICISM
EXAMPLE
TIMES
TITLE OF THE ARTICLE
DATE
pick up
2
on line
Plataforma on line
2
mail
2
tour
Se comunicaban
con mails
Este brutal tour
mail
El envío de mails
2
Aplastados por el cajón de
su camioneta
Ranking de la corrupción
Asaltaban en carros
robados
Compañía maneja portal
web
Más firmas recurren a
titularizacón
Estafaban vendiendo
carros robados
Chofer loco embistió a diez
personas
Quito, enorme bodega de
droga
24-11-09
web
Conducía una pick
up Nissan
el ranking mundial
Encontraron
laptops en su poder
En el portal web
ranking
laptop
7
2
2
2
26-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
28-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
01-12-09
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
CHART TWELVE
Variable: Tabloid Extra
Subvariable: Ads
ANGLICISM
EXAMPLE
TIMES
TITLE OF THE ARTICLE
DATE
suite
full
van
suites amobladas
Vitara full equipo
repuestos para
autos, vans, buses
Esteem full equipo
Salas VIP
Chat en vivo
Call center medio
tiempo
Hot!
Chat en vivo
Laptop toshiba
30% descuento en
items
Megane full equipo
Participa en el chat
Gran open house
Visita nuestra
página web
Trabaje en call
center
3
4
1
24-11-09
24-11-09
25-11-09
5
2
5
2
Bienes Raíces
Vehículos
Star Motors: La Casa
Mercedes Benz
Vehículos
Cartelera
Servicios
Trabajos
5
4
6
1
Servicios
Servicios
Mercaderías
Grifine Ceramics
27-11-09
27-11-09
27-11-09
28-11-09
5
3
1
2
Vehículos
Servicios
Central Park Club
Corín Tellado y Extra
28-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
01-12-09
1
Trabajos
01-12-09
full
VIP
chat
call center
hot
chat
laptop
Ítems
full
chat
Open house
web
call center
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
25-11-09
25-11-09
26-11-09
26-11-09
CHART THIRTEEN
Variable: Tabloid Extra
Subvariable: Social Pages
ANGLICISM
EXAMPLE
TIMES
TITLE OF THE ARTICLE
DATE
show
4
shopping
De shopping
2
Show
El montaje del
show empezó
Todavía hay feeling
4
La encontramos en
el mall
Participa en el staff
del programa
Su sexto Cd
2
Yolanda López: voy a las
pasarelas
Wisin Yandel: exquisito en
Ambato
Fernando Lara: todo un
fenómeno
Fernando Lara: todo un
fenómeno
Wisin Yandel: exquisito en
Ambato
Karen Minda: la diosa soy
yo
Voy a dar un gran
concierto
Voy a dar un gran
concierto
Voy ad ar un gran
concierto
Carolina: enamorada
como la primera vez
Paola infraganti
24-11-09
rock
En cada uno de
sus shows
Como teloneros del
show
Hasta con un club
de fans
Gracias al apoyo de
su fans
El staff de “Los
Extraterrestres”
Haber creado todo
un marketing
El grupo de rock
2
Paola infraganti
28-11-09
3
30-11-09
Ha batido records
con su 4to.CD
Ultima competencia
fast track
Es sexy hasta en la
mirada
Además de los
realitys de Gama
En el show
participan
2
Casi Ángeles: no nos
vamos a separar
Casi Ángeles: no nos
vamos a separar
Ecuador en reñida
competencia
Magali, la roquera sexy
Dora West, la bella
morena
Hoy Quito tiene show para
largo
01-12-09
club
fans
staff
marketing
feeling
mall
staff
CD
record
fast track
sexy
reality show
Show
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
2
2
2
3
1
4
1
1
3
2
3
24-11-09
24-11-09
24-11-09
24-11-09
25-11-09
26-11-09
26-11-09
26-11-09
27-11-09
28-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
01-12-09
CHART FOURTEEN
Variable: Tabloid Extra
Subvariable: Reports
ANGLICISM
EXAMPLES
TIMES
TITLE OF THE ARTICLE
DATE
fashion
1
CD
Ha grabado 5 Cd’s
4
breaker
Tener un bipolar o
breaker
Nuestras series
favoritas en DVD
Furon el boom en
otras épocas
Participaron en el
baby shower
Fue un verdadero
hit
Difundió tips de
cocina
El remake de 60’s
4
2
Escogiendo el juego de
dormitorio
De Cali es Quito la
sucursal
De Cali es Quito la
sucursal
Máximo León, sigue
rugiendo
Recomendaciones para
evitar tragedias
Perdidos en la repetición
24-11-09
DJ
Le dará un toque
fashion
Con jeans
ajustados
La música del DJ
1
Perdidos en la repetición
28-11-09
2
Belleza celebra baby
shower
“La niñera” que todos
queremos
Difusión cultural a través
de radio
Otra de terror
30-11-09
jeans
DVD
boom
baby shower
hit
tips
remake
1
2
2
2
1
25-11-09
25-11-09
26-11-09
27-11-09
28-11-09
30-11-09
01-12-09
01-12-09
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
CHART FIFTEEN
Variable: Tabloid Extra
Subvariable: Sports
ANGLICISM
EXAMPLE
TIMES
TITLE OF THE ARTICLE
DATE
Champions
revelación de la
Champions
El club se
concentró
Quien atajó tres
penaltis
Reunidos en la
suite presencial
Año de debut
El club de la
Cobró el corner
Cobró el off side
Luego al charter
que salió desde
En el tercer set
perdió el control
3
Rubín Kazán quiere pasar
a octavos
Flu no tiene miedo a la
altura
Se vuelven a ver las caras
24-11-09
Hasta los empleados en
Barcelona
Méndez, culpable
Dos estilos se enfrentan
Chullas con medio título
Chullas con medio título
Sarita, la hincha más
chiquita
Final de infarto
25-11-09
club
penalti
suite
debut
club
corner
off side
charter
set
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
2
2
1
2
3
2
2
2
4
24-11-09
25-11-09
27-11-09
28-11-09
30-11-09
30-11-09
01-12-09
01-12-09
CHART SIXTEEN
Variable: National Newspaper El Comercio
SECTION
News
f
42
%
18
Ads
48
21
Social Pages
32
14
Sports
37
16
Reports
71
31
230
100
SECTION
News
f
22
%
16
Ads
32
23
Social Pages
28
20
Sports
20
14
Reports
37
27
139
100
ANGLICISMS
Total
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
CHART SEVENTEEN
Variable: Local Newspaper Ultimas Noticias
ANGLICISMS
Total
Author:
Sun Ling Tay Lee
CHART EIGHTEEN
Variable: Tabloid Extra
SECTION
News
f
21
%
13
Ads
50
31
Social Pages
43
27
Sports
22
14
Reports
23
15
159
100
ANGLICISMS
Total
Author:
Sun Ling Tay Lee
CHART NINETEEN
The Most and the Least frequent anglicisms
(in all variables)
ANGLICISMS
full
ranking
club
show
web
laptop
suite
chat
set
mail
blog
film
tour
charter
exprés
rock
cd
fan
WORD REPETITION
NUMBER
36
27
26
26
20
17
16
14
14
13
12
12
12
10
10
10
9
8
ANGLICISMS
DVD
dj
flex
heavy metal
stock
hot
led
mall
round
boom
breaker
fuel oil
hit
light
marketing
master
off side
play off
ticket
call center
champions
email
jeans
penthouse
performance
rock star
sexy
spa
test
top
baby shower
best seller
break
burger
cheerleader
corner
crew
debut
deficit
dumping
glitter
GPS
internet
items
Latin jazz
lcd
TIMES OF
REPETITION
7
6
6
6
6
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
ANGLICISMS
look
notebook
off
on line
penalti
pick up
pivot
premium
reality show
record
remake
rent a car
Ring tone
sachet
shopping
slogan
smog
software
staff
tips
trailers
VHS
VIP
broster
check list
estándar
fashion
fast track
feeling
fitness
flogger
garage
gay
hobby
infocus
ipod
market
open house
plus
SAV
semifull
shock
stand
van
Author:
Sun Ling Tay Lee
TIMES OF
REPETITION
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
DISCUSSION
The following section contains the theoretical background which
supports this research.
Definition and explanation of important
linguistic terms, historical information and previous studies about the
topic are some of the items included.
After this theoretical setting three kinds of analysis will be
developed. They are: linguistic, comparative and sociological. They will
be the base for the final conclusions, with which this section is
completed.
Theoretical Background
Language
Language seems to be as old as our species. Yule (1996) says
that we do not know how language was originated, but what we know is
that spoken language developed before written language. What is
unquestionably certain is language is the expression of human
personality in words, whether written or spoken. It is the universal
medium for conveying the common facts and feelings of everyday life.
Along time, many definitions of language have been proposed.
Henry Sweet, an English phonetician and scholar, stated: “Language is
the expression of ideas by means of speech-sounds combined into words.
Words are combined into sentences, this combination answering to that
of ideas into thoughts”.
The American linguists Bernard Bloch and George L. Trager
formulated the following definition: “A language is a system of arbitrary
vocal symbols by means of which a social group cooperates.” Besides
these definitions, according to The New Encyclopedia Britannica (2007),
language is a system of conventional spoken or written symbols used by
people in a shared culture to communicate with each other.
Thus,
language reflects and affects a culture’s way of thinking, and changes in
a culture influence the development of its language.
Language, as described, is species-specific to human beings.
Other members of the animal kingdom have the ability to communicate,
through vocal noises or by other means, but the most important features
characterizing human
language, are
its
infinite
productivity
and
creativity. As Todd (1987) says “nothing in the animal kingdom even
approximates to human language for flexibility, complexity, precision,
and quantity. Humans have learnt to make infinite use of finite means”.
At this point it is possible to convey that language interacts with
every aspect of human life in society, and it can be understood only if it
is considered in relation to society.
Linguistics
The science of language is known as Linguistics. Todd (1987) gives
a clear and concise definition; Linguistics is defined as “the scientific
study of language”. When a linguist is said to be scientific it means that
he attempts to study language the same way as a scientist studies
physics. It means observing language use, forming hypotheses about it,
testing these hypotheses and then refining them on the basis of the
evidence collected.
As Linguistics traditionally has been well known as
the study of the nature and structure of language, we can find in the
Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics (2006) a short compilation
about its history. According to this publication Greek philosophers in
the 5th century B.C., who debated the origins of human language, were
the first in the West to be concerned with linguistic theory. The first
complete Greek grammar, written by Dionysus Thrax in the 1st century
B.C., was a model for Roman grammarians, whose work led to the
medieval and Renaissance vernacular grammars. With the rise of
historical linguistics in the 19th century, linguistics became a science. In
the late 19th and early 20th centuries Ferdinand de Saussure
established the structuralist school of linguistics, which analyzed actual
speech to learn about the underlying structure of language. In the 1950s
Noam Chomsky challenged the structuralist program, arguing that
linguistics should study native speakers’ unconscious knowledge of their
language
(competence),
(performance).
His
not
general
the
language
approach,
they
known
as
actually
produce
transformational
generative grammar, was extensively revised in subsequent decades as
the extended standard theory. Other grammatical theories developed
from the 1960s were: generalized phrase structure grammar, lexicalfunctional grammar, relational grammar, and cognitive grammar.
Chomsky’s
emphasis
on
linguistic
competence
stimulated
the
development of disciplines like psycholinguistics and neurolinguistics.
The goal of theoretical linguistics is the construction of a general theory
of the structure of language or of a general theoretical framework for the
description of languages; the aim of applied linguistics is the application
of the findings and techniques of the scientific study of language to
practical tasks, especially to the elaboration of improved methods of
language teaching.
Branches of Linguistics
Linguistics has been traditionally divided language into the
following five components for purposes of description and analysis even
though
in
actual
use
all
levels
must
interact
and
function
simultaneously. It traditionally encompasses phonology, morphology,
semantics, syntax, and pragmatics.
a. Phonology
In “Introduction to Linguistics”, Todd (1997) says that Phonology
as the branch of linguistics focused on the speech sounds according to
their production, composition, distribution and function within language,
involves two studies. The first one is the study of the production,
transmission and reception of speech sounds, a discipline known as
Phonetics, and the other is the study of the sound patterns of a specific
language known as Phonemics. Speech sounds considered as units of
phonetic analysis
are
called phones, and, following
the
normal
convention, are represented by enclosing the appropriate alphabetic
symbol in square brackets. Thus [p] will refer to a p sound. A phonetic
transcription may be relatively broad (omitting much of the acoustic
detail) or relatively narrow (putting in rather more of the detail),
according to the purpose for which it is intended.
On the other hand, considered as phonological units—i.e., from
the point of view of their function in the language—sounds are described
as phonemes and are distinguished from phones by enclosing their
appropriate symbol between two slash marks. Thus /p/ refers to a
phoneme that may be realized on different occasions of utterance or in
different contexts by a variety of more or less different phones.
b. Morphology
Simon (1990) in his book “An International Handbook on
Inflection and Word-Formation” says the term Morphology has been used
in Linguistics for over a hundred years as a general description for
phenomena of accidence and word formation. The term was borrowed
from the biological sciences and reflects consciously or unconsciously,
the view of language as an organism characterized by systems
susceptible to synchronic or diachronic analysis. For this author,
Morphology is the study of morphemes (smallest significant units or
grammar). As word structure study it is focused on the formation and
structure of words. In other words its core is the identification, analysis,
combination and description of morphemes by using a set of wordcombination principles.
If a morpheme in English is posited with the function of
accounting for the grammatical difference between singular and plural
nouns, it may be symbolized by enclosing the term plural within brace
brackets. Now the morpheme [plural] is represented in a number of
different
ways.
Most
plural
nouns
in
English
differ
from
the
corresponding singular forms in that they have an additional final
segment. In the written forms of these words, it is either -s or -es (e.g.,
“cat”: “cats”; “dog”: “dogs”; “fish”: “fishes”). The word segments written -s
or -es are morphs.
c. Semantics
As said by the New Encyclopedia Britannica, Semantics is the
study of meaning in natural human languages. Therefore it focuses on
what natural expressions (words, phrases and sentences) are about, and
how this can be discovered and described. As a branch of linguistics, it
has to do with the study of signs, symbols and structures of meaning. In
Ladusaw (1988), we find the two most important developments in recent
work in semantics are: first, the application of the structural approach to
the study of meaning and, second, a better appreciation of the
relationship between grammar and semantics, as Transformationalgenerative grammar.
The first, structural semantics, goes back to the period preceding
World War II and is exemplified in a large number of publications, mainly
by German scholars—Jost Trier, Leo Weisgerber, and their collaborators.
According to this approach the meaning of each word in the language is
described independently of the meaning of all other words. On the other
hand we have the Transformational-generative grammar. According to
Burneo (2008), it was proposed by Chomsky in 1957, and “had the
purpose of providing structural descriptions necessary to generate all the
grammatical sentences and only the grammatical sentences in a
particular language”. It includes a syntactic component which collects a
set of phrase structure rules which creates a limited number of base
structures. This element is closely tied to the semantic component which
determines the meaning of a sentence.
d. Syntax
British linguists often use the term “grammar” for the same level
of language that is referred to as “syntax” by many Americans. In
accordance with Burneo (2008), Syntax is a subfield of linguistics that
studies the principles and rules that govern the way words are joined
together to form phrases, clauses and sentences. As defined by the
Concise Oxford Dictionary of Linguistics, “Syntax is the study of the
grammatical relations between words and other unit within a sentence”.
Similarly, Syntax, for Bloomfield, was the study of free forms that were
composed entirely of free forms. Regarding modern syntactic research,
other theory rose by Halliday in the 1960’s, it was Systemic Functional
Grammar which links precise grammar patterns descriptions with their
function in a particular situation. This approach has been taken on by
many
grammarians.
As
previously
was
mentioned,
Bloomfield
determined a theory of syntax with the notions of form classes and
constituent structure. In Encyclopedia of Language Education (1997),
Bloomfield defines form classes, in terms of some common “recognizable
phonetic or grammatical feature” shared by all the members. He adds
that the smaller forms into which a larger form may be analyzed are its
constituents, and the larger form is a construction. For example, the
phrase “poor John” is a construction analyzable into, or composed of, the
constituents “poor” and “John.” Similarly, the phrase “lost his watch” is
composed of three word forms—“lost,” “his,” and “watch”—all of which
may be described as constituents of the construction.
e. Pragmatics
At New Encyclopedia Britannica we find that “Pragmatics is
defined as the study of the use of natural language in communication” or
the study of the relations between languages and their users. Pragmatics
is then the study of how both literal and nonliteral aspects of
communicated linguistic meaning are determined by principles that refer
to the physical or social context in which language is used. It analyzes
the relationship between utterances and the social context in which they
are produced, the relationship between linking words or sentence
meaning with the speaker’s meaning. The distinction between sentences
and speaker’s meaning is basic for semantics and pragmatics.
Morphological Procedures
As we previously saw, Morphology is focused on the formation
and
structure
of
words,
based
on
the
identification,
analysis,
combination and description of morphemes by using a set of wordcombination
principles.
The
most
widespread
morphological
constructions in terms of processes, from Encyclopedia of Language and
Linguistics are inflection, derivation and parasynthesis.
a. Inflection
From the same preceding source, Inflection is the change in the
form of a word (usually the addition of endings) to mark distinctions as
tense, person, number, gender, mood, voice, and case. It indicates noun
plural (cat, cats), noun case (girl, girl’s, girls’), third person singular
present tense (he buys), past tense (we walked), aspect (I’m calling), and
comparatives (bigger, biggest). Changes in the stem are another type of
inflection, as in sing, sang, sung and goose, geese.
b. Derivation
Derivation is the formation of new words from existing words;
e.g., “singer” from “sing” and “acceptable” from “accept.” Derived words
can also be inflected: “singers” from “singer.” Derivation uses prefixes
and suffixes (e.g., in-, -tion) to form new words (e.g., inform, deletion),
which can then take inflections. Inflection differs from derivation in that
it does not change the part of speech.
c. Composition
Bauer (2006) defines a compound as a word made up of two
other words. For example, compounds such as cloverleaf, gentleman, and
already show the collocation of two free forms. In describing the
structure of compounds it is necessary to take into account the relation
of components to each other and the relation of the whole compound to
its components. In the Encyclopedia of Language & Linguistics (2006) we
find that these relations diverge widely in, for example, the words,
cloverleaf,
icebreaker,
breakwater,
blackbird,
peace-loving,
and
paperback. In cloverleaf the first component noun is attributive and
modifies the second. Icebreaker, is a compound made of noun object plus
noun, consisting of verb plus agent suffix. The next type consists of verb
plus object. The blackbird type, consists of attributive adjective plus
noun. The next type, peace-loving composed of object noun and a present
participle.
d. Parasynthesis
In
the
Merriam-Webster
Online
Dictionary
we
find
that
parasynthesis is: “The formation of words by adding a derivative ending
and prefixing a particle. Those affixes preceding the word are prefixes
(do, undo; way, subway), and those which follow the word, are suffixes
(do, doer; way, wayward). They may be native (overdo, waywardness),
Greek (hyperbole, thesis), or Latin (supersede, pediment). Modern
technologists greatly favor the neo-Hellenic prefixes macro-“long, large,”
micro- “small,” para- “alongside,” poly- “many,” and the Latin mini“small,” with its antonym maxi-. The Internet era has popularized cyber“of computers or computer networks” and mega- “vast.”
Historical Linguistics
From a practical point of view, historical linguistics maps the
world’s languages, determines their relationships, and with the use of
written documentation, fit extinct languages. For a better understanding
we have made a compilation from The Linguistics Encyclopedia, taking
information since Antiquity to our current days.
Antiquity, Middle Ages and The Renaissance
The foundations for historical studies in the West were laid down
by the ancient Greeks. In etymology- in the ancient Greek sense “the
true meaning of the word-, they also discussed the nature of language in
terms of a pattern (analogy) or its absence (anomaly), and formulated
statements concerning the various part of speech. The initiated science of
language was passed on to the Romans, whose linguistics studies were in
general
application
of
Greek
thought,
controversies,
grammatical
categories and word changes in both form and meaning. Latin and Greek
grammar were studied during the Middle Ages from a pedagogical point
of view. With the Renaissance, language studies underwent a change as
both local and non-Indo-European languages came under linguistic
scrutiny.
Once vernacular languages were considered and the world’s
diversity in structures was recognized, language studies turned to
universal linguistic concepts and to the idea of universal grammar
18th, 19th and 20th Centuries
An important trend in the 17th century was the effort to compare
and classify languages in accordance to their resemblances. Early in the
18th century, comparative and historical linguistics gained more
consistency. The greatest achievement in the latter part of this century
came with the discovery that the Sanskrit language of ancient India was
related to the languages of Europe and to Latin and Greek, forming the
first period in the growth of historical linguistics and setting comparative
linguistics on a firm basis.
During the 19th century with scholars such as Dane, Rask, Boop
and Grimm, the comparative-historical linguistic studies of IndoEuropean languages had a definitive beginning. It depends upon the
principle of regular sound change—a principle that, as explained above,
met with violent opposition when it was introduced into linguistics by the
Neogrammarians in the 1870s but by the end of the century had become
part of what might be described as the orthodox approach to historical
linguistics.
In the mid-19th century, August Schleicher introduced into
comparative linguistics the model of the “family tree.” For this author,
there is no point in time at which it can be said that new languages are
“born” of a common parent language. This assumption is built into the
comparative method as it is traditionally applied. And yet there are many
clear cases of convergence in the development of well-documented
languages. For example, the dialects of England are disappearing and are
far more similar in grammar and vocabulary today than they were even a
generation ago. The same phenomenon, the replacement of nonstandard
or less prestigious forms with forms borrowed from standard language
has taken place in different places at different times.
In 1872 Johannes Schmidt criticized the family-tree theory and
proposed instead what is referred to as the wave theory, according to
which different linguistic changes will spread, like waves, from an
important centre along the main lines of communication, but successive
innovations
will
not
necessarily
cover
exactly
the
same
area.
Consequently, there will be no sharp distinction between contiguous
dialects, but, the further apart two speech communities are, the more
linguistic features there will be that distinguish them.
The most recent development in the field of historical and
comparative linguistics is the theory of generative grammar. If the
grammar and phonology of a language are described as an integrated
system of rules, then the grammatical and phonological similarities and
differences between two closely related languages, or dialects can be
described in terms of the similarities and differences.
Language change
Every language has a history, and, as in the rest of human
culture, changes are constantly taking place in the course of the learned
transmission of a language from one generation to another. Languages
change in all their aspects, in their pronunciation, word forms, syntax,
and word meanings (semantic change). These changes are mostly very
gradual, becoming noticeable over the course of several generations.
According to McMahon (1994) in “Understanding Language
Change”, in some areas of vocabulary, particular words closely related to
rapid cultural change are subject to equally rapid and therefore
noticeable changes within a generation or even within a decade. In the
20th century the vocabulary of science and technology was an
outstanding example. The same is also true of those parts of vocabulary
that are involved in fashionable slangs and jargons.
Robins and Crystal (1998) add that in the structural aspects of
language, their pronunciation and grammar, and in vocabulary less
closely involved in rapid cultural movement, the processes of linguistic
change are best observed by comparing written records of a language
over extended periods. This is most readily seen by English speakers
through setting side by side present-day English texts with 18th-century
English, the Bible, Shakespearean English, Chaucer’s English, and the
varieties of Old English (Anglo-Saxon) that survive in written form.
Noticeably, as one goes back in time, the effort required in understanding
increases, for the most part Old English texts are
unintelligible to
modern English. The differences include meanings, grammar, and, so far
as this can be reconstructed, pronunciation. Silher (2000) mentions
examples of changes in the branches of Linguistics:
•
Changes in Phonology
Old English
•
•
Modern English
hús
house
nama
name
wulfas
wolves
Changes in Morphology
(tó) climban (ne)
to climb
gé climbap
you climb
híe clumbon
they climbed
Changes in the verb system. Involve two separate but interrelated
matters, the subject pronouns and the form of the verbs
themselves. The second person singular has been lost in Standard
English: you for thou. One change in the verb forms is the past
tense. In Old English, there were two different forms one just for
the first and third persons singular indicative, and a different one
for the remaining forms. With the exception of the verb be.
•
Changes in nouns.
So much has changed in the structure of
English nouns that it could be misleading to try to compare the
morphology of Old and Modern English.
•
Changes in English Syntax.
Until a few hundred years ago the
English syntax for questions and denials in sentences were What
says she? And He gave not his reasons. This syntax was replaced
by structures containing a form of the verb do.
•
Changes in meaning. Semantic changes are so present that hardly
a word in a dictionary lacks earlier meanings.
For example:
Sacrilege in Early Modern English meant “stealing from a church”,
but now it means “any serious affront to religious teaching or
sensibility”.
•
Changes in English lexicon.
Changes in lexicon are common in
languages generally, but are abundant in the recent history of
English.
Many of them including most of those lost in modern
English, appear to have been poetical words in any case. It is also
noticeable that the items which survive formally have usually
undergone considerable changes in sense.
Other items are
maintained in current lexicon but only in very narrow use.
Language change may be considered in terms of changes
introduced into the underlying system of phonological and grammatical
rules (including the addition, loss, or reordering of rules) during the
process of language acquisition. As we can notice present-day conditions
tend toward the amalgamation of dialects and the disappearance of those
spoken by relatively few people. In a way, languages must be seen, to be
properly understood: as products of a continuous historical process and
also as self-sufficient systems of communication in any period. Both as a
component of cultural history and as a central part of culture, language
is able to reveal, more than any other human activity and achievement,
what is involved in humanity’s development.
Language Vice
According to Fernández (2005) language vice can be defined as
construction or use forms of inappropriate vocabulary which can lead to
a speech or text misunderstanding.
Burton (2009) has done a complete and wide research about
vices. This author says “the terms for vices do not strictly denote changes
of meaning or arrangement as do most terms for rhetorical figures;
rather, these are qualitative labels whose accuracy will always be relative
to the context and purpose”. Every dimension or aspect of style has vices
associated with it, and every vice has a corresponding virtue.
However, it is helpful to understand that language alters the
normal meaning or arrangement of words to some degree. When
figurative language is apt for a given context and purpose, it is eloquent
and effective (exemplifies one or more of virtues of style); when figurative
language is not apt for a given context and purpose, ineloquent and
ineffective (exemplifies one or more of vices of style).
It is from Burton that we have extracted the most important
information about vices. Despite the fact it could seem too long, all of the
cited vices are considered important and representative.
•
battologia
Vain repetition.
•
perissologia
Superfluity of speech generally; the vice of wordiness.
•
tautologia
The repetition of the same idea in different words, but (often) in a
way that is tedious or unnecessary.
•
macrologia
Longwindedness. Using more words than are necessary in an
attempt to appear eloquent.
•
pleonasmus
Use of more words than is necessary semantically.
Example:
With these very eyes I saw him do it.
•
homoeoprophoron
Repetition of the same consonant (especially the initial consonant)
in neighboring words.
•
paroemion
Alliteration taken to an extreme where nearly every word in a
sentence begins with the same consonant. Example:
The powers of prunes are prudent to provide potent palliative
prophylaxis of potential pooper problems, priming you for purging.
•
epenthesis
The addition of a letter, sound, or syllable to the middle of a word.
Example: Addition of a medial letter:
When "sherbet" is pronounced "sherbert"
Addition of a medial syllable:
When "realtor" is pronounced "realator"
•
catachresis
The use of a word in a context that differs from its proper
application.
•
periergia
Overuse of words or figures of speech; over-labored. As such, it
may simply be considered synonymous with macrologia.
•
acyrologia
An incorrect use of words, especially words that sound alike but
are far in meaning from the speaker’s intentions.
•
hypallage
Shifting the application of words.
Mixing the order of which words should correspond with which
others. Example:
Come stay with me and dine not.
•
solecismus
An element of speech or writing that is incorrect grammatically.
Like
barbarisms,
solecisms
are
possible
according
to
four
categories of change: addition, subtraction, transposition, and
substitution comprise the four categories of change. These are
fundamental strategies for the manipulation and variation of
discourse across a vast array of linguistic levels: word forms,
sentences, paragraphs, entire texts or speeches, etc.
•
amphibologia
Ambiguity of grammatical structure, often by mispunctuation.
•
barbarismus
The use of nonstandard or foreign speech; of a word awkwardly
forced into a poem's meter; or unconventional pronunciation.
Like solecisms, barbarisms are possible according to each of the
four categories of change.
•
soraismus
To mingle different languages affectedly or without skill.
•
heterogenium
Avoiding an issue by changing the subject to something different.
•
cacosyntheton
The ill placing of words, as when an adjective improperly follows a
noun or when there is any other order of words.
•
bomphiologia
Exaggeration done in a self-aggrandizing manner.
•
cacozelia
A stylistic affectation of diction, such as throwing in foreign words
to appear learned. Bad taste in words or selection of metaphor,
either to make the facts appear worse or to disgust the auditors.
•
parrhesia
Either to speak candidly or to ask forgiveness for so speaking.
Neologisms
Every living language can readily be adapted to meet changes
occurring in the life and culture of its speakers, and the main weight of
such changes falls on vocabulary. Grammatical and phonological
structures are relatively stable and change noticeably over centuries
rather than decades, but vocabularies can change very quickly both in
word stock and in word meanings.
In the Dictionary of Neologisms, Barhnart (1991) we find that
neologism is any word, meaning or expression that is considered to be in
addition to a language at a particular time. Neologisms are “the breath of
language. They indicate that it is active and functioning, provide the new
material necessary to describe, to make language answer its purpose of
expressing new and as old ideas”.
Some sources from where neologisms frequently appear in
English can be: in first place many words exist in a specialized
vocabulary before they become part of a general vocabulary. Also this
absorption can be the result of cultural contact, in which words or
phrases from foreign languages become a part of one’s native language. A
third source is the adoption of usages that come from the speech of
individuals not altogether familiar with regular patterns
According to Lehrer (2006), one of the commonest word
formation devices are compounding and affixation. On a previous section
we talked widely about them.
Underlying this, other ways to make
neologisms: conversions, clipping and acronyms, blends.
Lehrer (2006) explains that conversion is a process that turns a
word belonging to one part of speech into another (e.g. noun – verb or
verb – noun). For example to impact, to network, a given, a nasty.
Clipping
and
acronyms
have
also
become
popular
and
productive. Clipping or shortening simply deletes part of a word. Most
clippings delete the end of a word: veterinarian- vet, in some the
beginning is removed: airplane-plane, and in a few only the middle
remains: influenza - flu. On the other hand, acronyms are formed by
taking one or more of the first letters of phrase AIDS (acquired immune
deficiency syndrome). Finally, the author mentions blends, compounds
that take one word and part of another word or parts of two words:
Smog: smoke + fog, camcorder: camera+recorder.
Many neologisms are commonly used and become part of our
daily speech, they will enter the language as permanent words, while
others are used for a short time or perhaps are used only once.
Barbarisms
For a better understanding of the term barbarism, the Fourth
Edition of The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language
(2006) defines a barbarism as “1. An act, trait, or custom characterized
by ignorance or crudity;” also “2a. The use of words, forms, or
expressions considered incorrect or unacceptable;” and “2b. A specific
word, form, or expression so used.”
The etymology given is[Latin
barbarismus, use of a foreign tongue or of one's own tongue amiss,
barbarism, from Greek barbarismos, from barbarizein, to behave or speak
like a barbarian, from barbaros, non-Greek, foreign (imitative of the sound
of unintelligible speech). We can mention another definition found in
Wikipedia, it refers to barbarism as “a non-standard word, expression or
pronunciation in a language”. According to the source, the term is little
used by linguists today, because of its pejorative tone, and the fact that it
is not clearly defined.
Moreover, Shapiro (2008) adds that “The word
barbarism originally referred to incorrect use of language, but it is now
used more generally to refer to ignorance or crudity in matters of taste,
including verbal expression.”
McCarthur
(2009) agrees with
this
appreciation, saying that a barbarism is a non-technical term for a word
considered to offend against good taste by combining elements from
different languages, especially classical with vernacular, or being used in
an unsatisfactory way. Additionally, we have to note that a barbarism is
an error of morphology.
Anglicisms
Whenever languages have come in direct contact with each other,
either by virtue of geographical contiguity or as a result of mass
migrations, they have affected each other. They have visibly modified
each other’s lexicon, phonology, syntax and style. With the proliferation
of the mass media like television, cinema and even the Internet,
languages now influence each other through television programs and
movies. Though it is said that languages affect each other, it would be
more correct to say that English is affecting all other languages.
In the Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics, we find that the
phenomenon by which a foreign language adopts an English word or an
English way of speaking is known as Anglicism.
Taking the information provided in the 2001 edition of Dictionary
of the Spanish Royal Academy of Language (DRAE), because, along with
the Real Academia itself, it is constantly referred to in discussions
regarding anglicisms and the influence of English on Spanish. The
dictionary defines the term anglicism as follows:
Anglicismo. Giro o modo de hablar propio de la lengua
inglesa. 2. Vocablo o giro de esta lengua empleado en otra.
3. Empleo de vocablos o giros ingleses en distintos idiomas.
Of related interest are the terms barbarismo, extranjerismo and
neologism:
Barbarismo. Extranjerismo incorporado totalmente al
idioma.
Extranjerismo. (...) Voz, frase o giro que un idioma toma de
otro extranjero.
Neologismo. 1. Vocablo, acepción o giro nuevo en una
lengua. 2. Uso de estos vocablos o giros nuevos.
An anglicism is, therefore, a neologism, that is to say, an
innovation in the Spanish language whose source is a foreign language
(“extranjerismo”), i.e. English. In a wide sense, we could speak of
syntactic, morphological, and phonological anglicisms as well.
According to the Oxford English Dictionary the term was first
used in the 17th century and refers to an expression from English used in
another language. Though anglicism is connected to the word England
etymologically, it is generally not only used for anglicisms from England,
but also for loans from all varieties of the English language. Sometimes,
in order to specify the origin of an anglicism, the term Americanism is
also used for borrowings originating from the United States, this then
being a subordinate for the term anglicism.
As with any neologism, an anglicism may go through certain
phases of integration into language. At first, it is still very new and not
known to many speakers. Eventually, it may spread and take part in a
process of institutionalization. This process is brought to a close when
the word has become part of the common core of language Fischer
(1998), by which time ideally, the anglicism will not be recognized as
such any more, ands as a consequence, should not be called an
anglicism any longer.
Since it is often difficult to decide whether an
anglicism has become a fully accepted word of a language, scholars
include all English borrowed expressions in their analysis.
When a word has been borrowed, it becomes integrated into the
receiver language with varying extent. Gorlach (2002) distinguishes three
main degrees of acceptance:
a. The word is fully accepted –either the
word is not (or no longer) recognized as English, or is found in many
styles and registers, but is still marked as English in its spelling
pronunciation or morphology.
b. The word is in restricted use.
c. The word is not part of the language –it is a loan creation, or mainly
known to bilinguals, or used only with reference to British or American
contexts.
Foreign Language interference
In the period 1940s – 1960s language acquisition was studied on
the basis of the systematic comparison of languages that was to delineate
points of similarity and difference between native languages and target
ones in order to improve pedagogy. It was Robert Lado (1957) who
proposed a theory called the contrastive analysis. This hypothesis
postulated the existence of positive transfer, resulting from similarity
between languages, and negative transfer (or language interference),
stemming from difference between languages.
In Saville-Troike (2006) we find a theory about transfer in
learning: in the case of second language acquisition, this means the
transfer of elements acquired (or habituated) in L1 to the target L2. This
transfer is called positive when the same structure is appropriate in both
languages, as in the transfer of a Spanish plural –s to English (e.g.
lenguajes to languages).
On the other hand, the transfer is called
negative or interference when the L1 structure is used inappropriately in
the L2, as in the additional transfer of Spanish plural –s to a modifier in
number agreement with the noun.
Years later, Chomsky formulated another theory, based on the
limitations found in the contrastive analysis hypothesis. He brought the
notion of universal grammar claiming that human learning in general
and language acquisition are explainable in terms of an innate human
capacity aiding the generation infinite sentence patterns.
Chomsky’s theory paved the way for Error Analysis and it then
became possible for Corder (1992) to point out “…that some at least of
the strategies adopted by the learner of a second language are
substantially the same as those by which a first language is acquired”.
This author also made a distinction between learner mistakes, “the
selection of the wrong style, dialect or variety”, and learner errors, which
“result in unacceptable utterances and appear as breaches of the code”.
Learner errors can be categorized in terms of various criteria. In
this sense, Larsen-Freeman and Long (1991) bring to discussion two
types: Interlingual errors are said to occur due to L1 interference, whereas
intralingual errors are committed regardless of L1. Moreover, Corder
(1973) makes a distinction between expressive and receptive errors which
are manifestations of expressive and receptive behavior and depend upon
knowledge of the “formation rules” of a language: “Inadequate knowledge
of these rules will therefore show itself in both sorts of behavior. But it is
much easier to detect imperfect knowledge in the case of expressive
behavior. Expression leaves traces transient, but recordable, in the case
of speech, permanent in the case of writing”.
It is also possible to categorize learner errors on the basis of the
linguistic levels testifying to their manifestation. Lee (1990), for instance,
elaborates on the following classification due to the same kind of
interferences:
● Grammatical errors and orthographic interference, which stress the need
for
grammatical
accuracy
in
speech
and
writing,
may
hinder
communication but errors at the sentence level. It is manifested in
writing and involves alteration of the spelling of words under the
influence of L1.
● Discourse errors are dependable upon the observance of the rules of
speaking and writing and reflect learners’ cultural and pragmatic
knowledge of language use. L1 influences in terms of word order, use of
pronouns and determiners, tense and mood.
●Phonologically-induced
interference.
It
is
manifested
in
wrong
pronunciation and/or intonation in speaking and reading and is usually
indicated by recourse to word stress, intonation and speech sounds
typical of L1 which influence the acquisition of English.
● Lexical interference in combination with errors belonging to the other
levels may also impede communication and intelligibility. Another
instance of lexical interference is the transfer of function words such as
prepositions, conjunctions, determiners, and pronouns, which most often
happens unintentionally.
Newspapers and Tabloids
The language of news media has always attracted the attention of
linguistics and discourse analysts. The practical and principled reasons
for this interest include the accessibility of language data, the
significance of the media as language producing institutions, linguistic
interest in the ways media use language, and the importance of media
institutions and their discourses in culture, politics and social life.
One way to transmit these new is the newspaper.
The most
concrete definition is in Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary: it is “a paper that
is printed and distributed usually daily or weekly and that contains
news, articles of opinion, features, and advertising”.
The development of newspapers has been constant during the
time, from the first publications dating from 1690 until nowadays.
Rising circulations were made possible by increased literacy and by
technological advances in mechanical typesetting, high-speed printing, in
communications and in transport. One curious fact was a competition in
New York between Joseph Pulitzer, who owned the World from 1883 and
William Hearst Journal, 1895 led to excesses of lurid and sensationalized
news, called yellow journalism, this is what we can call a tabloid,
nowadays.
Nearly all the world’s major newspapers began publishing online
editions of their newspapers in the early 21st century. Although some
newspaper publishers charged their readers for this access, many made
their Web editions available for free, based on the expectation that
advertising revenue, combined with lower printing and distribution costs,
could make up for lost subscription fees.
Another source of information is a tabloid, which in contrast of a
newspaper
is
according
to
the
Merriam-Webster’s
Dictionary.
“a
compressed or condensed into small scope 2. of, relating to, or
resembling tabloids, especially featuring stories of violence, crime or
scandal presented in a sensational manner 3. a newspaper that is about
half the page size of an ordinary newspaper and that contains news in
condensed form and much photographic manner.
About its origin we find in the Britannica On Line Encyclopedia,
that in 1894 Harmsworth bought the Evening News, and by combining
his editing style with some of the American yellow journalism, he
quadrupled its circulation within a year. The Daily Mail appeared, and
its journalist had the job to rewrite the stories in a more simple style,
composing headlines, and if necessary to add a little seasoning to the
original story. Harmsworth coined the term tabloid when he designed
and edited an experimental issue of the New York World. The tabloid
halved the size of the newspaper page, which allowed easier handling by
the reader, but it also suited the new, curtailed size of articles and the
more numerous pages required per issue. In the long run, however, the
term has come to define the popular newspaper in style than in physical
characteristics.
Previous Studies
Despite the fact there are many studies and researches about
anglicisms, finding studies about their used in newspapers has been a
difficult job. However I will mention some studies I consider will be very
useful for my project, even though they are not properly about the topic.
1. Economic anglicisms: adapted to the Spanish linguistic system
Author: López Zurita Paloma - Universidad de Cádiz
[email protected]
Abstract: The enormous number of anglicisms used everyday in Spanish
language generates lexical interference between both languages. This
paper provides a semantic analysis of the changes in lexis this language
contact brings about, through the different linguistic mechanisms of
inter-language adaptation involved. When these anglicisms come from
the current trend to include English words in Spanish discourse,
appropriate equivalents which could avoid the excess of redundant
neologisms should be added. A glossary of the most habitual terms
derived from interference in English and Spanish in the economic field is
included as a result of this study.
2. Anglicisms in Buenos Aires Spanish
Author: Tocaimaza Cecilia
Abstract: The author listened daily for several hours radio programming
and browsed the articles and advertisements of these newspapers
documenting when and where she observed any English borrowing. She
concludes that there is a very favorable attitude towards the use of
anglicisms; however women showed themselves as more careful with
their use, also se saw that anglicisms are not adapted morphologically in
the language, but they also obtain new meanings, thus requiring more
research in the area of semantics. Finally she concludes anglicisms are
constantly being incorporated into Argentine Spanish.
3. English borrowing in Venezuelan Spanish
Author: Asención Yuly
Abstract: The exploratory examination of the borrowings from English
used by Venezuelan speakers suggests that they seem more prone to use
English words to refer to concepts, innovations and objects related to
computers and the internet. The borrowings more used were classified
as anglicisms, words taken in form and sense from English.
This
complete appropriation of foreign words seems to indicate a tendency in
these language users to prefer adoption from English over the creation of
new terms in Spanish.
Description, Analysis and Interpretation of Results
Three types of analysis will be presented. The first is a linguistic
analysis. To carry it out we considered 30 anglicisms, 10 for each
variable.
Each of them at the same time will have an etymologic,
syntactic-semantic and morphologic analysis.
Afterwards, a comparative analysis will be done.
In first a
comparison of the frequency of anglicisms use among the five considered
subvariables is exposed. The next analysis will be about the frequency of
anglicisms use among the three variables, that is to say the three
newspapers.
The third analysis is the sociological one. Here the author has
compiled the opinions of two linguists, as well as the opinions of two
frequent newspaper readers about the use of anglicisms in our
newspapers.
Linguistic Analysis
Thirty anglicisms will be analyzed in their etymologic, syntacticsemantic, and morphological aspects.
This analysis is important
because through it we can know the origin, function, use, acceptance
and alternatives of use for each anglicism. They will be examined in
terms of their official status in the inventory of vocabulary in Spanish.
This analysis will be based on two sources of language policy: the
dictionary published by the Royal Academy of the Spanish Language in
its 21st version and the Merriam Webster on line dictionary, despite the
opinion of linguists and our personal point of view.
Show
Word accepted by the Royal Academy of the Spanish Language
and incorporated to its dictionary.
Its origin dates from the 13th century and comes from Middle
English shewen and showen. From Old English sceawian which meaned
to look, look at, see, akin to Old High German scouwon to look, look at,
and probably to Latin cavere: to be on one’s guard.
We find that this word has the following English functions:
transitive verb, intransitive verb and noun. In our example: “Show de
Méndez”, the function is a noun and it refers to a demonstrative display.
It is noticeable that show is used in Spanish the same way it is in
English; the same spelling and pronunciation are used in both
languages; despite the fact we do not have this ending syllable in our
language. Thus, it has not suffered any change in its morphology.
Despite the fact this word is very common and well accepted by speakers;
there are other terms in our language that can be used instead of this
anglicism, such as: espectáculo or exhibición.
I consider this word enriches our language, based on the fact of
globalization, and spectacles or artistic fields are the ones where it is
more noticeable. Also, because the use of the word is done in the same
context we see in English mass media.
Stock
This word accepted by the Royal Academy of the Spanish
Language comes from Middle English stok, from Old English stocc, akin
to Old High German stoc stick with an origin before the 12th century.
Stock functions as a noun, verb and adjective. In our example
“Abastecer su stock”, it works as a noun, referring to a store or supply
accumulated or available, specially the inventory of goods of a merchant
or manufacturer.
The use of this word in Spanish is the same as in English, the
borrowing is absolute and exact and, in other words, it has not suffered
any change in its spelling or meaning, even though the initial sound s
followed by a consonant does not exist in our language, the word keeps
the same phonology.
This word can be replaced by inventario and
existencias.
The frequent use of this word in different context, especially in
business and commerce has produced a complete incorporation to our
language.
I consider the use of this word enriches our vocabulary,
because it is used in the same situations as it is in English. Moreover,
due to the fact it is a specialized term, its use is correct and it does not
represent any distortion for our lexicon.
Full
This term is not already accepted by the Royal Academy of the
Spanish Language.
Its origin is before the 12th century from the Middle English, from
Old English, akin to Old High German fol; Latin plenus; Greek pleres.
Among the functions this word carries out are adjective, adverb,
noun, verb and transitive verb. In the example “Se vende auto full
equipo”, full acts as an adjective which expresses a complete especially in
detail, number or duration and as being at the highest or greatest degree.
This word is used in one of the functions it has in English, what I
consider an enhancement to our language. Besides the context of this
word is specially used in Ads subvariable, talking about cars sell focused
on young or middle age potential buyers, who are more opened to find
and understand anglicisms in the newspapers.
It has not suffered any morphological change, thus its spelling
both in English and Spanish are the same. Also, the pronunciation is the
same.
In Spanish this expression can be replaced by words such as:
total or absoluto.
Estándar
Word already accepted by the Royal Academy of the Spanish
Language.
It comes from the 12th. Century Middle English, from AngloFrench standard banner, standard, of Germanic origin akin to Old
English standan to stand and probably to Old High German hart hard.
Standard can function as adjective and as noun. In our example
“Con los más altos estándares de calidad” its function is a noun referring
to something established by authority, custom, or general consent as a
model or example.
To reach the final version that we find in our language, the word
has suffered a change from the original English voice standard, being
added an initial e and an accent on the second syllable, becoming what
is called a grave Spanish word.
With this adaptation, estándar has
become incorporation to our lexicon and is more common to see it
instead of its equivalents in Spanish, like tipo, modelo, patrón and nivel.
Light
Word already accepted by the Royal Academy of Spanish
Language.
It comes from the Middle English, from Old English lecht,
akin to Old High German lihti: light, Latin levis, Greek elachys: small. Its
origin is before the 12th century.
It works as adjective, noun, verb, adverb and intransitive
verb. In our example “Parrilla light y vegetariana”, the anglicism has an
adjectival function because it is referring to something made with lower
calorie content or with less of some ingredient (as salt, fat, or alcohol)
than usual. This is an example of complete adoption of an item since it
keeps also the pronunciation despite the fact in Spanish the sound of i is
not the ai sound like in English. The incorporation of this word to our
lexicon is a globalization process reflect, because it is a word commonly
used in fashion or nutrition fields, which are very important for today’s
society. Despite the fact it has some equivalents in Spanish like: ligera
or con menos calorías, the use of the anglicisms is more spread than
them, as previously said, it is the result of the importance we give to our
appearance and health.
Film
This word which has already been accepted by the Royal
Academy of the Spanish Language is used in two ways: film and filme. It
comes from the Middle English filme, from Old English filmen, akin to
Greek pelm a sole on the foot, Old English feel skin.
It functions as a verb and a noun. It is as the second one that is
used in our example: “El film aumenta la tensión”, where it refers to a
motion picture.
In Spanish we find similar words like: película
cinematográfica.
For its use in Spanish, the term has not suffered
any change
neither in its phonology, morphology nor its meaning.
It is remarkable the fact that Cinematography field is one with
the biggest influence of English, if we consider that almost the 90% of the
films presented in our country come from USA, and it is has been almost
impossible to be apart from this influence, arriving to the point of
incorporating most of this field terms to our lexicon.
This reason is
strong enough to support the use of the term in our language.
Web
This world has already been accepted by the Royal Academy of
the Spanish Language. Despite the fact this word has an origin before
the 12th century in the Middle English, it is in 1992, when it gets the
nominal function found in our example “4 millones de suscriptores de la
Web sin cables”. Here it is referring to a group of World Wide Web pages
usually containing hyperlinks to each other and made available online by
any user. That is to say, the meaning of the term refers to the service
consisting on virtual communication obtained using internet. It is
classified as a noun and in Spanish is considered to have a feminine
gender as marked by the use of the article “la”,however its pronunciation
and spelling is kept the same as in English.
Smog
Word already accepted by the Royal Academy of the Spanish
Language but as esmog.
It is a noun which comes from smoke+fog. Its origin date is 1872.
As a noun in the example “túneles llenos de esmog” we find that
it refers to a fog made heavier and darker by smoke and chemical fumes.
As mentioned, this word has suffered a morphological change by the
addition of an initial “e” in order to have a word according to Spanish
grammar, due to in our language the initial sound of s plus a consonant
does not exist.
The incorporation of this word to our dictionary is
positive, because it is very hard to find in Spanish a similar term. Maybe
it could be humo negro, but it does not include the sense of the original
term, like pollutive and bad for health. That is why I consider important
and extremely useful the incorporation of this term to our lexicon.
Test
Term accepted by the Royal Academy of the Spanish Language.
As a noun, its origin dates from the 14th century in the Middle English,
vessel in which metals were assayed, potsherd, from Anglo-French test,
tees pot, Latin testum earthen vessel, akin to Latin testa pot.
Besides the nominal function, this word also has adjectival and
verbal ones. In our example “el test da confianza”, the anglicism refers to
something (as a series of questions or exercises) for measuring the skill,
knowledge, intelligence, capacities, or aptitudes for an individual or
group. The word is used exactly as it is in English, even in Spanish there
are no words ending in t. The adaptation has been complete, so we see
that to have the plural form only a final s is added as it is in English.
The best options for this word in Spanish could be prueba or examen.
I consider unnecessary the use of this word, because we have the
equivalent in Spanish which has the exact connotation as in English.
Laptop
Term not accepted by the Royal Academy of the Spanish
Language. It functions as adjective and noun and has its origin date is
1984. In the example “Laptops nuevas” is a noun referring to a portable
microcomputer having its main components (as processor, keyboard and
display screen) integrated into a single unit capable of battery-powered
operation. This is an example of complete adoption of an item since its
use keeps besides the written form in plural, considering the fact that in
a Spanish word ending in a consonant, for the plural form needs extra e
and s, and in the case of laptops we use the English form. As well as the
pronunciation is the same.
However it is frequent to see its Spanish equivalent portátil in the
fields it is used. I consider there is a misunderstanding about this term,
because as I have investigated it refers to a trademark, but we have given
this term to any portable computer.
Because of it is a specific field term
(computers) its use is accepted and seeing as correct, especially among
young people, who rather prefer to use the English term instead of the
equivalent.
Fan
This term is not already accepted by the Royal Academy of the
Spanish Language.
It is a shorter version from fanatic and has the origin in 1682.
In English its functions as a noun and verb. Is precisely in the
first aspect that we find the example “los fans de Sandro”, as an
enthusiastic devotee or ardent admirer.
It is used in the same context as it is in English and has adopted
the shorter version from fanatic. As in plural an s is added it presents a
complete borrowing from English, because if we follow the Spanish
grammar, the plural should be fanes. In this context, the word can be
replaced by fanático, admirador or seguidor.
I consider this term does not present any contribution to our
language because it is a short form from the term fanático, then its use is
not necessary in order to have an appropriate expression.
Cheerleader
Term not accepted by the Royal Academy of the Spanish
Language. It functions as a noun with the origin date of 1903. It is a
derivative from the transitive verb cheer-lead, and refers to one that calls
for and directs organized cheering (as at a football game). Is precisely in
this context that we find the example “bastoneras, cheerleaders, danzas”
as the girls who cheer for a sport team.
In Spanish, this word can be replaced by animadora.
The use of this anglicism is very common especially among young
people who see this term in movies or T.V shows, where it is noticeable
that important part of students’ life (in USA) is participating in sports
activity, playing the game or being a cheerleader.
Moreover this
influence has been so significant, that many schools as part of their extra
curricular activities have cheerleaders groups, and the name they use is
exactly the same in English and not the equivalent in Spanish. What is
more, they follow the same rules for dressing, hairstyle, qualifications,
vocabulary, etc. That is why I consider it is not a trouble to use this term,
because it refers exactly to the same activity completed in USA.
Mail
Not accepted by the Royal Academy of Spanish Language. It
comes from the Middle English male, from Anglo-French, of Germanic
origin, akin to Old High German malaha bag functions as noun in
different contexts and as transitive verb. In our example “escríbanos un
mail a ……” it works as a noun, describing a material sent or carried in
the postal system, in this case through the internet. Other words that
can be used in this context are mensaje or correo electrónico.
The use of this word is so usual in our daily speech that it has
become part of our vocabulary.
Hobby
Accepted by the Royal Academy of the Spanish Language. It is a
short for hobbyhorse and dates from 1816. As a noun, it refers to a
pursuit outside ones regular occupation engaged in especially for
relaxation. A context example found for this word in Spanish is “Rossi
arte y hobby”, where it can be seen functioning as a noun. We have to
mention that this word represents a complete adoption since it keeps
also the pronunciation. While in Spanish the “h” in initial position is
silent, this word is pronounced with the sound given to the letter in
English.
In Spanish some words that accomplish the same function are:
pasatiempo and entretenimiento. Even with the existence of these terms it
is more usual to see the word in English instead of them.
The use of this term is so incorporated to our language that it has
become part of our daily speech, this fact and considering it is used in
the same contexts as it is in English, are reasons to consider it as a
contribution to Spanish language.
Chárter
Word already accepted by the Royal Academy of the Spanish
Language.
It comes from Middle English charter, Anglo French,
Medieval Latin chartula and Latin, diminutive of charta from the 13th
century.
It can function as noun, transitive verb and adjective.
In our example “luego el chárter que salió desde” the word charter
functions as a noun referring to a charter travel arrangement, but the
correct use should be as an adjective relating to, or being a travel
arrangement in which transportation (as a bus or plane) is hired by and
for one specific group of people. This is the function found in the
Dictionary of the Royal Academy of the Spanish Language. Furthermore,
this word has suffered a change to its use in Spanish, by adding an
accent on the first syllable producing a grave word.
The incorporation of this word to our language is positive,
because it is very hard to find an equivalent in Spanish which has all the
elements that chart include, like: a travel which includes meals or
transportation, or a flight reserved only for a specific purpose. Enough
reason to consider this word as enrichment to Spanish lexicon. Even
more, it has derived in the verb chartear, which as we can see, has the
final ear Spanish ending for verbs.
It could be possible to use the
equivalent fletar instead of the anglicism; however, it does not cover all
the connotations of the English word.
Chat
This word has not been accepted yet by the Royal Academy of
Spanish Language. It comes from Middle English chatten, short for
chatteren. We find it functioning as verb and noun. In our context “chat
en vivo”, it performs a nominal function, referring to an online discussion
in a chat room, also an instance of such discussion.
In spite of the fact, it is not included in our dictionary; it has
been adapted to Spanish grammar becoming a verb which ends in ear
(chatear). The use of this term and all the derivative forms is so
widespread, that we can not find a similar term in Spanish, with the
same whole meaning: a conversation through an electronic device like
computer or cell phone.
Moreover the influence of Internet and
globalization and communication impacts it carries, is more than a
valuable reason for the acceptance of this term use.
Staff
Term not accepted by the Spanish Language Royal Academy.
The origin dates before the 12th century from Middle English staf, from
Old English stæf, akin to Old High German stab staff, Sanskrit stabhnati
he supports.
Among the functions it carries out, we find verbal and nominal.
Although being a well known borrowing, its usage differs semantically
from the English original. In English, staff includes all the personnel in
an organization or firm, whereas in Spanish it usually only includes the
senior posts (directors and executives). In some cases it does attach to its
original meaning, as in the academic field, where staff refers to the whole
group of workers, teachers, administrators, etc.
In the example “el staff de Los Extraterrestres” it works as a noun
referring to the personnel who assist a director in carrying out an
assigned task.
Despite the fact this word is not incorporated in the DRAE, it is
very used and accepted in our country. We must notice that this term is
mostly used in business and spectacles areas.
Shopping
It has not been accepted yet by the Royal Academy of the Spanish
Language. It is the progressive form of the verb shop, which has an origin
in 1764, as a noun it comes from the Middle English shoppe, from Old
English sceoppa booth, akin to Old High German scopf shed. However,
the term shopping is the first utterance of composed terms such as
shopping bag, shopping mall, shopping list or shopping center.
In the example “estuvieron de shopping”, it works as a noun
talking about the action of shop. Despite the wrong use of the
expression, we notice its use is so popular among us, especially young
people, that it has become part of our daily speech, even in newspapers.
It is used to replace words such as compras.
I consider the use of the term does not represent any
contribution to our language, because it is not used with the same
function it has in English, even more, it is unnecessary considering there
are words in Spanish which have the whole same meaning.
Feeling
Word not accepted by the Royal Academy of Spanish Language.
As the verb feel and as a noun its origin is before the 12th century from
the Middle English felen, from Old English felan, akin to Old High
German fuolen to feel, Latin palpáre to caress. Besides as adjective it
dates from the 14th century.
We can observe that this word is used in Spanish as a noun, like
“Todavía hay feeling”, but referring specifically to a love or attraction
feeling, when the meaning denotes any partly mental, partly mental,
partly physical response marked by pleasure, pai, attraction, or
repulsion, it may suggest the mere existence of a response but imply
nothing about the nature or intensity of it.
This term is used almost only by young people, when they talk
especially to a love or attraction feeling.
It is difficult to determine if it
improves or worsens our language, because as part or youth jargon, it
has an own meaning and context. However, if we look the use of the
term, we notice it is done in a wrong way, very different from the English
one, maybe, considering this aspect, we could add that feeling in the
context used by the newspaper and young people does nor represent any
improvement for our language.
Short
Term accepted by the Spanish Language Royal Academy.
It
comes from before 12th century from Middle English, from Old English
sceort, akin to Old High German sourz short, Old Norse skotr lack.
It can function as adjective, adverb, noun and transitive verb. It
is as a noun that we find this word in our example “Con shorts
ajustados” talking about knee-length or less than knee-length trousers –
usually used in plural.
This word is so incorporated to our language that it is extremely
uncommon to hear the expressions pantalones cortos or pantaloneta
when people refer to this kind of clothes.
Moreover, many people
pronounce the sh as ch, adapting the word to Spanish pronunciation,
even more for the plural form it is added es instead of only s as in
English (shores) and it causes some fun among people to hear the
pronunciation chores .
I consider the incorporation of this word enriches our language,
since it is used in the same context as in English, despite the different
pronunciation it has for many speakers.
Breaker
This term has not been accepted yet by the Royal Academy of the
Spanish Language. Its origin dates from 1872 as circuit breaker.
Nevertheless in English the correct utterance is circuit breaker,
in our example “tener un bipolar o breaker” the expression has the same
meaning, refering to a switch that automatically interrupts the current or
an overloaded circuit.
This short version of the original term is so
widespread in our language used in Spanish that it is difficult to find an
appropriate word in Spanish, moreover the term as been fully adopted as
an electric appliance by all the people who use it, like technicians,
electricians, and consumers.
The pronunciation is kept the same as in English, however the
spelling can change according to the place where it is used, in some
cases it is breiker, but the most common way it is found is with the
correct form. To make it plural only and s is added at the end, what
represents a complete adoption of the English form, considering that in
Spanish, nouns ending in r must have a vowel previous to the ending s.
Boom
Term accepted by the Royal Academy of the Spanish Language.
Comes from the 15th century Middle English bomben, bummen.
Its functions are verbal and nominal. Is precisely in the second
context that we find the example “fueron el boom en otras épocas”, talking
about an upsurge in activity, interest or popularity, which is the same
meaning and use given in Spanish. It replaces words such as: éxito or
auge.
As it is already accepted by the RASL, I consider this word
enriches our language in the sense that it is a superlative for the
equivalents in Spanish. It represents further more than a simple success
or upsurge, and finding a word in Spanish with all these meanings is
quite difficult.
Top
Word accepted by the Royal Academy of the Spanish Language.
Its origin dates before the 12th century, from Middle English, from Old
English, akin to Old High German zopf tip, tuft or hair.
Among the functions it has in English we can mention as noun,
verb and adjective. In the example “llegó al top de la lista”, it refers to a
noun meaning the highest point, level or part of something. However in
the DRAE we find that this word is accepted as a garment worn on the
upper body and not as the highest level of something, which is the
connotation we found in our newspapers. It can be replaced by terms
like: cima or pináculo. Despite the fact it is used in a different context as
it is done in English, the use of this term has become so popular that it
is understood and also well accepted by almost all readers.
Hit
Term not accepted by the Royal Academy of the Spanish
Language. The origin is from Middle English, from Old English hyttan,
probably from Old Norse hitta to meet with, hit. It can be used as verb
and noun. Is as a noun that we find the example “ fue un verdadero hit”,
where it talks about a stroke of luck or a great success.
This word is an example of complete adoption of an item since its
use keeps also the pronunciation. While in Spanish the “h” in initial
position is silent, this word is pronounced with the sound given to the
letter in English.
Ranking
Accepted by the Royal Academy of the Spanish Language. Comes
from rank from the Middle English, from Old English ranc overbearing,
strong, akin to Old Norse rakkr erect and perhaps to Old English riht
right.
In our example “ante el ranking mundial”, it is a noun referring to
a classification from the highest to lowest, useful to establish some
validation criteria.
However, in English ranking is an adjective about
having a high position of the highest rank, we can notice that this word
has been adapted to Spanish, giving another function and pronunciation
because it is very hard to listen a speaker pronouncing the “g” sound at
the end of this word. As previously mentioned, the term is used as a
noun like categorization.
Words like escalafón or clasificación can replace the use of this
anglicism.
We see that the anglicism and its equivalents are used
indistinctively in our written media.
However we can infer from the
example that the word in English is used when the author tries to
emphasize the idea of rating something among a selected and specific
group.
Set
Word accepted by the Royal Academy of Spanish Language.
Comes from the Middle English setten, from Old English settan, akin to
Old High German sezzen to set, Old English sittan to sit. It works as
verb, noun and adjective.
Is as the second function that we find the
word in our example “Ganó en dos sets 6-2 y -2”, as we can see set refers
to a division of a tennis match won by the side that wins at least six
games beating the opponent by two games or by winning a tiebreaker.
As most of terms used for sports, set has been totally incorporated to our
language, they are used with the same meaning in both languages. About
this term, it is remarkable the fact that it is pronounced the same way it
is in English, and its plural form takes the English way, with a final s
and not as it should be in Spanish with the addition of a vowel before the
final s. Furthermore, there is not a word that can be used instead of it.
We could use juego, but this term refers to each of the components of a
set.
For this reason, I consider its use as an incorporation which
improves Spanish, besides it is used in the same context as in English.
Off-side
This sports field term has not been accepted yet by the Royal
Academy of the Spanish Language. Its origin date is 1867, and it is found
accomplishing functions as adverb or adjective.
In the example “reclamó por un off-side” the function is a noun
describing an illegal advance of the ball. It is noticeable that this word
does not have an English nominal function. Then the use should be as
and adverb or adjective.
We can notice this word has suffered a
morphological change from the original offside to the version we find in
our newspapers: as a composed word with a middle hyphen.
It can be replaced by the expressions “fuera de lugar” or “fuera de
juego”. As most of sports register the use of this term is very common,
understood and even well accepted for those who by any reason read an
article including it. However it is common to see the use of its equivalent
in Spanish, in other words we find both languages terms applied to the
same context.
Récord
Word already accepted by the Royal Academy of the Spanish
Language. Comes from Middle English, literately, to recall, from AngloFrench recorder, from Latin recordari, from re+cord, cor heart.
It can have verbal, nominal and adjectival functions. Is as a noun
that we find record in the example “Ha batido récords con su 4to CD”,
talking about the best result in an activity, meaning taken from the
original English as being one that is extraordinary among or surpasses
others of its kind.
For its use in Spanish, it has suffered a change by adding an
accent on the e from the first syllable, thus it becomes a “grave” word.
The pronunciation also changes when it is very common to hear the
omission of the last d sound.
Personally, I agree with the incorporation of this term to our
lexicon, because I do not find any equivalent in Spanish, moreover the
use people give it in Spanish is exactly as a noun, which is one of the
functions it accomplishes in English.
Fashion
Word not already accepted by the Royal Academy of the Spanish
Language. Comes from the 14th century Middle English facioun, fasoun
shape, manner, from Anglo-French façun, fauschoun, from Latin faction,factic act of making, faction, from facere to make.
As noun and transitive verb are the functions, we find this word
in English. However, in our example “le dará un toque fashion” it has an
adjectival function because it is describing the noun toque. The purpose
is to say that it is modern and with a lot of style. We can see that the
adoption for the use of this word is done in a different function as it does
in English, what I consider a barbarism and represents an unnecessary
use of a foreign word.
Some expressions that could accomplish the
expected function could be moderno or con estilo.
However, its use is so
spread, especially among young people and women that it is very normal
to read it as in the cited context.
Tip
This word is not accepted yet by the Royal Academy of the
Spanish Language. It comes from 1567 Middle English.
functions as verb, noun and transitive verb.
It can have
As noun, it has many
different meanings, but in our example “difundió tips de cocina”, the
context refers to a piece of advice or expert or authoritative information.
The adoption of this word is absolute in our language because its
spelling, even in plural is the same as in English, going against Spanish
grammar rules (just adding a s at the end).
The use of this word is
unnecessary because there are words in our language for this function
such as consejo or recomendación, which have the same meaning in
context that the original English word has.
The explanations for the use of loan words in the type of
newspapers analyzed fall within the field of sociolinguistics perhaps more
than any other aspect of the phenomenon of anglicisms. Most of the
reasons discussed below can be universally found in the history of
languages – differences existing only as to detail (such as proportions,
diffusion media) but not in essence. The most important ones are the
following:
1.
The difficulty or impossibility of finding Spanish equivalents. This
is particularly so in three cases:
a. Technical vocabulary: this category comprises a significant
number of the total anglicisms found, since the adaptation of the original
word for a foreign device, technique or procedure is the most frequent
way to build up vocabulary. Consequently, the Spanish lexicon had to
adapt itself, as in the case of chat.
b. Words denoting people, things or situations which simply did
not exist in the Spanish world, and of which no translation would give
the real meaning: blog is one of the clearest cases.
c. Trade marks: legal regulations tend to be quite explicit as to the
use
of
these
names;
some,
on
the
other
hand,
have
become
extraordinarily popular.
2.
Problems in the translation of anglicisms into Spanish. Generally
the result would be a long paraphrase, which, as has been observed
above, tends to be avoided in printed materials where space is scarce.
For example: e-mail.
3.
Pragmatic reasons, most of which would be applicable to
journalistic language in general, and some to general Spanish usage.
As far as the Spanish language is concerned, pop music, sports,
computer technology and, recently, the financial world equate or perhaps
surpass the film industry in the introduction of anglicisms. Among them,
possibly only sports have an audience of a scope comparable to that of
films. But as the mass media, and among them the genre of the written
press, represent one of the areas where speech and writing most often
meet and interact, newspapers may be considered to be an avenue
through which many anglicisms enter the language.
COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
The analysis will have two components. The first analysis will be
among the five subvariables: news, ads, social and culture, reports and
sports, in a general way, considering the anglicisms used in each section
but in the three newspapers. Here we will point out those subvariables
with the highest frequency of anglicisms use and the possible reasons for
these results. This is going to be a first step to an analysis of the five
subvariables but into each newspaper. Secondly, a comparative analysis
among the three variables will be settled, as well as the reasons, which
could explain such performance.
In the obtained list of loan words, there are some words that have
been already accepted by the Royal Academy of the Spanish Language,
and some others are on list to be included in its dictionary new edition.
CHART TWENTY
Anglicisms Frequency of Occurrence
VARIABLE
EL
SUBVARIABLE COMERCIO
News
42
ULTIMAS
NOTICIAS
22
EL EXTRA TOTAL
21
85
Ads
48
32
50
130
Social Culture
32
28
43
103
Sports
37
20
22
79
Reports
71
37
23
131
TOTAL
230
139
159
528
Author: Sun Ling Tay Lee
DISTRIBUTION OF ANGLICISMS
(in the three variables)
NEWS
16%
25%
ADS
SOCIAL
24%
15%
20%
SPORTS
REPORTS
We can observe from Chart twenty and Figure one that considering
the subvariables in the three newspapers, the sections where the highest
frequency of anglicisms use is found are: Reports and Ads with the 25%
and 24% from the 528 anglicisms found in our research. It is noticeable
that the two of them have almost the same frequency, followed by social
and cultural pages with the 20% and finally, we have news and reports
which similarly to the first case have just about the same repetition
frequency, to be exact the 16% and 15%.
As some linguists argue, there are no fixed rules in the use of
anglicisms and native terms. The varying use of anglicisms depends on
factors, which have to do with the status of the user, the means or
channel of communication, the subject matter, etc.
We find in our written media that stylistic differences associated
with spelling adaptations are highlighted in modern journalism: a
newspaper distinguishes two major classes of information known as
“news”
(that
is,
basically
informative)
and
“comment”
(basically
interpretative). The first is a more formal style, and foreign terms are
preserved in their original form. The second which encompasses less
formal style, is thus more casual and receptive to colloquialisms and
phonetic spellings. This phenomenon can be noticed in our sample. In
the first category, we include the subvariable News and on the second
one, subvariables such as: Reports, Sports, Ads, and Social and Cultural
pages. That is why it can be observed the highest frequency on sections
belonging to comment information.
DISTRIBUTION OF ANGLICISMS
(Subvariables)
EL COMERCIO
NEWS
18%
31%
ADS
SOCIAL CULTURE
21%
16%
14%
SPORTS
REPORTS
It is remarkable the fact that from the 230 anglicisms found in the
national Newspaper, El Comercio, the 21% that is, 71 anglicisms are
included in the Reports section.
Then the Ads with the 21% (48
anglicisms) is on the second place, followed by News and Sports and
Social Cultural pages which have around the same frequency of
anglicisms use: 18%, 16% and 14% in their order. In addition, in Reports
the most common anglicisms are: ranking, mall and mail. In Ads are full,
e-mail, and penthouse. In News the most used are laptop, round and
ranking. In Sports: club, ticket and set. And finally in Social and Culture:
film, web and rock star.
ULTIMAS NOTICIAS
NEWS
18%
18%
ADS
SOCIAL CULTURE
16%
26%
22%
SPORTS
REPORTS
In the local newspaper, Ultimas Noticias, the subvariable where the
highest rate of anglicisms is found is Ads with the 26% that is 32 from
the total of 139 anglicisms. It is followed by Social and Culture with a
22%, by News and Reports, both sections with an 18% and finally by
Sports with the 16%.
In Ads the most common anglicisms are full,
laptop and chat. As in Social and Culture are show, fan and film, in
News are exprés, blog and show, and finally in Sports are ranking, club,
and charter.
EL EXTRA
14%
NEWS
13%
ADS
14%
SOCIAL CULTURE
32%
27%
SPORTS
REPORTS
In this tabloid, the section with the highest rate of anglicisms use
is Ads with a 32% from the total, being: full, hot and web those which
are repeated the most. On second place is the Social and Culture with
the 27%, from which show, club and sexy represent the 43% of all the
anglicisms used in this section. From a long distance of these two first
subvariables, are Sports and Reports, each one with the 14% and in the
end News with the 13%: In Sports the most used are: club, champions
and set and in News are ranking, mail and web.
From the previous analysis, we can add that the majority of
anglicisms in Spanish are nouns. As they become integrated, they can
pose problems in the assignment of gender and number. Verbs and
adjectives, which show less capacity for inflection, are found less
frequently.
It is important to mention that the days with the highest rates of
anglicisms use were weekend days, especially Saturday.
A reason for
this finding is that on this day most of the articles are reports. As it was
previously mentioned, this subvariable has the highest occurrence of
anglicisms, and on that day most of the reports are about technology,
fashion and cinematography, which will be cited as the fields with an
increasing number of English loans.
We must remember that the seventies and especially the eighties
saw the emergence of new technical fields such as computers and the
nineties brought the Internet, with growing numbers of users and its
characteristically anglicized jargon. Moreover, media coverage of sports
increased in popularity. Much of their jargon was and is English.
Advertisers often use foreign words even when there is a
corresponding word in the native language. English words seem to be
connected with fashion and entertainment and anglicisms are indeed
frequently used in those contexts in rather innovative ways.
One of the reasons for the large number of loans in those domains
is probably the fact that these advertisements are often directed to young
people who are seemingly more receptive to anglicisms and frequently
use them even in everyday speech.
The language of advertising differs from standard language in that
while special loans constitute the largest number of loan words in
standard language, advertisements contain predominantly citation loans.
Moreover, they illustrate rather well the tendencies in the integration and
semantic distribution of anglicisms and reflect in an interesting way the
changes that have taken place in Ecuadorian society and culture over
time.
DISTRIBUTION OF ANGLICISMS USE
(variables)
30%
44%
EL COMERCIO
ULTIMAS
EXTRA
26%
A very interesting data we can observe is that the variable with the
highest rate of anglicisms use is the national newspaper “El Comercio”.
This has a logic explanation on the fact its size is about three times the
size of the other two variables considered for our research: Ultimas
Noticias and El Extra. Besides the size, it has longer articles and more
variety of sections, specially the section of Reports that, as we previously
said, has the highest frequency of anglicisms use.
Furthermore, it is noticeable that the tabloid has an important
presence of anglicisms (30%), what is reasonably explained by the target
of readers to which this kind of press is focused. We talk about lower
social classes or people who do not like to read long or deep articles and
prefer to have the information featuring stories of violence, crime, or
scandal presented in a more relaxed and even sensational manner. We
can see also that this kind or readers are more open to the use of
borrowed words.
Anglicisms with a wide currency among the lower social classes
tend to undergo speedy and extensive transformation in Spanish. On the
other hand, anglicisms used by educated speakers used in their registers
(journalists, economists, film critics) tend to remain anglicized longer.
Additionally, these words generally keep the English spelling in written
style and likewise in the spoken language the reproduction of such words
is quite close to English sounds.
As it was previously mentioned, cinematography, sports, social and
technology, are the areas where the use of anglicisms has increased
significantly.
This external phenomenon is also observed in our
newspapers. Young readers are seemingly more receptive to see
anglicisms in newspapers; this fact could explain the prevalence of
anglicisms use in subvariables not belonging to “news”. Spread by means
of phonetic, morphological and semantic variations.
The Most and the Least frequent Anglicisms
As we can see in Chart nineteen, the most frequent anglicisms
found in our research are: full with a repetition of 36 times, ranking with
27 times, club and show with 26 times each one, web with 20 times,
laptop with 17 times, chat and set with 14 times mail and blog with 13
and 12 times respectively.
If we make a first analysis, considering the distribution of the five
most used anglicisms in the subvariables, it was very interesting to find
out that they are used following this pattern: Full in advertisements the
same as laptop, show and web were found the most in reports, socialcultural and sports, while ranking was found in news and sports and
club in sports and reports.
We can also add that this use denotes the need of naming
technological innovations and novel situation is modern society. The
expressive function allows the speaker to use the borrowing with a
relaxed purpose, such as in the case of full, or to show other speakers
that he/she employs the same specialized term as it is done in English,
like ranking, club or show.
It is undeniable that globalization and internationalization of
economy and communication as well as the easier access to information
are producing a big change in our native language, as they are dynamic
and thus they are changing constantly. Considering this fact, computerrelated disciplines or registers seem to be one of the language areas in
Spanish where borrowings are more evident. This phenomenon also
occurs on fields like Cinematography, Arts, Sports and Technology. In
several fields such as modern music, sports, etc, anglicisms are more
frequently used among the young. This is easy to understand if we take
into account the introduction of English in school curricula, and the link
of many English terms with new technical innovations and social and
cultural phenomena. We also know how ready young people are to accept
new fashions and everything that smacks to modernity. In consequence,
the young are in the biggest part responsible for the growing use of
anglicisms in slang and colloquial language.
This importance is
considered by newspapers writers, who in most of the cases try to reach
to a bigger readers market, using a more relaxed style.
In addition, most of all the found terms have been already
incorporated to our Dictionary and are part of our daily speech.
In contrast, we find plenty of anglicisms which are used only once
in our chosen sample. Some of they are: market, open house, plus,
semifull, shock, stand, van, market, fitness, broster, etc. This single use
can found a reason on the basis of most of them are not accepted by the
Royal Academy of the Spanish Language and can be replaced by the
equivalent Spanish term.
Some Spanish and English equivalents stay in the language and
will continue to do so, because of their specialized uses. In such cases
the users have to decide which term to choose according to the context.
In other cases, the two terms co-occur within a single text, they may even
alternate when the author (speaker but generally writer) aims at stylistic
variation.
There
are
examples
of
this
principle
in
the
media:
jeans/tejanos, basket/baloncesto, rating/calificación.
SOCIOLOGICAL ANALYSIS
The increasing international influence of English has been
welcomed by many, but criticized by many others. While some appreciate
its political, economic and cultural advantages, others are sensitive to a
possible menace to other languages and cultures. However, complaints
about take-over or at least an infiltration through foreign words are
nothing new. Until the 19th century this critique was mainly aimed at
French; later English became the focus of attention. From the viewpoint
of linguistics, lexical borrowing is a natural process, which has been
going on since the beginning of languages and language-induced contact.
That the borrowing from foreign languages facilitates and enriches
communication cannot be denied. Sooner or later the foreign words that
happen to stay in a receiver language will be integrated into the existing
language structures to such an extent that they will not be recognized as
foreign any more.
But the critique of the anglicisms is not so much about the fact
that language is a means of communication, but rather about language
being a symbol of the national and cultural identity of a speech
community.
For those who support this critic, anglicisms embody
Anglophone or American social and cultural structures and values,
which can be perceived as a threat to one's own values.
In order to avoid the negative connotations of English borrowings,
House (2005) distinguishes between languages of communication and
languages of identification. The advantage of this distinction is that
English and one's own national language are not perceived as
competitors but rather as complementary possibilities of communication.
Accordingly, anglicisms should function as a means of communication
and not of identification. But there lies the rub: many people do not
perceive the transfer of certain English or even "pseudo- English" words
into their language through the advertising media or the entertaining
industry as a meaningful kind of communication, but rather as an
attempt to take over their national and cultural values.
It is remarkable that the influence of anglicisms in our language is
increasing day by day. That is to say, not only in our colloquial
expressions but in other specific terminology too. The adoption of foreign
terms in Spanish, and in particular the influx of loans from English has
traditionally met with the opposition of linguists and lexicographers as
well as of social and political institutions.
For pure linguists the use of anglicisms in our vocabulary is due to
snobbism and/or to a sense of inferiority towards the English language.
They consider they damage our language with inadequate words and
sometimes even with inexistent words in either language. It is suggested
to use words in Spanish as the richness of our language generally does
not require of anglicisms.
The consulted linguists cited some reasons to use anglicisms:
1. Convenience, maybe because English words could be shorter than in
Spanish, for example “show”, instead of espectáculo.
2. As a symptom of snobbism with the intention to impress the people
who are listening and maybe with a deep feeling of inferiority towards
English language.
They consider this kind of complex is produced among high social
classes in towns or villages. They say “we cannot either treat English
language as invader; because this effect is produced without any special
effort from their side. It is something more pathetic: some Spanish
speakers wish to be invaded because in
their inside there is an
unconscious scorn towards their own culture, which they consider
inferior and subsequently with the obligation to surrender to the rest of
the world, and the rest of the world is for them North America”.
Thus, for them, anglicisms evoke the hegemony of Anglo-Saxon
countries, especially the United States, in the international community,
and this may trigger markedly purist attitudes
3. Negligence or a total absence of respect towards our language.
In this sense, those who adopt a neologism are motivated by some
reasons. In first place, a misunderstanding about the real meaning of
prestige. It means they take an expression from another language,
thinking it is more charming and stylish than its Spanish equivalent.
Also, by ignorance or incompetence to find the correct word in Spanish
(so they use stock without knowing it is inventario) or the case of the
speaker who uses a technicism without setting an alternative voice.
4. Absolute lack of knowledge of the Spanish word due to cultural
absence “It is very sad to admit, but there are colleagues who don’t even
read the newspaper”.
As a conclusion, they say that the richness of our language does
not need the use of anglicisms.
There are always terms or more
appropriate words that can be used instead of them. Their suggestion is
to use terms in Spanish to stop adding anglicisms to our language and
especially do not make up words which do not even exist in English.
On the other hand, there is a less extreme opinion. The consulted
readers consider we need anglicisms only when it is not possible to find
an equivalent term in our language.
At the same time they do not
consider the use of anglicisms as an invasion or a lost of national
identity. Moreover, they agree in the prominence of English nowadays,
but do not think this recognition is to put it as the only language for
today’s civilization. They say, “ there is not any language over another”.
In addition, no people, no human being can feel superior to other, just
for having the heritage of an accent, words or language richness. At the
same time, nobody could feel accomplished facing a foreign culture, and
because of it make the mistake of imitating it because there is nothing
more valuable than our own culture.
As a personal opinion, I consider foreign terms should be
considered not only from a purely linguistic perspective but also from a
more social angle.
They introduce special connotations related to the
idiosyncrasy of the speakers.
Though it is said that languages affect each other, it would be more
correct to say that English is affecting all other languages. English
vocabulary is making inroads into all other languages of the world,
including Spanish. That there is a sudden upsurge in Anglicisms is
widely acknowledged by all. The reasons for the upsurge have been
traced to economy, globalization, and the emergence of the U.S. as superpower in the world. When we talk about globalization, we do not refer
just to economic field, it means specially communication. Written media
can not be the exception for this global context in which all the activities
are being developed. That is why, the use of anglicisms is, every day,
more common to see in our newspaper. What is more, they are present,
accepted and specially understood by the readers. It does not mean we
are losing our national identity; neither it is a corruption of our native
tongue and even more seriously a stifling way towards the capacity or
our tongue to evolve by coining words and expressions. I consider it is
just a reflection of what is happening in all the rest of fields.
However, those who write in media press should be able to
recognize an anglicism when it occurs, and he or she should avoid using
English words, English ways of speech and English grammar, in
unnecessary contexts.
I mean, the use of borrowing terms must be in the same function it
has in the native language. It is not suitable and recommendable for
instance to use an term with a verbal or adjectival function in English, as
a term with a nominal function in Spanish, as it occurs for example with
the term shopping, which in English works as an adjective, or verb, and
in Spanish is very common to use as a noun or as the action of going
shopping.
It is important to underline this point, anglicisms are important
for our language, and we cannot keep away our media from their
influence, but they must be used only when it is necessary and with the
same function they have in English.
In the long term, syntactic or morphological anglicisms might be
more influential in the evolution of Spanish than loanwords. However,
vocabulary is the most obvious mirror of culture, including, of course,
contact between communities and, consequently, innovations of all
kinds. New words appear every day, whether borrowed or invented, but
only part of them remain long enough to be reasonably observed.
Conclusions
At the end of our research, considering the theoretical background,
the field investigation, the three types of analysis, and considering the
opinions of linguists and readers as well ours, we can present as final
conclusions the following:
• The penetration of English in the Ecuadorian newspapers is an
active phenomenon. As the time goes on, it is more frequent and
considered as normal to see anglicisms in written media press.
•
The studied anglicisms have suffered little or no morphological
adaptation. They appear in our newspapers (in most cases) just as they
would do in any American or English newspaper. The adaptations some
of them have suffered are related to incorrect plural formation and some
phonetic adaptation.
•
It must be noted that some anglicisms have been orthographically
modified to suit Spanish spelling and pronunciation, in spite of concerted
attempts to resist them with native alternatives.
•
Some anglicisms have been a part of Spanish for quite a long time
and they have become a part of our mainstream vocabulary, what is
reflected in their regular use in the newspapers.
•
In the considered newspapers sample, the sections with the
highest use of anglicisms are in this order: Reports (25%), Ads (24%),
Social-Culture (20%), News (16%) and Sports (15%).
•
Anglicisms with the highest frequency of use among the three
variables are in this order: Full, Ranking, Club, Show, Web and Laptop.
•
Anglicisms are constantly being incorporated to Ecuadorian
newspapers, especially on reports of technology, social pages, sports and
advertisements.
• Among pure linguists, anglicisms do not enjoy the favored status of
well-accepted borrowings and should be distinguished from them. They
are generally regarded as incorrect and substandard and are defined as
intromissions to the native language.
•
Some anglicisms are so incorporated to our language, to the point
that they do not have an equivalent in Spanish, and if there is one, it is
not used or even more it is unknown.
•
In the global community, the growing communication between
people favors the consolidation of a lingua franca. In this perspective,
anglicisms are an inevitable language resource in our written media to
which we have to get accustomed.
The search for a proper and
convenient balance rather than an entrenched linguistic purism should
be the logical result.
•
The elaboration of this research has helped the author to have a
clear view about the spread of anglicisms in Ecuadorian newspapers,
understanding the need to use them in some cases and in others viewing
them as just a matter of convenience or an adaptation to the actual times
by part of those who write in newspapers.
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