Lexical Abbreviation
It is natural that in the course of time and language development some graphical abbreviations should penetrate into the sphere of oral speech and turn into lexical abbreviations, used both in oral and written speech, e.g.: MP, S.O.S., TV, etc.
They are formed by a simultaneous operation of shortening and compounding. They are made up of the initial sounds, e.g. TV, or syllables of the components of a word-group, e.g. pop-music, or a compound word: V-day.
Ways of reading lexical abbreviations:
- as a succession of alphabetical reading of the constituent letters:
G.M.T.- Greenwich mean time; a V.I.P. - a very important person; EEC -
European Economic Community.
- as a succession of sounds denoted by the constituent letters, i.e. as if the
abbreviations were ordinary words: UNO - United Nation Organization;
NATO; UNESCO - United Nation Educational, Scientific and Cultural Or-
ganization.
As a rule, lexical abbreviations do not include functional words (prepositions, articles, etc.), although there are some exceptions, e.g.: R. and D. - research and development programme.
In two-member word-groups as a rule the first component is shortened: V-day; H-bomb; M-day (the first day of mobilization); D-day (decimal) - äåíü ââåäåíèÿ äåñÿòè÷íîé ìîíåòíîé ñèñòåìû 15.02.1971; L-driver (learner driver).
In three-member word-groups the first two components are shortened, e.g.: V.J.-Day; H.M. The Queen.
Clipping
Clipping consists in the cutting off one or several syllables of a word. In some cases it is the stressed syllable which is left after cutting off, e.g.: sis -sister; doc. - doctor; telly - television; Alf - Alfred; Ed - Edward; Sam -Samuel.
Sometimes, however, the unstressed syllable remains, e.g.: phone - telephone; Alec - Alexander; plane - airplane; Bess - Elizabeth.
Kinds of clipping:
1. aphaeresis - initial clipping, e.g.: phone - telephone; cologne - aude-
cologne;
2. apocope - final clipping, e.g.: demo - demonstration; steno - stenogra
pher; disco - discotheque; limo - limousine; lib - liberation;
3. syncope - middle clipping, e.g.: maths - mathematics; pants - panta
loons; specs - spectacles;
4. mixed type - clipping at the beginning and at the end, e.g.: frig, fridge
- refrigeration; tec - detective; flu - influenza.
As a rule in Modern English nouns are shortened; there are very few clipped adjectives and they all belong to jargonisms, e.g.: dilly - delightful; comfy - comfortable; impass - impossible; mizzy - miserable. As for clipped verbs they are usually formed from clipped nouns by means of conversion, e.g.: to taxi - taxi; to phone - phone.
In most cases a shortened word exists in the language together with the longer word from which it is derived and usually has the same lexical meaning, differing only in emotive charge and style. In this case we speak about the variants of one and the same word, e.g.: exam - examination, sis - sister. When there is a semantic difference between a shortened unit and a longer one they must be called two distinct words, e.g.: cab - íàåìíûé ýêèïàæ, cabriolet
- êàáðèîëåò.
Shortening affects not only words but word-groups as well. Clipped phrases appear as a result of:
- ellipses - omission of a word or words in a phrase when the remaining
part keeps the lexical meaning of the whole phrase,
- substantivation - dropping out of the final noun in an attributive phrase,
when the remaining adjective keeps the meaning and all the syntactical func
tions of the noun,
- clipping of substantivated words followed by ellipses,
e.g.: pub (subst.) = public (clipping) house (ellipses); a sit-down (subst.) = a sit-down (subst.) demonstration (ellipses); pop (subst.) = popular (clipping) music (ellipses); nuke (subst.) = nuclear (clipping) bomb (ellipses).
Substantivation is often accompanied by productive suffixation, e.g.: a two-decker - a two-deck bus; outdoorsy - outdoors types of people; old-timer
- old time man (ñòàðèê).