Linguistic peculiarities of teenager speech (based on the novels by Joanne Rowling: "Harry Potter and the goblet of fire" and "Harry Potter and the order of the Phoenix")

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Ізмаїльський державний гуманітарний університет

Linguistic peculiarities of teenager speech (based on the novels by Joanne Rowling: "Harry Potter and the goblet of fire" and "Harry Potter and the order of the Phoenix")

Анотація

О. Четверікова

кандидат філологічних наук, доцент,

Статтю присвячено дослідженню лінгво-комунікативних особливостей мовлення тинейджерів. Як відомо, тинейджери привертають увагу різних вчених: психологів, соціологів та, звичайно, лінгвістів, які приділяють особливу увагу вивченню особливостей їх мови та різновидів мовлення, у тому числі неформального, досліджують його соціальні та територіальні відмінності. Великої уваги заслуговує питання про те, як тинейджери висловлюють свої емоції в повсякденному спілкуванні, а також у конфліктних ситуаціях. Актуальність нашого дослідження базується на сучасних принципах дослідження, враховуючи створення і функціонування мовленнєвих виразів. Мова тинейджерів майстерно представлена в художніх творах. Письменники намагаються зробити усе можливе, щоб означене мовлення було природнім, хоча мова художніх творів і є завжди стилізованою. Форма реалізації мовлення тинейджерів в основному представлена діалогами, оскільки молоді люди не просто виражають себе, а й прагнуть бути почутими та зрозумілими. У белетристичному тексті діалог тинейджерів розглядається як багатофункціональна єдність, що має ситуативний характер. Його основна мета полягає в створенні характеристики особистості персонажа, або у введенні якої-небудь іншої точки зору, що допомагає створити ефект об'єктивності і достовірності подій. Досліджувані діалоги виявляють використання так званих "пустих слів", що передають чи-то невпевненість, вагання, розпач. Іншою рисою виявляється вживання багатої кількості стандартизованих та клішованих фраз і висловів. У статті також розглядаються основні функціональні типи діалогів тинейджерів та найбільш частотно вживаних к них слів, лінгвістичне визначення емоцій, способи та причини скорочення певних слів, особливості вживання сленгу та лінгвістичне втілення оціночних лексичних одиниць. Запропоновано напрям подальшого дослідження.

Ключові слова: мовлення, тинейджер, форми спілкування, сленг, скорочення.

Annotatіon

Chetverikova O. Forms of realization of teenager speech (by the novels by J.Rowling «Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire» and «Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix») -- article

Person's speech reflects cultural and historical background of each epoch and is the means by which cultures express themselves and represent their identity. Linguists pay much attention to study the speech peculiarities of different population groups, investigating social, age, and territorial differences. Particular interest is focused on the study of various features of teenager speech, that is, of the young people who most quickly respond to all life challenges and the environmental changes. They absorb and reflect new phenomena, tend to stand out and catch people's attention, and this is reflected in speech on phonetic, lexical and syntactic levels. Since the speech of teenagers is being changed during each period of social and historical development, the interest of linguists to investigate its striking features remains not little. Various aspects of teenager speech and language have been studied by such researchers, as: H. Mencken, G. Holmes, U.O. Potyatynnyk, V. J. Mizetskaja, V.V. Balabin, and other researchers.

The topicality of our investigation is grounded in the modern principles of speech creation and functioning including man's language in general. Young people figuratively compose one of the potentialities existing in every society, consequently, the mobilization of it influences social viability and future development. In addition, the formation of teenager speech allows us to trace the role of certain linguistic components in the processes that contribute to dialogical communication. The study of the syntactic organization of teenager speech is important because the ontogenesis of linguistic ability helps to insight in the core of speech behavior, understand the conditions of mutual understanding or misunderstanding when the communicants exchange opinions, thoughts and values.

The object of our study make linguistic characteristics of teenager characters represented in the novels «Harry Potter and the goblet of fire» and «Harry Potter and the order of the Phoenix» by Joanne Rowling. As we known, the speech characters, observed in various belletristic texts, though stylized and processed by the author, at the same time is very close to the natural spoken language.

We concentrated our attention at the study of communicative and lexical features observed in the speech of teenagers. According to J. Arnett, a teenager is a young person, a boy or a girl between the ages from 13 to 19 years [1, c. 470]. As a specific age group, teenagers are characterized by individual markers of maturity, the ability to make own decisions, peculiar role expectations, definite functions in the society, which are undoubtedly reflected in their speech.

Languages stabilize, consolidate and unite nations and states. Speech, being realized in a language, also unites, but at the same time contributes to the creation of jargon, Argo, professionalsms, often retaining dialectal and individual characteristics of man. The term «speech» denotes both, the process of communication, and the result of speech activity, i.e., the text - oral, written, or even not pronounced, as for example, in case of inner speech. According to V.J. Mizetskaja, the speech of teenagers realizes all the richness of a language, all its expressive power [2, c. 47].

We have observed that the most frequent forms of teenager communication are performed in the form of a dialogue. One of characteristic features of dialogical speech is its emotional character.

According to O.O. Selivanova, a dialogue is a two-way exchange of information between two people having the form of questions and answers [3, c. 112]. In a belletristic text, a dialogue between teenagers is understood as a multifunctional entity characterized by situational character and spontaneity and having cooperative character. Its main purpose is viewed in the creation of a character's self-characteristics, or in the introduction of some other's point of view, which contributes to «the creation of the effect of objectivity and authenticity of events» [4, c. 161]. Studying all personage's dialogues we deeply insight in his image.

Dialogical speech has bilateral character. In the course of communication one of the characters acts as a speaker, then - as a listener, who should respond to the words of his partner. In general, dialogues realize personage's viewpoints, structuring speech in a peculiar way. The better teenagers know each other, the shorter are their replies if they talk about their everyday problems. That is why such speech is often noted by incompleteness and shortness of replies.

How are you, Mr. Weasley? - Thank you, Harry, I'm o'key [5, c. 31].

«Hello, Ron. How are you?» «Fine, thanks. What about you?» «Oh, not too bad» [5, c. 12].

In the given example, teenagers use short sentences and clichйs, such as: «How are you?» Ta «What about you?» We consider that teenager speech is characterized by standard phrases and clichйs, which helps young people to react quickly and brings them confidence and weight.

Laconic speech of initiating character as well as relies indicate that, firstly, the omitted members of a sentence can be easily restored, and secondly, that young people are not verbose in their communication, except for specific situations of psychological pain or need to speak about the touching important past events.

The investigated dialogues highlight the use of the so-called «empty words», that is, words that do not indicate anything, but serve to fill in the pause when the teenager tries to find the necessary word in his memory. For example: well, well now, so, now, you know, let me think, in fact.

Since teenagers do not always have the required number of lexical units in the vocabulary, the use of similar words becomes a hallmark of their speech.

In the dialogues we noted many standardized speech expressions. They are knowen as: «formulas», «templates», «stereotypes», for example: «Well, look here», «Please, tell me», «Can I help you?», «Cool».

Depending on the leading communicative function [3] performed by this or that dialogue, scientists distinguish the following functional types of dialogues:

• Questioning :

- Whose car do you think is faster, yours or mine?

- I have no idea.

- Well, okay, what kind of car do you drive?

- Honda Accord [6, c. 64].

• Agreement:

- That car is a big piece of shit!

- That is what I can afford.

- So, it is still a big piece of shit.

- Well, it works [6, c. 65].

• Exchange of impressions (thoughts):

- «Have you had a good summer, Harry?» - said Hermione. «Did you get our food parcels and everything?»

- «Yeah, thanks a lot», said Harry. «They saved my life, those cakes».

- «And have you heard from -?» Ron began, but at a look from Hermione he fell silent [5, c. 36];

• Discussion (talk)

- You know what kind of car I drive?

- No.

- A Ford Mustang. Ford, baby! Ford.

- Is that a good car?

- Damn right it's a good car.

- I see.

- Does your car go fast?

- It goes however fast I make it go. Generally, around forty miles an hour I guess [5,

The language of teenagers includes such common expressions as «of course, to take care, OK, to get up, lunch».

The replies «OK» or «o 'kay» are known from the early childhood. They come from «all correct», in the meaning that «everything is all right». The «OK» expression became frequently used in the thirties and came to life in many languages of the world. At first it penetrated into the German language and later to almost all European languages. For example:

- How is Hermione? Is she o'kay now? - She is OK! [5, c. 166]

-I think it's not OK! -SaidHarry- No, it's OK! - answer Ron[5, c. 166]

Another word, often observed in the language of teenagers is «cool», which in dictionaries is translated as something between warm (luke-warm) and cold. In everyday communication, «cool» is translated as «great», «grandiose», «excellent». Compared with the word-combination «It'sgreat!» the phrase «It's cool!» is preferred by teenagers.

- Do you like ice-cream?

- Harry, it's cool! [5, c. 175]

At the moments we admire somebody or wonder about something, we may say: «That's wonderful!», or «How can it be!», Teenagers shout «Oh boy!» Regardless of whether a boy or a girl is standing next to the speaker. For example:

- «Oh boy!» - said Ron in disbelief [5, c. 154].

- «Oh boy!» -1 expect they 'll be six feet long [6, c. 243].

We know that emotions accompany people in every situation, especially when something extraordinary happens, which calls forth emotional change, like astonishment, strong fear, great joy. For example:

- Ouch - squealed Lavender Brown [5, c. 106].

- Ouch - just about summed up the Blast-Ended Skrewts in Harry's opinion [5, c. 107]. «Ouch!» yelled Dean Thomas after about ten minutes «It got me» [5, c. 107].

In the situations of tension and excitement we observed phrases, like «Oh my God! Jesus!» For example:

- Jesus -said Ron shortly.

«Your dad's in the paper, Weasley!» said Malfoy, brandishing a copy of the Daily Prophet and speaking very loudly, so that everyone in the packed entrance hall could hear. «Listen to this!» [5, c. 110].

Nevertheless, phrases, like «Oh my God! Jesus!» are used by teenagers less often than the exclamations «Ouch!» або «Oh boy!».

In the modern English language there is a tendency to shorten words in sentences. So it becomes very laconic and confidently, without any regret, changes long and not very long words. The same tendencies are observed in the language of teenagers. For example:

«Tha's next lesson, Malfoy. Yer jus ' feedin' `em today. Now, yeh'll wan' ter try `em on a few diff'rent things - I've never had `em before, not sure what they 'll go fer -1 got ant eggs an' frog livers an' a bit o' grass snake - just try `em out with a bit of each» [6, c. 106].

So, because of the length and cumbersome nature of some English words, the younger generation more and more often uses in their writing instead of 'you' simply U (the pronunciation is one and the same), and instead of 'to', it's just '2', and «4» instead of «for». So all these rock-band names - «U2», «INXS» - are not just abbreviations. They have another concealed meaning, for example: «U2» may be read as «You two» or «You too».

A significant part of the slang words used be teenagers make lexical doublets of neutral or spoken units. For example: ace, boon, coon in the meaning chap, pal, fellow; guy, chum, mate, friend.

To the category of synonymic doublets we may also relate such slengizms as: posse, dogpack, tribe, crew /one's circle of friend; buzz crusher / killjo; kill, kari / make fun of.

Particular attention deserves the part of teenager slang, which belongs emotionally colored vocabulary, often having a mocking, ironic or parody connotation, which in general is typical of any professional jargon, for example: mule with a broom - a very ugly girl; fruit і looser - stupid person.

As we can see from the above examples, metaphorical transfer plays a significant role in the formation of these units.

Considering some variations of abbreviations, we should especially focus on various types of abbreviations and clipped forms that are widely used in teenager speech. We can observe numerous examples of expressively coloured shortenings, the function of which varies depending on the situation of use: the more informal is the situation of communication, the more often these units are noted. For example:

soph = sophomore; zam = exam. ret = tobacco cigarette; croc = crocodile, fab = fabulous, uni = university, vac = vcation. The tendency to use them in speech may be explained by the wish to sound modern, be “the member” of some group.

Initial shortenings are often used with the purpose of economy: B.F. = best friend; P= parent; F = father/friend/false/farewell. The use of such words by teenagers may indicate their attempt to remain obscure to the uninitiated, as a characteristic feature of some group. The named phenomenon may also have playful-parody colouring.

There exist formations based on numerals and decimal fractions: 42 / cool, hip - very nice, suitable; 2,5 - universal policeman or safeguard [7].

A special place among slang units occupies a rather large group, of interjections and exclamations, which add emotional colouring and reflect feelings or will. Most often, they represent a couple of words or sounds and express different emotional manifestations:

1) surprise: bonk!, aha!, chyaa!, flip mode!, oh my goshness!, shnikies!;