Professional vocabulary. Topic: “Vocabulary. Normative use of professional vocabulary in speech. Lexical errors and how to fix them

Professional (special) vocabulary is the vocabulary used by groups of people connected professionally. In special vocabulary, two layers are distinguished: terminological and professional vocabulary itself.

The largest group of words in professional vocabulary are scientific and technical terms. They belong to the language of science and form within the term system.

MI Fomina points out that terminological vocabulary includes words used “for a logically accurate definition of special concepts, for establishing the content of concepts, their distinctive features” Fomina MI Modern Russian language. Lexicology. - M., 2001. - P. 216 .. This suggests that for the term the basic is the definitive function, that is, the function of definition.

The ideal requirements for terms are unambiguity, lack of synonyms, clearly limited, predominantly motivated specialization, and absolute semantic accuracy. Today the terms do not meet these requirements, the same term can be used in different sciences and with different meanings. For example, the term image is used in philosophy ("mental imprint of the surrounding world"), in linguistics ("something sensuously perceived"), as well as in literary criticism, psychology and other sciences. The requirement for the absence of doublets is also violated: in linguistics, for example, the terms prefix and prefix, word, lexeme and lexical unit.

The system of terms is replenished with common vocabulary: nose(general) and the bow of the ship, bird wing(general) and airplane wing... However, today, more often the terms themselves go beyond scientific works, penetrating into common vocabulary: reaction, start, radio, oxygen.

If the terms belong to written, book speech, then professionalisms belong to oral, colloquial speech and serve groups of people connected by one job. Professionalisms go beyond the literary language and, as a rule, are reduced in style.

The actual professional vocabulary includes words and expressions that are not strictly legalized and commonly used, but are used in certain areas of production. Unlike terms, professionalisms are used in oral speech as "semi-official" words that do not have a strict scientific character. Such words are often distinguished by special figurativeness and metaphoricity, as well as greater differentiation. For example, hunters have many names for foxes by suit and breed: simple, red, forest, fire, red-brown, cross, black, karsun, stocked fox etc.

Some professional words are of a narrow professional nature and are used in the colloquial speech of people united by a certain occupation. Sometimes such words are defined as professional jargon. This vocabulary has a reduced expressive coloring and is used only in the oral speech of people of the same profession. For example, engineers snitch- "self-recording device"; the pilots nedomaz, re-grease- "undershoot and overflights of the landing mark"; from printers widow- "a line not included in the text." The boundaries between semi-official professional words and professional jargons are very vague, unstable, and are distinguished only conditionally.

Certain professionalisms, often diminished in sound, can become part of the common vocabulary: give out on the mountain, fluidity... In fiction, professional vocabulary itself is used by authors for a specific purpose - to create character when describing the life of people associated with any kind of production.

In dictionaries, professionalisms are given with the mark "special", sometimes the sphere of use of this or that word is indicated: physical, medical, willing. etc.

In special vocabulary, words and phrases used by groups of persons united by the nature of their activities (by profession), in various spheres of production, technologies that have not become common, however, are distinguished - the so-called professionalisms. Their status is rather complicated, because some specialists: a) identify with terms, b) refer to units of craft vocabulary; c) to special vocabulary of a non-nominal nature (verbs, adverbs, adjectives); d) non-standardized special vocabulary, limited to the use of professionals in oral speech in an informal setting, and often having emotionally expressive connotations. Unlike terms - the official scientific names of special concepts, professionalisms function mainly in oral speech as "semi-official" words that do not have a strictly scientific character. Professionalisms are used to designate various production processes, tools of production, raw materials, products, etc. For example, technical professionalisms: charge d "un atelier, calcul des tolérances, gestion de l" entreprise, escompte, par itération; theatrical: armoire a sons = piano de l "orchestre, baisser le torchon = baisser le rideau, un tunnel = longue tirade dans le texte, faire de la baraque = donner un mauvais spectacle, boire ta lasse = connaоtre l" insucci complet; artists: croýte = peinture qui n "est pas au goyt du peintre, navet = peinture horrible, cro-queton = croquis.

For example, in the speech of printers, professionalisms are used: cul-de-lampe - graphic decoration at the end of a book, mustache - an ending with a thickening in the middle. Professionalisms are characterized by significant differentiation in the designation of special concepts, tools and means of production, the name of objects, actions, and so on. For example, in meteorology, in accordance with the distinguished types of snowflakes, there are several of their names: astйrique- asterisk , aiguille- needle, hйrisson- hedgehog, lame- plate.

Professionalisms are either created anew using original or borrowed word-formation means according to general linguistic models, or (which is very often observed) are the result of a rethinking of general literary words. By the way of education, one can distinguish:
1) proper lexical professionalisms that arise as new, special names. For example, in this way the names of various types of plane appeared in the speech of carpenters and joiners. : moulure- kalevka, enlève-carré- zenzubel, etc.;

2) lexico-semantic professionalisms arising in the process of developing a new meaning of the word and its rethinking. This is how, for example, the professional meanings of words in the speech of printers arose: sapins - herringbones or oreilles - paws - a kind of quotation marks; in the speech of hunters, the professional names of animal tails differ: for a wolf - byche, the fox - tube, in the beaver - pelle, the hare - fleur, faisceau etc.;
3) lexico-derivational professionalism, which includes words such as a spare wheel - a spare mechanism, a part of something; chief director - the main director, etc., in which either a suffix or a way of adding words are used, etc.

4) One of the ways to educate professionalism is compression: when a word is removed from a compound name, which conveys its functional and semantic meaning to the remaining word, complicating its content. A distinctive feature of such names is brevity and semantic capacity (compare: hydraulic brake system - hydraulique).

Professionalisms can be grouped according to the area of ​​their use: in the speech of athletes, miners, doctors, hunters, fishermen, etc. Technicisms are distinguished into a special group - highly specialized names used in the field of technology. They are characterized by great detail in the designation of special concepts, tools, production processes, material. So, horse breeders distinguish horses by purpose: de trait- harness, de selle- horse, de bвt- pack, and the first in harness: limonier- root, de renfort- attached; in the speech of carpenters and joiners, the tool for planing the boards of the plane has varieties: varlope- jointer, riflard- sherhebel. In professional speech, logs and boards are distinguished by size, shape and are called: bois carré- timber, dosse- croaker, etc.

Professionalisms are often expressive, which brings them closer to jargon. So the drivers of buses, trucks, cars call the steering wheel a steering wheel, the typographers call the sign adopted in the letter - the quotation marks are figuratively called Christmas trees (""), paws (""), the general heading in the newspaper - a heading.

A kind of professionalism is professional jargon, which is not capable of acquiring a normative character, and their conventionality is clearly felt by the speakers. It has a reduced expressive coloring and is used only in the oral speech of people of the same profession. For example, engineers jokingly call the recorder “ cafard"-" sneaky ". Sometimes jargon professionalisms pass into the national language, while remaining stylistically diminished; for example, avoir le trac To be "afraid" in theatrical jargon, or barbouiller"Smear" from the jargon of artists. Professional slang words, as a rule, have neutral synonyms devoid of colloquial connotation, which have a precise terminological meaning.

Professional vocabulary contains words containing semes of disapproval, disdain, contempt: tubercle - senior duty, pile up marriage, paleness, etc., which bring them closer to jargon. Professionalisms bordering on jargon are used as an effective method of speech contrast. Such professional names are associated with the communicative process in labor activity. Imagery is a characteristic feature of professionalism in all areas of production. Uncodified professional vocabulary is outside the literary norm, therefore, like colloquial or slang words, it is usually taken in quotation marks in the text. But now the norm has become more free, quotation marks are not always used to highlight professionalism.

In works of fiction, as well as in newspaper and magazine texts, professionalisms, as a rule, perform a nominative function, and also serve as a pictorial and expressive means. Certain professionalisms, often of a reduced stylistic sound, become part of the common vocabulary: travail par saccades- assault. In fiction, professionalisms are used by writers with a certain stylistic task: as a characterological means in describing the life of people associated with any kind of production.

Covering the life of society, newspapers cannot but touch upon the scientific and professional-production side. In materials of this orientation, vocabulary is used that constitutes the sublanguage of the national language, "its subsystem, which includes special words necessary only for a given profession." Moreover, the more complex the purposeful activity of people, the more their special language, or sublanguage, is isolated from the common language, therefore the use of special vocabulary in the texts of newspaper publications requires careful selection and a deliberate approach to it. The introduction of professionalism into the text as a modeling function is used not only in the speech characteristics of the characters, but also in the author's speech of the journalist. This technique allows you to show the author's involvement in the problem he writes about, his competence in this area. The text, which includes professionalisms, becomes similar to oral speech. This allows the reader to feel like a participant in the events, to delve deeper into their essence. A professional title in newspaper text is used to style the text, i.e. to bring it as close as possible to the reality of that professional and production sphere of human activity, about which the author writes, thus ensuring realism. Therefore, professionally oriented words are often found in interviews, where they create the speech characteristics of the characters. The unedited text should reflect the reality of living speech, and professionalism only emphasizes its situationality.

Sphere of use of professional vocabulary

Professionalisms, in contrast to their commonly used equivalents, serve to differentiate related concepts used in a certain type of human activity. Thanks to this, professional vocabulary is indispensable for laconic and accurate expression of thoughts in special texts intended for a trained reader. However, the informative value of narrowly professional names is lost if a layman encounters them. Therefore, professionalism is appropriate, say, in large-circulation industry newspapers and is not justified in publications aimed at wide readership.

As a product of practice, professionalism makes speech concrete and easily assimilated not only by ordinary representatives of a particular industry, but by a wide range of people in contact with this environment. He is preferred to a term that gives a generalized scientific, often using foreign language roots, the name of objects, phenomena, actions. Professional names allow you to quickly and easily get acquainted with the production, and the emotionality of professionalism makes this process interesting. These qualities of professionalism are becoming necessary for journalists who seek to draw the attention of the general reader to a certain professional field, to problems in it.

Narrow professional words usually do not receive wide distribution in the literary language, that is, the scope of their use remains limited. Most often, this is the colloquial speech of representatives of a particular profession, since professionalisms are semi-official names (and this is one of their differences from terms), fixed in the language of a particular profession. Sometimes they are a kind of informal synonyms for special names. Often they are reflected in dictionaries, but always marked "professional".

Terminological and professional vocabulary

Socially restricted use terminological and professional vocabulary used by people of the same profession, working in the same field of science, technology. Terms and professionalisms are given in explanatory dictionaries marked "special", sometimes the scope of use of this or that term is indicated: phys., med., mat., astronomer... etc.

Each area of ​​knowledge has its own terminological system.

Terms are words or phrases that name special concepts of any sphere of production, science, art. Each term is necessarily based on the definition (definition) of the reality it denotes, due to which the terms represent an accurate and at the same time succinct description of an object or phenomenon. Each branch of knowledge operates with its own terms, which constitute the essence of the terminological system of this science.

As part of the terminological vocabulary, several "layers" can be distinguished, differing in the sphere of use, in the features of the designated object.

First of all it is general scientific terms, which are used in various fields of knowledge and belong to the scientific style of speech in general: experiment, adequate, equivalent, predict, hypothetical, progress, reaction etc. These terms form a common conceptual fund of various sciences and have the greatest frequency of use.

Differ and special terms, which are assigned to certain scientific disciplines, branches of production and technology; for example in linguistics: subject, predicate, adjective, pronoun; in medicine: heart attack, myoma, periodontitis, cardiology and so on. These terminologies concentrate the quintessence of each science. According to S. Bally, such terms "are ideal types of linguistic expression, to which scientific language inevitably strives" [ Balli S. French stylistics. M., 1961 p. 144].

Terminological vocabulary, like no other, is informative. Therefore, in the language of science, terms are irreplaceable: they make it possible to formulate a thought succinctly and extremely accurately. However, the degree of terminology of scientific works is not the same. The frequency of the use of terms depends on the nature of the presentation, the addressing of the text.
Modern society requires such a form of description of the data obtained, which would make it possible to make the greatest discoveries of mankind the property of everyone. However, the language of monographic research is often so overloaded with terms that it becomes inaccessible even to a specialist. Therefore, it is important that the terminology used is sufficiently mastered by science, and the newly introduced terms need to be explained.

The spread of terms outside of scientific works has become a peculiar sign of our time. This gives reason to talk about general terminology of modern speech... So, many words that have terminological meaning have been widely used without any restrictions: tractor, radio, television, oxygen... Another group consists of words that have a dual nature: they can function both as terms and as common words. In the first case, these lexical units are characterized by special shades of meaning, giving them special accuracy and uniqueness. So the word mountain, meaning in widespread use - "significant elevation rising above the surrounding terrain" and having a number of figurative meanings, does not contain specific measurements of height in its interpretation.
In geographical terminology, where the distinction between the terms "mountain" and "hill" is essential, a clarification is given - "an elevation of more than 200 m in height". Thus, the use of such words outside the scientific style is associated with their partial determinologization.

Professional vocabulary includes words and expressions used in various spheres of production, techniques, which, however, have not become common. Unlike terms - the official scientific names of special concepts, professionalism function mainly in oral speech as "semi-official" words that do not have a strictly scientific character. Professionalisms are used to designate various production processes, tools of production, raw materials, manufactured products, etc. For example, in the speech of printers, professionalisms are used: ending - "graphic decoration at the end of the book", antennae - "ending with a thickening in the middle", tail - the "bottom outer margin of the page"; and the "bottom edge of the book" opposite the head of the book.

Professionalisms can be grouped according to the sphere of their use: in the speech of athletes, miners, doctors, hunters, fishermen, etc. Technicisms are distinguished in a special group - highly specialized names used in the field of technology.

Professionalisms, in contrast to their commonly used equivalents, serve to differentiate related concepts used in a certain type of human activity. Thanks to this, professional vocabulary is indispensable for laconic and accurate expression of thoughts in special texts intended for a trained reader. However, the informative value of narrowly professional names is lost if a layman encounters them. Therefore, professionalism is appropriate, say, in large-circulation industry newspapers and is not justified in publications aimed at wide readership.

Certain professionalisms, often of a reduced stylistic sound, become part of the common vocabulary: give out on-the-mountain, assault, turnover... In fiction, professionalisms are used by writers with a certain stylistic task: as a characterological means in describing the life of people associated with any kind of production.

Professional slang vocabulary has a reduced expressive coloring and is used only in the oral speech of people of the same profession. For example, engineers jokingly call a self-recording device a sneak, in the speech of pilots there are words undermaz, overmaz, meaning "undershoot and flight of the landing mark", as well as bubble, sausage - "balloon-probe", etc. Professional slang words, as a rule, have neutral synonyms devoid of colloquial connotation that have precise terminological meaning.

Professional slang vocabulary is not given in special dictionaries, in contrast to professionalisms, which are given with explanations and are often enclosed in quotation marks (to distinguish them graphically from terms): "hammered" font - "a font that has been in galleys or stripes for a long time." ; "someone else's" font - "letters of a font of a different style or size, mistakenly included in the typed text or heading."

Rosenthal D.E., Golub I.B., Telenkova M.A. Modern Russian language.
M .: Ayris-Press, 2002

Professional and special vocabulary make up words, the use of which is characteristic of people of certain professions.
Special vocabulary - these are officially accepted, regularly used special terms.
Professional vocabulary ( professionalism) - these are expressively rethought words and expressions characteristic of many professions, taken from the general circulation.
The difference between technical terms and professionalism can be shown in the following examples.
In metallurgy, the term crust denotes the remains of frozen metal in the ladle, and the workers call these remnants a goat, therefore, frozen is an official term, that is, a special vocabulary, and a goat is professionalism.
In the manufacture of optical instruments, one of the abrasive devices is called a concave grinder (technical term), and workers call it a cup (professionalism).
Nuclear scientists jokingly call the synchrophasotron (a special term) a pan (professionalism).
Doctors (primarily therapists) call a candle a special type of temperature curve with a sharp rise and fall.
Cabinet carpenters call sandpaper (the official terminological name) skin, and it is this professionalism that is also characteristic of colloquial vocabulary.
Special vocabulary is created by the conscious and purposeful efforts of people - specialists in any field. Professionalisms are less regular, since they are born in the oral speech of people, as a result of which they rarely form a system.
In contrast to special terms, professionalisms have a bright expressive coloring and expressiveness due to their metaphoric and, often, imagery.
In some cases, professionalism can be used as official terms. In these cases, their expressiveness is somewhat erased, faded, but the metaphorical meaning is still felt quite well. Compare, for example terms:
Lever arm; Gear tooth; Pipe elbow, etc.
It should be remembered that, despite the limited scope of the use of special and professional vocabulary, there is a constant connection and interaction between it and the national vocabulary.
The literary language masters many special terms: they gradually begin to be rethought in the process of use, as a result of which they cease to be terms, that is, they are determined.
Compare, for example, the use in modern journalism, in colloquial speech, and sometimes in fiction of such phrases, created according to the "term + common word" scheme:
Ideological vacuum; Bacillus of indifference; Orbit of Glory; Corrosion of the soul; Contact with the population, etc.

Bibliographic description:

I.A. Nesterova Professional vocabulary [Electronic resource] // Educational encyclopedia site

Professional vocabulary has features that allow people of the same profession to communicate freely. However, professionalism is not necessarily a term. There are certain differences between terms and professional vocabulary. This will be mentioned in our article.

The concept and features of professional vocabulary

Words related to professional vocabulary, I call professionalisms. Halperin interpreted professionalisms as "... words associated with the production activities of people united by one profession or occupation." In his opinion, professionalism is comparable to terms. The latter appear to define newly emerging concepts as a result of scientific discoveries and technological progress. Professionalisms in a new way designate already known concepts, usually objects and processes of labor (activity). Professionalisms differ from terms in that terms are a specialized part of literary and book vocabulary, and professionalisms are a specialized part of non-literary colloquial vocabulary. The semantic structure of professionalism is obscured by a figurative representation, in which the singled out features can be very random and arbitrary. The emergence of professionalism is based on semantic specialization - the narrowing of the meaning of a word.