It’s no secret that far from all the words that make up the lexical stock of the native language are native Russian. Even with the pronunciation and / or spelling of some words, one can easily guess that their country of origin is Britain, France, Germany, or some other. What are the reasons for borrowing, why are they needed, and what are the general borrowings in modern Russian?
What is borrowing?
And although it is perhaps a little silly to consider such a question (everyone should understand what is being discussed), one cannot start a conversation about borrowing without defining the term itself. So, linguists call borrowing, firstly, any foreign word that appeared in a native language from someone else’s, even if in terms of its morphemes (parts of the word) it does not outwardly differ from Russian words. Secondly, borrowing refers to the very process of acceptance by a language of a given alien element, getting used to it, and its gradual use by native speakers. Borrowing is an integral part of the process of development and change of speech. Foreign words in the Russian language make up no more than ten percent of all the vocabulary it contains (nevertheless, this is a lot).
Why do we need
Why can't a language develop independently without outside interference? What is the role of borrowing? Why are they so necessary - and these are not big words, they really are needed.
First of all, it is worth recognizing the fact that the borrowing process is characteristic of any language, it is a normal and even inevitable phenomenon. They play a truly important role for a language that absorbs new words. Firstly, it is thus enriched, its vocabulary is increasing. Secondly, language, speech are a direct and direct reflection of the relationship between different nationalities and nationalities. Thirdly, borrowings often act as a “transmitter” of new word-forming morphemes, thanks to which new words subsequently appear (we will return to this issue in more detail a little later).
Borrowing is necessary when a word is completely absent in the native language to express one or another concept. This situation is considered the main reason for their appearance and the most popular. Borrowing then acts as the “savior” of the host language. A close (but not the same) reason for the appearance of new words in a language from another source language is the emergence of new objects that require one or another nomination. In addition, in some cases, borrowing words in modern Russian appear as a kind of tribute to fashion. Another reason lies in the fact that often in the Russian language to refer to a concept there is a whole expression, while foreigners use only one word. This reason can be briefly described as "convenience."
The need to fill in the gaps in the expressive means of the language also leads to the appearance of foreign borrowed words. By the way, such a (foreign) word often, according to many, sounds better, it is more solid, pathos, more prestigious - and this also gives reason to take it for yourself. There are a lot of reasons for borrowing in modern Russian - another question is whether they are always really necessary and are used exclusively on the merits. We will return to this issue a little later.
Where do they come from
Many people mistakenly believe that only English gives us their words and expressions. However, this is fundamentally wrong, despite the fact that there are really enough borrowings from English (Anglicisms) in our language.
Throughout its long history, the Russian people conducted close economic, cultural, political and other relations with various nations. This could not but affect the vocabulary - the most receptive and fluid layer of the language, which, like a sponge, absorbed many elements of foreign-language cultures.
The Russian language contains words from English, French, German, Latin, Greek, Turkic, Scandinavian, Slavic languages. For example, “notebook” came from Greek, “waltz” from French, “tomato” from Italian. Moreover, it is interesting that it is far from always possible to easily and quickly understand the “country of origin” of a given word or expression. The etymology of many of them is still a mystery to linguists and philologists.
Ways of borrowing
What are the ways of borrowing words in modern Russian? There are only two such options: this is oral and written speech. The first method often changes the face of the word (for example, the potato that came to us from the Italian language looks like tartufolo in the original), the second, on the contrary, leaves the tokens almost untouched. In addition, a word can pass from language to language directly, or maybe through the so-called intermediary language.
Classification
Borrowings in modern Russian can be divided into several groups in different ways. The first acceptable classification is by source, that is, by the language from which the given word came. Each language has its own term. So, English borrowings in modern Russian are called Anglicisms, Czech - Bohemisms (because the historical name of the region is Bohemia), French - Gallicisms (from Gaul). Words that came from Hungary are called Magyarisms or Ungarisms, and from any oriental language they are called Orientalisms, and so on.
Another method of classification is by the type of contact, as mentioned above: either directly, or through an intermediary, either verbally or in writing (through books). Incidentally, artists often resorted to the latter method, finding and reviving archaisms (old words that are not used today) in their masterpieces - for example, Richard Wagner or Alexey Tolstoy.
The third category is the method of borrowing: the whole word or some part of it (either one or the other will be a lexical borrowing) can go into a new language, in addition, an existing word may have a new meaning (semantic borrowing).
Finally, all foreign-language borrowings in the modern Russian language can be classified into necessary and unnecessary, in other words, justified and unjustified. The first category will include those words whose analogues were not in the language before their appearance, and their appearance was necessary to describe a particular phenomenon and / or subject. There are a great many such words, for example, a telephone, a mixer, a snowboard, chocolate, bowling and the like. These tokens filled the gaps in our language, so their appearance is justified.
A completely different thing is foreign language words that appear in Russian as a synonym for existing concepts: “message” - “message”, “goalkeeper” - “goalkeeper” and the like. As a rule, such equivalents are just Anglicisms and are associated with the general fashion for all English and American, associated with the "equalization" of these countries. Meanwhile, the presence of words in the language that duplicate each other ultimately leads to the elimination of one of the synonyms from speech. It is impossible to predict which word will disappear - own or borrowed.
Borrowing Periods
Below will be a little more detailed about the words that came from English, German and French. In the meantime, it is worth giving a general description of borrowings in modern Russian.
This process began in antiquity - perhaps even in the prehistoric period. This question has not yet been fully studied and is of great interest to philologists and linguists, as well as to historians. If we talk about the known periods of borrowings, then the first undoubtedly refers to the Old Russian language - then words penetrated into it from Slavic (for example, the names of the months) and non-Slavic (usually Baltic and Scandinavian) languages (village, herring, anchor and many others).
Separately, it is necessary to mention the influence of the Greek language (largely due to close ties with Byzantium, and also thanks to the establishment of Christianity in Russia) - it was he who gave the Russian "brother" many scientific terms (such as, for example, mathematics or history), religious concepts (anathema, icon or bishop) and so on.
The seventeenth century was marked by borrowings from Latin - since then they have been relentlessly appearing in our language. Some of the lexemes that arose then still exist (for example, a doctor). Then, under Peter, active penetration of European culture into Russia began, which was most directly reflected in the language. Many concepts of military, scientific, cultural terminology and many, many others have been known to Russian speakers since then: ammunition, cruiser, captain, general, tariff, and the like. Do not forget about marine terminology, because just Peter was actively developing shipping. Thanks to his connections with Holland, the Russian language was enriched with such words as sailor, navigator, drift and others. Peter's reforms and innovations gave way to a variety of German, French, and English borrowings in the modern Russian language, and this taking into account that the emperor himself demanded not to use foreign words in his speech.
In the eighteenth century, the French language became almost courtly, extremely widespread in Russia. This contributed to the fact that a huge number of words from the language of Dumas penetrated into Russian speech. Basically, these were words describing life, clothes, food: marmalade, vest, couch and so on. In the same period, words from Italy and Spain appeared in Russian vocabulary, however, in their numbers they were significantly inferior to French borrowings: aria, piano, short story, guitar, tenor - all the words similar and familiar to the Russian ear came to us from these warm countries .
Similar lexical transformations continued in the nineteenth century, until they were replaced by Anglicism - these are the borrowings that characterize the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The flow of English words into our speech is due to the activation of all kinds of ties with foreign representatives, and since the international language in which all affairs are conducted is English, such a trend is not surprising. All these words can rightfully be considered the latest borrowings in modern Russian. And most of them have already been completely assimilated.
Categories
There are several groups or categories into which all borrowings in modern Russian can be divided. The first of them will include all those words that have already lost all possible signs of their foreign origin. For example, the word bed - hardly a large number of people know that this word came to our language from Greek. Or such a token as a chair - who would have thought that Germany was his birthplace.
The second group includes words that preserve some elements of a foreign sound unusual for Russians: for example, French veil or British jazz - these words have long been familiar to us, but nevertheless something inherent in them makes us guess about their non-Russian origin (sometimes prefixes contribute to this - for example, trans- or anti-).
The third category includes political, cultural and scientific concepts. Borrowings in modern Russian are often words that are used in several languages at once - in other words, internationalism. Such words include, for example, the telegraph.
And finally, the fourth group is the words of the so-called limited use. The problem of borrowing in modern Russian is such that far from all the lexemes that came into our speech become common and popular. Some remain undisturbed book vocabulary - such words, as a rule, have synonyms that have long been known and familiar to the inhabitants of Russia (this again brings us back to the issue of unjustified borrowing): for example, to shock - to stun, immoral - immoral and the like. Not to book ones, but tokens that have an alternative in Russian, include such “noble” words as rendezvous (we will say more often - a date).
In addition, the same category includes words that are quite common in our speech, but at the same time retain a foreign language spelling - merci or ok. They also have equivalents, but they can be considered as a kind of expressive means that serve to decorate and give greater expression.
How to find out a loan
We learned above that many of the words that came into the Russian language from others have already become so “accustomed” to it that they completely lost the signs of their origin. Therefore, sometimes it’s not at all easy to understand that the word foreign is in front of you. However, there are still ways to solve this problem. So, borrowings in modern Russian can be found as follows:
- If the word begins with the letter “a” (except for the original Russian interjections - ah, yeah, ay): profile, aster, lampshade.
- The presence of the letter "f" in the word (anywhere) also indicates foreign words - also with the exception of Russian interjections such as fu: cafe, carafe, fact, cupboard, February.
- The junction of two or more vowels at the root: a duel, a poet, a theater, a guard, a diet.
- The presence of the letter "e": echo, peer, sir, aloe, floor (excluding Russian interjections and pronouns eh, e and others).
- Combinations of kyu, pyu, mu and others: debut, mashed potatoes, cuvette, muesli, bill.
- Double consonant in the root of the word: Saturday, abbot, alley.
- Combinations of ke, ge, heh at the root of the word: rocket, coat of arms, scheme.
- Unswerving words: metro, coat, coffee, cafe, cinema.
- Türkic words can be recognized by the endings -fang or -cha: turf, cherry plum; Greek - at the end –os: space, epic, chaos. A sign of Latin borrowings - endings -us, -um, -tsia and the like: plenum, radius, third and so on. German ones are recognized by the combinations –sht- and –shp- at the beginning of the word, as well as at the end of the master: stamp, punks, accompanist. The English, however, are characterized by the use of the combinations –tch- and –j-, as well as the endings –ing, -men or –er: rally, timer, businessman, match, manager.
Tracing paper
The so-called dictionary of modern borrowings in the Russian language also includes tracing paper. This French term denotes a word or even a whole phrase that is created according to a foreign model, but using primordially Russian elements. As a rule, such words arise as a result of the translation of foreign tokens in parts. Similar examples of modern borrowings in the Russian language can be, for example, the verb look like - it is a Pomorphic translation of the German verb aussehen. Such words appear mainly due to translations as neoplasms.
There are also so-called half-pebbles - words half created from Russian elements and half from foreign ones. These tokens include the word humanity, the suffix of which is Russian, and the root came from German.
English-language borrowings in modern Russian
The first relations between Britain and Russia began in the sixteenth century - at first trade began, then political and diplomatic relations. In the same period, the first "news" from the British appeared in Russian speech - words such as a lord or a mister. A huge number of English borrowings in modern Russian came into it back in the era of Peter the Great - basically, of course, these were the terms on maritime affairs, trade, from the military field.
Anglicisms continued to arise in the Russian language throughout the course of subsequent history, but it became possible to speak of a new round of borrowings after the influence of the United States of America increased. Active interaction with Britain and America in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries led to the incredible number of English words that appeared in our speech. Moreover, the fashion for English expressions contributes to this: even the names of many posts and professions in Russian now do not sound at all in Russian - for example, a cleaner is called a “cleaning manager”.
German borrowings in Russian
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The French borrowings available in modern Russian first appeared in it even during the time of Peter — despite the fact that relations between Russia and France existed before. Peter, who was interested in the achievements of the French in science and technology, contributed to the appearance of gallicisms in Russian speech. At first, the French words, with which the inhabitants of Russia began to juggle, referred exclusively to military terminology and science, but later the range of their use expanded - up to the everyday level.
The latter happened after the French language became the court of the Russian tsars - during the reign of Catherine II. And to this day, there are many tokens in Russian that come from French: shop, parliament, regime, advance, compartment, luggage, trench, dugout, crew, kiosk, credit, patrol, bank, taxi, lawn, premiere, gallery, city hall and so many others.
Foreign borrowing in Russian is a topic of incredible interest not only for specialists, but simply for native speakers. It is so fascinating to know where these or those words came from in our speech.