What is phraseology

One of the most interesting phenomena in any language is phraseological turns, or phraseological units. What is phraseologism? This is a stable phrase or expression, the meaning of which is very difficult to guess from its constituent words. It is they that greatly complicate the study, and especially the understanding of foreign languages ​​- because sometimes, even knowing the language at a decent level, when communicating with its native speaker who uses such expressions, it can be difficult to understand the meaning of phraseological units. The peculiarities of phraseological units also lie in the fact that, as a rule, they have historical or literary roots.

Phraseologism is absolutely any stable phrase that is used to denote any concept, both in oral and in written speech. They are used in colloquial speech, in fiction, in journalism and are unacceptable in official documents and scientific papers. All proverbs and sayings are phraseological units - because, despite the importance of the words that make up them, they mean something completely different. As a rule, each person one way or another uses them in everyday life, without even thinking about what phraseological unit is. When writing articles, phraseological units are used to give the language its originality and often decorate and enliven them very much. However, they should not be abused either: their frequent use makes the speech cliched, or even too popular. Phraseologisms are especially inappropriate in technical articles, except in special cases when you need to speak with a specific target audience, trying to bring complicated information to it as simply as possible, as well as in news materials or when using business style.

In order to understand what phraseological unit is, it is enough to consider a few of the most common examples. One of them is "eat the dog." This sweet phrase means, as we know, not a visit to a Korean restaurant, but absolute possession of a person by any knowledge or skill. Here, by the way, is a vivid example of how phraseologism can puzzle a foreigner. By the way, the Russian language in this regard is one of the richest and most complex: in the Russian dictionary of phraseological units there are more than two thousand such turns, but it is believed that for more or less productive communication it is enough to learn five thousand words. So, in addition to the other difficulties of our language, which we ourselves deal with in half with sin, the share of courageous foreign citizens who decided to learn it also has such happiness. By the way, phraseologisms are generally absolutely untranslatable and relevant for only one language, even in related languages ​​they may not be completely understandable - they are translated only by conveying the main meaning, and even then it is not always successful. The exception is the so-called tracing paper, that is, the literal transfer from one language to another of expressions especially loved by someone, most likely by a writer or poet.

Or the wonderful synonyms of “fooling around” and “beating the bucks”, as well as many similar expressions in meaning. By the way, phraseological units can, like any other concepts, be synonyms or antonyms. The antonyms for the data will be "working hard like Papa Carlo" or, for example, "working tirelessly."

All the words that make up phraseologism are one member of the sentence and usually are not separated by punctuation marks in letters.

Phraseologisms are an interesting linguistic phenomenon that deserves close study. Without them, speech would be much drier and would not have that amazing amount of semantic shades that ensures their use. It doesn’t matter whether we know or not what phraseological unit is - the main thing is that we use it jokingly or seriously, in accordance with its direct or figurative meaning, and this makes the speech richer and more multifaceted.

Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/C33724/


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