Peculiarities of Newspaper Style in English and Ukrainian Languages 002
Розміщено 13-05-10 у розділі Освіта.
Differences and Similarities between Ukrainian and English Newspaper Styles (Різниця між українським і англійським журналістськими діловими стилями)
According to I. R. Galperin, the English newspaper writing dates from the 17-th century. It was the last of all the styles of written literary English to be recognized as a specific form of writing standing apart from other forms. But it happened only by the 19-th century that newspaper English developed into a system of language media, forming a separate function style.
The specific conditions of newspaper publication, the restriction of time and space, have left an indelible mark on newspaper English. For more than a century writers and linguists have been vigorously attacking “the slipshod construction and the vulgar vocabulary” of newspaper English. The very term newspaper English carried a shade of disparagement.(Galperin :296). And really when we translate some English article into Ukrainian, we may use some neutral or even bookish words instead of collocations, whereas when we translate some Ukrainian article into English the situation is quite the reverse – we use many colloquialisms so that to create a real English newspaper style. Yet Fedorov wrote that “newspaper-texts – in contradiction to other texts – are very seldom translated completely and in “pure form” (A.B.Федоров 1977:208).
Yet, for all the defects of newspaper English, serious though they may be, this form of the English literary language cannot be reduced – as some purists have claimed –merely to careless slovenly writing or to a distorted literary English. This is one of the forms of the English literary language characterized by a definite communicative aim and its own system of language means.
The modern newspaper carries material of an extremely diverse character. On the pages of a newspaper one finds not only news and comments on it, press reports and articles, advertisements and announcements, but also stories and poems, crossword puzzles, chess problems and the like. It is newspaper printed matter that perform the function of informing the reader and providing him with evaluation of the information published. In fact, all kinds of newspaper writing are to a greater or lesser degree both informative and evaluative.
Information in the English newspaper is conveyed, in the first place, through the medium of:
1. brief news items;
2. press reports;
3. articles purely informational in character;
4. advertisements and announcements.
Elements of appraisal may be observed in the very selection and way of presentation of news, in the use of specific vocabulary. The headlines of news items, apart from giving information about the subject-matter, also carry a considerable amount of appraisal. But, of course, the principal vehicle of interpretation and appraisal is the newspaper article, and the editorial in particular. Editorial are characterized by a subjective handling of fact, political or otherwise.
Now, let us dwell on the peculiarities of the Ukrainian newspaper style. We should not forget the fact that Ukraine is a very young independent country and, of course, since the times of Reconstruction the style of the Ukrainian mass media has impressively changed. These changes are not simply radical but revolutionary, reflecting new conditions of social life in Ukraine. First of all, they relate to the quickly disappearing heavily- censured, dull, sometimes even Aesopian, style of the party press and to the emergence of out-spoken, vivid, close-to-life, colloquial style, and, most importantly, to the consolidation of a comic element in it, when humor, irony and satire are in everyday usage, esp. in independent or opposition Ukrainian mass media (MM).
Such tendencies led to the reduction of the gap between the downright and scoffing style of the west MM and their Ukrainian correspondences. P.Newmark describes the West newspaper style as “…a familiar, racy, non-technical style for popular journalism, characterized by surprising metaphors, short sentences, Americanese, unconventional punctuation, adjectives before proper names and colloquialisms” (Newmark , 1988, p. 41). And here is another comment about the language of Ukrainian newspaper – “the Day”- one of the most objective newspaper in opinions of many deputies of the Supreme Soviet (Експрес, 11.01.2000, c.4), made by a famous historian O.Субтельний: “… I’m pleased to read “the Day”… One of the reasons - is your candid language. Because a lot of Ukrainian newspapers , you know, have such a tradition: to whirl, whirl” (Д., 5.01.1999, c.4).
New style is brightly revealed in the headlines:
- (about economic agreement) “ Як Україна, Румунія та Угорщина “зметикували на трьох”.
- (about financial system) “ Банки вмирають, як динозаври”.
- (about the economic policy of the government) “Уряд ризикує “кинути” долар, спішно повертаючи борги електорату.”
But in spite of such radical changes in Ukrainian MM, it is only approaching the current style of democratic mass media, and the language of many journalists still remains pompous. Let us compare such exаmples:
- “… про це розмова журналістів “Дня” з Валентином Симоненком, головою вищого державного органу фінансово-економічного контролю”.( Д., 10.12.98, с.4) – “…with V. Symonenko, head of supreme state watchdog of financial and economic operations (Д., 22.12.98.,p.4).
Apparently, we should take into consideration the fact that, in comparison with Ukranian MM, irony is a distinctive feature of the Anglo-American tradition (and not only in MM!). Besides, it depends on the age of journalists – a new generation has a more lashing pen, whereas the old ones were trained on the dead dogmas of totalitarian age.
The criminality of political and economical life in Ukraine, new political powers, introduced sometimes even by the former criminals, who won the immunity of deputies for themselves – all this caused the appearance of criminal jargon not only in oral speech but also in written style of UMM:
“Дехто з них (депутатів ВР) із виглядом ображеної невинності говорили кореспонденту “Дня” – “якщо Паша (екс-прем’єр Лазаренко) “спікся”, хто ж тут за нього повинен тільник на грудях рвати?! Якби він не “звалив” (до США), усе було б інакше” (наводимо цей текст на депутатському жаргоні в оригіналі. – Ред.)(Д., 18.02.99, с.4).
The usage of such words is considered as taboo by the representatives of Mass Media. The correspondent of “The Day” describes the “The man of the year 1999” competition in such a way: “ І ставало гірко на душі від цього тріумфу олігархів, від їхніх жартів із зеківською термінологією (один “мер в законі” чого вартий) …” (Д., 9.05.99, с. 4). Besides being non-literary, the term “мер в законі” is also a strong marker of satiric appraisement. The translator has done everything in his power – but he omitted a parenthetic sentence, because the main stress is laid on the phrase “ставало гірко” concerning which the satiric effect is of less importance:
“ The whole thing left a bitter taste in one’s mouth. Oligarchs in their hour of glory, their jokes using words from prison camp vocabulary.” (16.03.99, p. 4).
Теги: in English, дипломні
