§ 7. Number of Vocabulary Items in Actual Use and Number of Vocabulary Units in Modern English

Taking into account the growth of the vocabulary in the last forty years an estimate of 30,000 words in the actual working vocabulary of educated persons today may be considered reasonable though it comprises a number of non-assimilated, archaic and occasional words. It should be pointed out, however, that a considerable number of words are scarcely ever used and the meaning of quite a number of them is unknown to an average educated English layman, e.g. abalone, abattoir, abele and the like. It follows that there is a considerable difference between the number of lexical items in Modern English vocabulary and the number of lexical items in actual use.

The relative “value” of lexical items is dependent on how frequently this or that particular unit occurs in speech and on the range of application of these units. 4,000 – 5,000 of most frequently occurring words are presumed to be amply sufficient for the daily needs of an average member of the given speech community. It is obvious that these 4,000 – 5,000 comprise ordinary words which are as a rule polysemantic and characterised by neutral stylistic reference. Specialised vocabulary units (special words and terminology) are naturally excluded.

Variants and dialects of the english language

To this point we have been dealing with the vocabulary of the English language as if there were only one variety of this language.

Every language allows different kinds of variations: geographical or territorial, perhaps the most obvious, stylistic, the difference between the written and the spoken form of the standard national language and others. We shall be concerned here with the territorial variations, the others being the domain of stylistics.

For historical and economic reasons the English language has spread over vast territories. It is the national language of England proper, the USA, Australia, New Zealand and some provinces of Canada. It is the official language in Wales, Scotland, in Gibraltar and on the island of Malta. The English language was also at different times enforced as an official language on the peoples who fell under British rule or US domination in Asia, Africa and Central and South America. The population of these countries still spoke their mother tongue or had command of both languages. After World War II as a result of the national liberation movement throughout Asia and Africa many former colonies have gained independence and in some of them English as the state language has been or is being replaced by the national language of the people inhabiting these countries (by Hindi in India, Urdu in Pakistan, Burmanese in Burma, etc.) though by tradition it retains there the position of an important means of communication.

§ 8. General Characteristics of the English Language in Different Parts of the English-Speaking World

Modern linguistics distinguishes territorial variants of a national language and local dialects. Variants of a language are regional varieties of a standard literary language characterised by some minor peculiarities in the sound system, vocabulary and grammar and by their own literary norms. Dialects are varieties of a language used as a means of oral communication in small localities, they are set off (more or less sharply) from other varieties by some distinctive features of pronunciation, grammar and vocabulary.

Close inspection of the varieties mentioned above reveals that they are essentially different in character. It is not difficult to establish that the varieties spoken in small areas are local dialects. The status of the other varieties is more difficult to establish.

It is over half a century already that the nature of the two main variants of the English language, British and American (Br and AE) has been discussed. Some American linguists, H. L. Mencken for one, speak of two separate languages with a steady flood of linguistic influence first (up to about 1914) from Britain to America, and since then from America to the British Isles. They even proclaim that the American influence on British English is so powerful that there will come a time when the American standard will be established in Britain. Other linguists regard the language of the USA as a dialect of English.

The differences between the English language as spoken in Britain, the USA, Australia and Canada are immediately noticeable in the field of phonetics.

The variations in vocabulary, to be considered below, are not very numerous. Most of them are divergences in the semantic structure of words and in their usage.

The dissimilarities in grammar like AE gotten, proven for BE got, proved are scarce. For the most part these dissimilarities consist in the preference of this or that grammatical category or form to some others.