Основы теории английского языка. Листунова Е.И. - 10 стр.

very recent period, as contrasted with the large number of Italian
words which were adopted at the time of the Renaissance and later, is
again a historically significant fact. By the diffusion of culturally im-
portant words, such as those referring to art, literature, the church,
military affairs, sport and business, there have grown up important
transnational vocabularies which do something to combat the isolat-
ing effect of the large number of languages which are still spoken in
the modern world.
                                                Edward Sapir. Language.
      VII.
      Read the following.
      Imbedded in our everyday speech are words that evidence the
once pervasive influence of the predecessor of modern astronomy,
astrology. The extent of these vestiges of old astrology is greater than
we usually realize. The heavenly bodies have caused us to be jovial,
mercurial, saturnine, martial and venereal (an ironic tribute to the
goddess of love). Something of the original ‘value’ of some astrological
terms is still maintained: disaster (an evil star) retains a superlative
graveness, and consider (to be with the stars) still denotes a very high
form of mental deliberation.
                                 Donald A. Sears and Henry A. Smith.
                              A Linguistic Look At Aerospace English.
      VIII.
      Discuss along the same lines the contribution of modern science
and technology (the technical language of trades and occupations) to
the development of English, as exemplified in the following words or
sets of words:
      blitz (our house was blitzed; a blitzed town); built-in (a built-in
bookcase; fig. a built-in contempt for daydreaming; a built-in shortage
of teachers); count-down (the pilots were in their places when the
count-down began;
      whatever the future holds, there is no sign that a sinister, doom-
fraught count-down is in progress); polythene (they had everything in
polythene bags); screen (coal is screened in the colliery when it has
stone and other impurities removed from it; all the suspects were
screened).



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