Cognitive, Structural, and Semantic Features of Professional Neologisms in Modern English

Abstract

This article describes 180 modern English neologisms with a professional component. Their structural and semantic features reveal how native speakers perceive and conceptualize new words through spiritual and practical activities, thus adjusting their worldview to the changing reality. The research involved the methods of definitional analysis, word formation, semantic assay, and cognitive-discursive interpretation, as well as various standard linguistic and statistical methods. The material was classified according to the type of professional activity. These lexical and semantic groups were united by intralinguistic links based on interrelated and interdependent connotative shades of meaning. Many neologisms demonstrated a metaphorical basis, which served as a tool for creating expressive images. All the neological units were emotive and evaluative. The emotive content conveyed the thoughts and feelings of the speaker, while the evaluative content was associated with the pragmatic function and contained information about the speaker’s attitude to the denotation. Most professional neologisms were gender-neutral. The universal nature of the images behind the neologisms probably testifies to the current mental changes in a society that values gender equality. Interdiscursivity appeared to permeate all lexical and semantic fields of the English neological space. The heterogeneity reflected the complex activity the speaker performs in an attempt to comprehend a complex and multifaceted environment, which, in turn, gives the neological units an anthropocentric character. The relevance of the research is determined by the rapid development of various social spheres, which inevitably affects the modern communication and the linguistic worldview in general.