The Influence of English on Romanian

The Influence of English on Romanian

Abstract

We all know that the vocabulary of any language is enriched through different borrowings. In nowadays in Romanian there are many English words that are used in speaking and writing. The large number of newly created terms in Romanian after English language, through derivative affixes and elements of composition, reveals the increased capacity of the Romanian language in forming new words. -deal with the subject of the avalanche of British and American borrowings from an up-to-date point of view regarding the Romanian vocabulary. The paper also underlines the importance of these borrowings and renders different norms (phonetic, orthographic, morphologic etc.) of the adaptation of English elements into Romanian language. The language is made through transformation and ,,dies when it stops changing.

The influence of English language on the Romanian language and on other European languages started increase in the 20th century. This process was made through the massive retrieval of lexical elements and also by assigning the meaning of the English borrowings to the Romanian words. The Anglicisation in Romania took place due to the technological development, to the current socio-political conditions and also because of the economic and financial enlargements with the western world. The Romanian language has drastically changed from a well-known wooden language before the communist times to a dynamic, fresh and new language. Given also the integration into NATO and the recent integration of Romania in the European Union, the Romanian language is under the influence of English more than ever, thanks to the increasing number of commercial, business and professional connections established between Romania and the international community and due to a large number of foreign investors who decided to set up their business here.

The geographical position of Romania and each historical period have resulted very significant in the linguistic evolution of the Romanian language, each period having its own borrowings from different languages: Slavonic(10% of the words in modern Romanian are Slavic - e.g. da for yes, a iubi for to love, bogat for rich, lebd for swan ) Turkish (cafea for coffee, papuc for slipper), Hungarian and Greek influence (nostim for funny, politicos for polite, prosop for towel, anapoda for tupsy-turvy) to which major French influence (i.e. 38% of the number of words in Romanian are of French or Italian origin) can be added in the nineteenth and early twentieth century (birou < bureau for desk; creion < crayon for pencil; contiin < conn aissance for conscious; (it.) secol for century, lege for law, a.s.o) and, in the present day, the influence of English. English is now by far the most used language by especially the younger generation, while French remained the language of our grandparents spoken in the mid 1930s when Bucharest was called little Paris due to a strong influence of French on our culture.

We have to admit and, at the same time, to acknowledge the fact that we are no longer living in an elegant society with elegant behaviour and elegant manners for a long time. Before 1989, during the Ceausescus totalitarianism - well-known in our history as the gold epoch - we have preserved the French language in our schools just to remind us of the bygone period of prosperity and welfare and to oppose the Russian language which was seen as the communist instrument of oppression. Each and every kid in the Romanian Educational system was obliged to learn Russian but, fortunately, there was the healing option of studying French against the Slavic influence, and relying on our Latin origins, despite the fact that our geographical universe is Eastern Europe and not Western as many may consider.

Without any doubt, French had had an enormous influence over the Romanian culture, because it had succeeded in acquiring the status of a lingua franca after the Great French Revolution and it had permeated all domains of activity, especially literature and culture all over Europe. However, we should not forget that the exaggerated use of French neologisms had been mocked at by our greatest playwright I. L. Caragiale in his plays and many other Romanian scholars. Meanwhile, English has stood back like a volcano which eagerly waits for its time to come. And the time of English has indeed come with the 1989 Revolution, and French was replaced by a new and fresh language-English language.

Therefore, it is natural to think that Romanian is facing a rapidly changing linguistic facet and turns to English in the 3 rd Millennium, which is in the privileged position of a lingua franca, because the British and the Americans shake hands to deliver an efficient communication system about capitalism to a mass international audience, especially to the former communist countries, by means of two major international and economic concepts: the concept of globalization that has much to do with the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the World Trade Organization, on the one hand, and the Internet on the other. Changes have been felt on the Labour Market due to the development of economy, too. Romanians are facing the reality of new jobs and new position in the European context. New jobs names have crossed the Romanian borders and few of them found new equivalents in our language. We are dealing now with salesman (agent de vanzari), sales manager, assistant manager (secretara), trainer, senior recruiter, agentmarketing, PR coordinator, HR manager (director resurse umane), brand manager, key account (responsabil de conturi importante), and so many others.

1. The most important fields influenced by the English vocabulary

In the studies of some linguists, the most important fields on which English had a massive contribution are the following: economic field, business field, political field, technical field (especially in the IT language), medical field, mass-media field, sports field, etc.

Economic and business fields:

Dealer,broker (intermediar), target market (piata tinta), billing (facturare), board (consiliu de conducere), overdraft ( descoperire de cont), deadline( termen-limit) salesman ( comerciant).

Calques : autosuficient < engl. self-sufficient, aciune lichid < engl. liquid share, companie scoic < engl. shell-company, piee de capital < engl. capital-markets, reea de distribuie < engl. distribution network.

Mass-media field (examples from newspapers):

Brockerii au tranzactionat (Ziua de Cluj, 15 octombrie 2007, p. 5)

ncepe greul la CM feminin de handbal (Pro Sport,6 decembrie 2007, p. 1);

Baschetbalistii clujeni vor juca (Cluj Expres, 27noiembrie 2007, p. 11);

prima generatie de marketing (Adevarul financiar,12 octombrie 2007, p. 7);

puzzel-ul creste puterea de concentrare(www.ceseimntampladoctore.ro. 14.12.2007, ora 10:08).

din fata supermarketului Billa (Ziua de Cluj, 15octombrie 2007, p. 5);

n weekenduri se face coada (Adevarul financiar, 12octombrie 2007, p. 28);

are un viciu deloc ieftin: shoppingul (Clujeanul 15-21 octombrie 2007, p. 4);

Un bussiness n faza incipienta (Cancan, 6 decembrie,p. 2).

Sports field:

Snow-board (