Influence of the American English on the world of idioms

 

The conclusion is that the future of idiomatic expressions in the English language seems certain. They are more and more based on American English. This development will continue through new mediums like the Internet and interactive mediums. It is hard to say what this will do to idioms and what kind of new idioms are created. This will be an interesting development to follow, and by no means does it lessen the humor, variety and color of English language.

 

CHAPTER 3.  ENGLISH IDIOMS AND THEIR USAGE IN EVERYDAY LIFE

There are only some examples of idioms, consider to be the most interesting and recommend to use them working with British literature classes, making analyses of different creative works and writing project tasks.

A chicken and egg situation. This is an informal expression, which describes a situation or problem in which it is impossible to decide which of two things was the cause of the other. For example: The connection between lack of education and poverty is a chicken and egg situation. Are people poor because they have no education or do they not get an education because they are poor?

The expression comes from the idea of a chicken and its egg. Does the egg come from the chicken or the chicken from the egg?

Bread and butter. When people use the idiom "bread and butter" they mean someone's livelihood or income. For example: I don't especially like doing this job, but it's my bread and butter.

Idiomatic expressions are a vital component of English in particular. The common idioms will increase our understanding, though most of people instinctively avoid trying to use them. There some idioms around themes such as health, school, accommodation, family relationship, everyday life. It have selected from different books and Internet sources. It will be a good stream for teachers and students. (Appendix 1)

3.1 People’s example of using idioms in daily speech.

Example: ’’I had a narrow escape this morning. I was cycling to work when a lorry knocked me off my bike. The driver stopped and got out to see if I was all right. He was as white as a sheet and I was shaking like a leaf. Fortunately I had landed on some grass and I wasn't hurt.’’

To have a narrow escape - to be very close to danger or something terrible but manage to escape

To be/go as white as a sheet - to be very pale in the face, especially because of illness or great fear

Shaking like a leaf - to tremble with fear or great anxiety

3.2 Examples of idioms from textbook Tom Hutchinson. .

Now, there are some examples from school textbook “Hotline”.

Introduction Unit:

To have got the message - to understand

Unit 2:

We'd better be off - it's time to come out

Unit 3:

The sky's the limit - you haven't got any limits to improve yourself

Unit 5:

That's beside the point - it doesn't concern the matter

Kim I think we should all think about the environment. That's why I'm buying a car with a small engine that runs on unleaded petrol.

Vince Huh! It's all that you can afford. You'd buy that gas-guzzler, too, if you had the money.

Kim :That's beside the point!

Unit 7:

I've made up my mind - to decide to do something, to be going to do

To get one's hand on somebody - to interfere in somebody's business

Unit 10:

To lose one's temper - to lose one's head/wits, to blow up

To want a word with somebody - to want to talk with somebody

A write-off (car) - completely destroyed

Rosy If Kim hadn't been driving so fast, she wouldn't have had an accident. She might lose her license. The car's a write-off.

Unit 11:

To have a real heart-to-heart with (someone) = to have a friendly conversation

That's all water under the bridge = to forget everything (esp., bad things) which were in the past

Kim I had a real heart-to-heart with Andrea when she came. So that's all water under the bridge now. Mind you, Vince hasn't said anything about it!

You see: one of the characters, Kim, has used not one, but two idiomatic expressions in the conversation.

Thus, you see that my classmates and I meet and use in our every day speech idioms. The authors of this textbook understand the necessity of using idioms fluently.

To sum up, I suggest a variety of exercise practice in recognition and production of idioms. (Appendix 2).

 

CONCLUSION

An idiom is a set expression which has a meaning different from the literal meanings of its components. Idioms present a great variety of structures and combinations that are mostly unchangeable and often not logical and may not follow basic rules of grammar.

Idioms can be quite clear (in general; come out; at first; the root of all evil) or pretty unclear (on end; pack it in; high and low; hard cash). Some idioms have proper names in them (a Jack of all trades; Uncle Sam); some other idioms are comparisons (as clear as a bell; as the crow flies). Proverbs and sayings may also have idiomatic character (every cloud has a silver lining; still waters run deep).

It is pointless to ask why idioms have such unusual structure or choice of words, or why they don't follow basic grammar rules. Let's just accept as fact that idioms are a difficult peculiarity of English.

In the section Idioms, in this research present useful idioms that native speakers use frequently in their everyday life. These idioms are accepted as part of everyday speech and undoubtedly are of great practical value to you. Many other idioms, though they are often interesting and colorful, are not so necessary in everyday conversational English. Short lists of everyday idioms in this section include the most common idioms that need to learn by heart and use actively in speech.

Idioms make the speech more expressive, vivid, and imaginative. Having a rich vocabulary of idioms, people can not only understand shades of meaning, stylistics, emotion, but also will enrich their speech, made it more natural, that, of course, will make intercourse easier with foreign colleagues and friends.

So, researching the history of American idioms it has known that many authors call attention to the fact that idioms can more easily than other language units cumulate and store facts about the past, cultural semantics of a nation, traditions, folklore, etc. because of the so called "cumulative" function of the language

The future of idiomatic expressions in the English language seems certain. They are more and more based on American English. This development will continue through new mediums like the Internet and interactive mediums. It is hard to say what this will do to idioms and what kind of new idioms are created. This will be an interesting development to follow, and by no means does it lessen the humor, variety and color of English language.

In this work is a composed small story trying to apply the received knowledge about idioms in practice.

Moreover, it is analyzed the school textbook and made the comments on some idioms, which have touched upon at the lessons.

There is also appended a lot of exercises and examples how to understand idioms and use them in practice.

 The aims have been achieved.

 

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