Distinctive Stylistic Features Of English Functional Styles

Distinctive stylistic features of major English FSs are presented in the following table:

Style Level	Literary Colloquial style	Familiar colloquial style (spoken variety)	Publicist (media) style	The style of official documents	Scientific/Academic style
Phonetic	Compression of frequently used forms (it’s don’t, I’ve), omission of non-stressed elements (you know him?)	Casual, often careless pronunciation, deviant forms (gonna=going to), reduced forms (they've, I'd), omission of unaccented elements due to quick tempo (you hear me?), emphasis on intonation, onomatopoea.	Standard pronunciation, wide use of prosody as a means of conveying the shades of meaning, overtones and emotions. Phonetic compression.	Adherence to the norm	Adherence to the norm
Morphological	Use of regular features, with interception of evaluative suffixes (doggie, duckie)	Use of evaluative suffixes, nonce words formed on morphological and phonetic analogy with other nominal words (baldish, moody, hanky-panky).	Frequent use of non-finite verb forms (gerund, participle, infinitive), non-perfect verb forms, omission of articles, link verbs, auxiliaries, pronouns, especially in headlines and news items.	Adherence to the norm, sometimes outdated or even archaic, e. g. in legal documents.	Terminological word building and word-derivation: neologism for­mation by affixation and conversion. Restricted use of finite verb forms. Use of 'the author's we' instead of I. Impersonal constructions.
Lexical	Formal and informal, neutral and bookish, terms and foreign words, abbreviations, conversational formulas, intensifiers and gap-fillers (awfully, kind of), exclamations, phrasal verbs.	Combination of neutral, familiar and low colloquial vocabulary, including slang, vulgar, taboo, curse words and euphemisms, the same word in different meanings, colloquial interjections (boy, wow), hyperbole, epithets, evaluative vocabulary, trite metaphors and simile, tautology.	Newspaper cliches and set phrases, terms from various spheres, acronyms, proper names, abstract, elevated and bookish words. Headlines: pun, violated phraseology. Oratory: elevated and colloquial words, metaphor, alliteration, allusion, irony, etc.	Prevalence of stylistically neutral and bookish vocabulary. Use of legal, commercial terminology; of proper names, abbreviations. Official clichés, conventional and archaic forms and words: hereof, thereto, thereby. Foreign words, especially Latin and French: status quo, persona поп grata.	Bookish words (presume, cognitive), scientific terminology and phraseology, use of words in their primary dictionary meaning. Seldom use of tropes, interjections, expressive phrase­ology, phrasal verbs, colloquial vocabulary connotative contextual meanings, neologisms, proper names.
Syntactical	Simple sentences with participial, infinitive constructions, parentheses, compliance with the literary norm, syntactical compression, decomposition and ellipsis of sentences in a dialogue, use of special colloquial phrases (that charming hubby of hers)	Dialogues: the question-answer type. Use of simple short sentences, echo questions, parallel structures, ellipses, repetitions, asyndetic coordination in complex sentences.	Oratory: rhetorical questions, interrogatives Headlines: impersonal, interrogative sentences, elliptical constructions, attributive groups. News items: comprise one to three sentences with prepositional phrases, no complex coordination, exclamatory sentences.	Long complex sentences (up to 70% of the text), passive and participial constructions, numerous connectives, detached constructions, parenthesis, participle I and II as openers in the initial statement.	standard syntax, logical sequence of thought and argumentation, direct word order, lengthy sentences with subordinate clauses, participial, gerundial and infinitive complexes, adverbial and prepositional phrases, parenthesis introduced by a dash. Frequent use of passive and non-finite verb forms, impersonal forms. Avoidance of ellipsis.
Compositional	Used in written and spoken varieties: dialogue, monologue, personal letters, diaries, essays, articles, etc. Spontaneous types have a loose structure, relative coherence and uniformity of form and content.	Use of deviant language on all levels, strong emotional colouring, loose syntax, little coherence with the topic, no special compositional patterns.	Text: precision, logic and expressive power, selected vocabulary, quotations, direct and represented speech, parallel constructions. Oratory: simplicity of structural expression, clarity of message, argumentative power. Headlines: devices to arrest attention (rhyme, pun, puzzle, high degree of compression, graphical means). News items and articles: strict arrangement of titles and subtitles, emphasis on the headline. Careful subdivision into paragraphs, importance of the opening paragraph.	Special compositional design: coded graphical layout, clear-cut subdi­vision of texts into units of information; logical arrangement of these units, stereotyped, official phraseology, accurate punctuation, objective, concrete, unemotional and impersonal style of narration.	Types of texts compositionally depend on the scientific genre (mono­graph, article, presentation, thesis, dissertation, etc), formalized text with formulae, tables, diagrams supplied with concise commentary phrases, descriptive narration, supplied with argumentation and interpretation. Logical and consistent narration, sequential presentation of material and facts. Citation, references and foot-notes. Restricted use of expressive means and stylistic devices.