NEW WORDS IN ENGLISH: TAKING A CLOSE LOOK AT WINNERS OF THE WORD OF THE YEAR

Abstract

The article explores current innovational processes on the lexical level in the English language. It focuses on studying the peculiarities of the formation of neologisms that have been announced the winners of the Word of the Year by the Oxford Dictionary since 2009, i.e. in the last decade of the 21st century. The findings of the present research show that the vocabulary of the English language develops both quantitatively and qualitatively. Quantitative changes result in an increase in the number of words, while qualitative development is evident in new meanings and functions of ‘old’ affixes, new derivational patterns and redistribution of the activity of the available derivational types in the formation of new words