Text of the modern mass media: the linguistic aspect

This article deals with function of language system in contemporary Russian mass-media texts. Specific feature of development of mass-media language is the extension of vocabulary. The specific of modern period of mass-media language is that the extra-linguistic factors are dominating now. This process is realized through introducing new foreign borrowings and formation of neologisms. Majority of this new vocabulary are euphemisms and so-called “fashionable words” which are the special sort of the new units of dictionary, often used in commerce, propaganda, professional activity. From the point of view of speakers these words designate something possessing prestige or subject of value, they not only reflect the features of mental picture of the world of this speakers but also set a language fashion and construct the wanted picture of the world. They serve for language manipulation of public consciousness in modern discourse. The presence of such lexical units signals that a sender and addressee of text conform to the requirements of time, possess prestige, and absence of such words-markers is examined as an index of "backwardness" and ignorance of the author.