Scientific style is the style of speech used in science and learning. Its main features are the following: generalization and abstractness, terminology, emphasized logic. Secondary features: unambiguity, semantic accuracy, standardity, objectivity, brevity, rigor, clarity, non-categorical, impersonal, figurative, evaluative, etc.
There are three sub-styles: proper scientific style of the text (articles, monographs, dissertations, scientific reports, speeches at scientific conferences, disputes), scientific and educational (lectures, textbooks), popular science (articles, popular science messages, essays).
Scientific style: its main characteristics
Academician Likhachev D. S. pointed out in his works:
1. The requirements for scientific style differ significantly from those for the language of fiction.
2. The use of metaphors and different images in the language of scientific work is permissible only if it is necessary to put a logical emphasis on a certain thought. In the scientific style, imagery is just a pedagogical device necessary to draw attention to the main idea of the work.
3. Really good scientific style language should not be seen by the reader. He should notice only the thought, and not the language in which the thought is expressed.
4. The main advantage of scientific language is clarity.
5. Other virtues of scientific style are brevity, lightness, simplicity.
6. The scientific style involves the minimal use of subordinate clauses in scientific papers. The phrases should be short, the transition from one sentence to another - natural and logical, "unnoticed".
7. You should avoid frequent use of pronouns that make you think that they are replaced, what they refer to.
8. No need to be afraid of repetition, try to get rid of them mechanically. One and the same concept should be denoted by the same term, it cannot be replaced by a synonym. Only repetitions that come from the poverty of the writer's language should be avoided.
9. Parasite words that add nothing to the thought should be avoided. However, an important idea should be disclosed in more detail, with some stop on it.
10. Scientific style calls for paying special attention to the quality of words. It is better to use the word opposite instead of opposite, difference instead of difference.
Scientific style texts: characteristics of language tools
- book words with an abstract (abstract) and generalized meaning (reflection, thinking, weightlessness, variability);
- general scientific vocabulary (process, value, quality, component, reason);
- words-terms - setnames united in the terminological system of a certain science (plankton, phoneme, congruence, reflection);
- specific combinations of words (boiling point, demographic crisis, pancreas, compound sentence);
- high frequency of adjectives (about 13%), prepositions, conjunctions, prepositional combinations (because of, with the help of, on the basis of, compared to …, in relation to, in connection with … etc.);
- complex sentences (especially complex sentences);
- sentences with introductory words, participial and participial phrases.
Scientific style should be familiar to everyone.
