Anglicism
An Anglicism is a word, phrase, or construction borrowed from English into another language, or an English-influenced usage in a non-English variety. Görlach's Dictionary of European Anglicisms (2001) defines an Anglicism as "a word or idiom that is recognizably English in its form (spelling, pronunciation, morphology, or at least one of the three) but is accepted as an item in the vocabulary of the receptor language." The term covers everything from fully naturalised loanwords to phrases that translate English models without showing visible English form.
Typology
Furiassi, Pulcini, and Rodríguez González (2012) organise Anglicisms along a direct–indirect axis:
| Category | Subtype | Description | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
| Direct | Loanword | English form imported with minimal change | Italian computer, Vietnamese email |
| Direct | Adapted loan | English form integrated to native phonology / morphology | Spanish fútbol, German gestresst |
| Direct | False / pseudo-Anglicism | Coined from English elements but not used or differently used in English | Italian footing (jogging), Korean handphone (mobile phone) |
| Indirect | Calque (loan translation) | English structure translated morpheme-by-morpheme | French gratte-ciel (skyscraper), Spanish rascacielos |
| Indirect | Semantic loan | Existing native word acquires an English sense | French réaliser extending from "make real" to "understand" under English realise |
Pseudo-Anglicisms are a productive subclass: Japanese salaryman, German Handy (mobile phone), Italian autostop (hitchhiking). They look English to non-English speakers, sound foreign to English speakers, and exist only in the borrowing language.
Drivers
Post-war Anglicisation accelerated through American economic and cultural reach, and from the 1990s through the internet and global popular culture. Domains showing the heaviest English influence across European languages include technology (download, streaming, podcast), business (marketing, manager, startup), entertainment (show, fan, trend), sports (goal, coach, match), and youth slang. Görlach's sixteen-language survey shows substantial overlap in the borrowed inventory, suggesting that English now functions as a shared lexical resource across European languages.
Reception and Resistance
Attitudes vary by speech community. France maintains an institutional resistance through the Académie française and the loi Toubon, recommending native equivalents (courriel for email, baladodiffusion for podcast) with mixed uptake. Spanish, German, and Italian generally accept Anglicisms more freely, though purist commentary persists. In Asia, Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese have absorbed English vocabulary heavily in commerce, technology, and youth culture, often via the local phonological filter.
In ELT
Vietnamese contains hundreds of Anglicisms in everyday and professional vocabulary: marketing, online, check-in, PR, deadline, meeting, gym, fan. Learners can recognise these and use them as a positive-transfer foothold in topics like business and technology. Three classroom risks recur. Pronunciation of Anglicised forms diverges sharply from English originals because Vietnamese phonology restructures the sound shape (marketing with final stress on -ing, syllable-timed delivery). Meanings have often narrowed or shifted, creating false-friend effects. Pseudo-Anglicisms imported from other Asian languages, particularly Japanese and Korean media, sometimes reach Vietnamese learners as if they were genuine English.
References
- Görlach, M. (Ed.) (2001). A Dictionary of European Anglicisms: A Usage Dictionary of Anglicisms in Sixteen European Languages. Oxford University Press.
- Furiassi, C., Pulcini, V. & Rodríguez González, F. (Eds.) (2012). The Anglicization of European Lexis. John Benjamins.
- Pulcini, V., Furiassi, C. & Rodríguez González, F. (2012). The lexical influence of English on European languages. In The Anglicization of European Lexis. John Benjamins.