Coronapandemia as a source of language vocabulary enrichment (On the example of the German language)

Abstract

Coronapandemia has affected not only human health but also the economy, politics, daily life and even language. Language is a living organism, it is born, grows and develops continuously, including in times of crisis. Language reflects everything that happens in the world. Coronapandemia affected all languages, including German. New vocabulary have been created, which are gathered in a special digital dictionaries. The purpose of our study is to determine what impact Coronapandemia on German vocabulary. The object of research is: digital coronaplexes created during the coronapandemic period. The word "coronavirus" was introduced into the German language in 1984 (in the context of the AIDS study) and not in 2020. Coronapandemia has changed the vocabulary of the German language. None of the events had such an impact as the coronary crisis in 2020 on the German language vocabulary. Corona and Covid have become the main words in public communication. Coronapandemie became the word of the year. The German language is distinguished by the abundance of composites. Coronapandemia further increased the number of composites. Several structures were identified. Particularly common are two-component: (noun + noun) Coronageneretion- Corona generation and three-component composites: (essential Name + Noun + Noun) Coronaviruspandemie- Coronavirus pandemic. The introduction of restrictions also gave rise to neologisms: Zoomschule- Zoom school. The coronapandemia had a profound effect on the vocabulary of the German language. In a short time the German language was enriched with a comprehensive pandemic-related vocabulary. For example, working at home, Heimarbeit has a better chance of staying in the language than a virtual party (Coronaparty), as working from home has been shown to be more profitable for some companies as it is less expensive and may continue in the aftermath of a pandemic.