Chapter Nine
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Notably, in linguistics, lexical items belonging to this group may be
referred to as jargon, with jargon being defined by Yule (2010: 259) as:
(...) special technical vocabulary (...) associated with a specific area of
work or interest [helping] to create and maintain connections among those
who see themselves as ‘insiders’ in some way and to exclude ‘outsiders.’The second subgroup of aviation vocabulary also includes words used
by professionals, i.e. airport technical staff, pilots, aviation hobbyists, etc.,
and, similarly to the lexemes in the first group, the lexical items assigned
to the second group are not known and not understood by laypeople.
However, unlike the vocabulary items attributed to the previous group,
words in the second subgroup appear in less formal situations, frequently
in oral communication. The lexemes air bear referring to ‘a helicopter,’ or
can ‘an airplane’ may serve here as examples. Adopting Yule’s (2010:
259) definition of slang as (...) ‘colloquial speech’ (...) used instead of
more everyday terms among younger speakers and other groups of special
interests, these vocabulary items may be referred to as aviation slang.
Last but not least, the third group of aviation vocabulary includes
words used by professionals in professional communication to
communicate issues connected with aircraft, but at the same time these
words belong to the lexical repertoire, at least passive, of lay people.
These lexical items, for example, airplane fuselage, aisle, check-in, black
box relate primarily to different aspects of air travel. Appearing in media
addressed to the general public, as well as at airports, they are used both in
oral and written modes of communication.
Taking into account the division of aviation-related vocabulary into
three groups, as presented above, it appears that the frequently quoted
definition of an LSP as the language used by professionals in the context
of the area of their expertise is insufficient (Grucza 2008). The prototype
theory, being part and parcel of cognitive linguistics, seems a useful tool
for formulating a revised, though still not perfect, definition of LSPs.
Without going into details, one may tentatively assume that the range of
aviation LSP is primarily delimitated by the topic of communication.
Professionals, in turn, have to be perceived as prototypical, rather than
sole, users of the language of aviation. What is more, highly skilled
professionals, i.e. pilots, technical staff and engineers in aeronautics
constitute the core of the conceptual category PROFESSIONALS IN
AVIATION. However, with the criterion of formality of the
communication context, only words and structures used by them in formal
texts will belong to the very core of the category AVIATION LSP. In turn,
linguistic means used by professionals in less formal situations will be