GRAMMATICAL REDUCTION IN ENGLISH AND FRENCH DIGITAL DISCOURSE: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS

Abstract

The article presents a comparative analysis of grammatical reduction in English- and French-language digital discourse. The relevance of the study stems from the rapid development of computer-mediated communication, which contributes to the transformation of linguistic norms and the emergence of new communicative models characterized by a high degree of variability and deviation from codified standards. The aim of the article is to identify the specific features of reduction processes in the languages under study, taking into account their typological characteristics. The research is based on the approaches of computer-mediated discourse analysis, as well as elements of contrastive and functional analysis, which make it possible to examine linguistic phenomena in the context of technological, social, and pragmatic factors.
The findings indicate that grammatical reduction in digital discourse operates at morphological, syntactic, and graphical levels and exhibits a complex nature. In English, reduction processes are predominantly syntactic and are manifested in the systematic ellipsis of the subject, auxiliary verbs, and the predicative core, leading to the formation of minimized utterances. In French, reduction is mainly realized through the omission of function elements within the verbal group, particularly the negative particle ne and the formal subject il, which indicates the morphologically conditioned nature of reduction processes. At the same time, elements such as articles and prepositions in French demonstrate a high degree of structural stability and are rarely subject to reduction due to their grammatical obligatoriness.
Particular attention is paid to graphical reduction, which in both languages includes the omission of capitalization and punctuation, orthographic variation, and the active use of shortened and abbreviated forms. It is established that in French digital discourse these processes are more systematic due to the development of specific reduction patterns within langage SMS, which involve elements of phonetic spelling. The study demonstrates that grammatical reduction is a complex and typologically conditioned phenomenon that gives rise to different models of linguistic compression in English and French and reflects the adaptation of language systems to the conditions of digital communication.