Abstract: | Language is a “living organism”, which is subject to change due to borrowed words and structures from different languages. Thus, in the case of Romanian, words and lexical structures enter the vocabulary and then fall out of use or are totally replaced in different circumstances along the process of communication. Some of these words, which are frequently used in speech, belong to the “active vocabulary” of Romanian, whereas other lexical structures, which are not constantly used, belong to what lexicologists call “passive vocabulary” and are (re)activated when used in certain fields. The aim of this paper is to bring into discussion the influence exerted by European languages such as French, English, Italian, German, etc. on Romanian language through language contact and the process of neologisation. The words borrowed from these languages into Romanian reveal the extent to which they contributed to building and reshaping the Romanians’ linguistic identity. |
