Diachronic and synchronous manifestations of feminization in Ukrainian medical terminology

Abstract

This article deals with the female profession names afterthe medical activity in their diachronic and synchronous manifestations. This group of nominative units along with a category of feminitives resulted from a long history of the vernacular-based Ukrainian literary language development in which vernacular served as a platform for atrend towardmasculine and feminine derivative counterparts. The evidence ofthe slow development of this lexicalsemantic subgroup conditioned by linguistic and extralinguistic factorsis attested from the early historic period. The article examines its operationat each historical stage separately, especially at the contemporary one which is characterized by the increase of female profession names derived from male profession names and the use of such forms in various styles of Ukrainian. The historical development resulted in intense and extensive phenomena with respect to feminitives. The outcome of intensification implies changes proceeding from one stage to another partially supplemented at a certain point, whereas the outcome of extensification meanschanges introduced to the lexical and word-forming structuresand functional features of feminitives in each synchronous section. These phenomenalargely occur during the period of active modern feminization of the Ukrainian language. The formation of female medical activity shows a relatively high ranking of extensivity over intensity. Thispresents dynamic and progressive manifestations in the female profession names formation. Keywords: history of the Ukrainian language, diachrony and synchrony, intensification and extensification, contemporary feminization, female profession names after the medical activity