Why Technical English?

By Galina Vitkova

 Self-evidently Technical English remains the English (even though Microsoft Word check speller offers about 13 kinds of the English). Nevertheless, Technical English like Business English has its own specific features and particularities. In this sense nobody has any doubt regarding Business English. There are many course books and other tutorial tools dealing with the Business English. The situation around the Technical English is quite different.  We won´t be discussing the reasons for that now. Let us concentrate on the specifics of the Technical English.

In my opinion based on long-term experience with learning and teaching English they are as follows:

·       Technical texts are as a rule difficult for understanding;

·       Vocabulary comprises a large amount of special terms, expressions, word constructions;

·       The texts are full of acronyms or abbreviation, especially in the case of modern technologies;

·       The technical texts contain a lot of stable sayings, phrases, expressions;

·       There are favourite grammatical constructions that are mostly used in these texts (we discuss thoroughly them later).

However, technical texts in English are interesting and comprehensible for technicians. It increases person´s emotional involvement in the learning English and brings better results in the language knowledge. That is why they are worth being studied.