Common mistakes in the journalistic text and formation of media standard

Abstract

The study is devoted to the functioning of the neutral construction "predstavlyat' soboj" ("to represent") and the grammatical form of the superlative "blizhajshij" ("the nearest") and colloquial versions of these phrases in Russian media text. Based on National Corpus of the Russian language also on the material of newspaper publications of 2000-2022, the author shows the gradual loss of stylistic differences. Constructions that are characterized in educational and reference literature as colloquial or outdated are actively used by journalists, including in a high-quality media addressed to educated audience. The emerging media standard allows the functioning of in fact non-contrasted, equivalent grammatical variants in the journalistic text. According to the author of the article, the new standard ensures that the media text is close to the speech level of the mass audience, but this trend leads to a certain decrease in the expressive capabilities of the media language. The obtained results give an opportunity to come to a conclusion that the journalistic style of the Russian literary language has been transformed into a modern media speech which is normalized to a much lesser extent, and that new approaches to its study are needed.