Advances in Language and Literary Studies - Flourishing Creativity & Literacy - Volume 7 - Number 4 - August 2016

Oct 15, 2026

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The study, qualitative and descriptive in nature, examines the use of transliteration in the paid Pakistani obituary announcements authored in English. It identifies frequently used transliterated vocabulary in these messages and analyzes the functional relationships arising between the textual moves of the announcements, shaped by transliterated words and phrases. The study also explores authors’ motives for selecting this lexical borrowing, using The Dawn and The News International, and concludes it supports need-based, religiously and culturally grounded communication.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages7

Reading Time18 min

AccessFree to download

Abstract

1. Introduction

2. Literature Review

Advances in Language and Literary Studies ISSN: 2203-4714 Vol. 7 No. 4; August 2016 Australian International Academic Centre, Australia | | | | | --- | --- | --- | | | | | | Flourishing Creativity & Literacy | | | Pakistani English Newspaper Paid Obituary Announcements: A Descriptive Analysis of the Transliterated Vocabulary Sajid M. Chaudhry (Corresponding author) Awang Had Salleh Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, Universiti Utara Malaysia, Malaysia E-mail: [sajid_mahmood@ahsgs.uum.edu.my](sajid_mahmood@ahsgs.uum.edu.my) Anne A. Christopher School of Education & Modern Languages, College of Arts and Sciences, Universiti Utara Malaysia, Malaysia E-mail: [althea@uum.edu.my](althea@uum.edu.my) [Hariharan A/L N.Krishnasamy](Hariharan A/L N.Krishnasamy) School of Education & Modern Languages, College of Arts and Sciences, Universiti Utara Malaysia, Malaysia [E-mail: hn1084@uum.edu.my](E-mail: hn1084@uum.edu.my) Doi:10 .7575/aiac.alls.v.7n.4p.39 URL: [http://dx.doi.org/10.7575/aiac.alls.v.7n.4p.39](http://dx.doi.org/10.7575/aiac.alls.v.7n.4p.39) Received: 27/02/2016 Accepted: 02/05/2016 Abstract The study, qualitative and descriptive in nature, examines the use of transliteration in the paid Pakistani obituary announcements authored in the English language. Primarily, it identifies the frequently used transliterated vocabulary in these linguistic messages and reconnoiters the functional relationship that emerges in and between the textual moves of these announcements due to the linkage created by these transliterated words and phrases. Additionally, the study shedslight on the motives of the authors of these announcements behind opting for this lexical borrowing. Data, for the purpose, comes from the two prominent Pakistani English newspapers: The Dawn and The News International. The study concludes that the transliterated vocabulary used in the Pakistani English obituary announcements is a needbased, religiously and culturally enthused, lexical borrowing that not only helps the authors of these texts convey their intentional messages effectively but also enhances the exactness and spontaneity of the contents of these announcements. Keywords: Obituary Announcement, Transliteration, Lexical borrowing, Source language, Target language, Cognitive synonyms 1. Introduction Newspaper obituary, adhering to the delineation provided by the Oxford English Dictionary (1992), is “a record or announcement of a death or deaths, especially in a newspaper, usually comprising a brief biographical sketch of the deceased”. Nwoye (1992) categorized it as a media genre having a specific communicative function. The first announcement of such kind was published in 1731 in a London based periodical known as The Gentleman’s Magazine (Fowler, 2007, Bates, Monroe and Zhuang , 2009) . With the passage of time, this journalistic text gained recognition asa distinctive genre in the field of print media and nowadays features regularly in the newspapers around the globe irrespective of their language of publication. English dailies of Pakistani press, like their global counterparts, publish obituary announcements in their everyday printouts. These announcements are of two types: unpaid and paid. The unpaid obituaries are published as news items and editorials. Newspapers’ designated staffers author these obituaries. These unpaid obituary announcements mainly celebrate the lives of the acclaimed elite of the bourgeois class of the Pakistani society. Newspaper managements have the prerogative to decide about the personalities entitled to this kind of obituary. Generally, it is observed that the people of high ranking in the fields of politics, civil and military bureaucracy, education, social welfare, etc. are delineated and honoured through these unpaid obituary announcements. The second kind of these announcements is of paid obituaries. Survivors of the deceased pay to the newspapers to get the obituaries of

FAQs

What does the study examine about paid Pakistani obituary announcements?

It examines how transliteration is used in paid Pakistani obituary announcements authored in English, focusing on the transliterated vocabulary and its linguistic function within the text.

Which newspapers provide the data for the study?

The Dawn and The News International are used as the two prominent Pakistani English newspapers for the data.

What is the study’s main conclusion about the transliterated vocabulary?

The study concludes that the transliterated vocabulary is a need-based, religiously and culturally motivated lexical borrowing that helps authors convey intentional messages effectively and improves the exactness and spontaneity of the announcements.

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by Terk