Functional specifics of English interjections: Sociocultural aspect (based on the series “Downtown Abbey”)

The aim of the study is to identify the functional parameters of the use of English interjections depending on the sociocultural position of the communicants. The scientific novelty of the study lies in the fact that the relationship between the communicants belonging to a certain social class and the peculiarities of the use of the qualitative and quantitative composition of interjections in their speech is established for the first time. The study revealed that interjections can act as indicators of English communicative behaviour. Among the distinguished functional groups of interjections (emotive, hesitational, phatic and conative), interjections in the emotive function, traditionally recognized as the main one due to the nature of interjections, for the first time lost its dominant position in favour of interjections in the hesitational function. The reason for this is the influence of such parameters of English communicative behaviour as emotional restraint, understatement, the desire to reduce flatness, as well as an anti-conflict orientation of communication. A predominant number of interjections of all functional groups and a more diverse qualitative composition of interjections is recorded in the speech of nobility, than in the speech of the common class, which is explained by their higher level of education, speech culture and the development of their emotional intelligence.