Бытование лексемы «духовность» в русском языке

Abstract

The article aims to determine dynamics of the semantic structure of the word “духовность” (“spirituality”) in lexicographic sources and contexts of the Russian language. In order to describe certain features of the studied word, the researcher has analysed its dictionary definitions using historical, etymological, explanatory and frequency dictionaries. The issue of spirituality has interested many scientists at different times. The lexeme “духовность” has a large number of semantic fields in the scientific community and is found in different contexts: psychological, theological, cultural, political and sociological. The study is novel in that it is the first to carry out a comparative analysis of the semantic scope of the lexeme “духовность” in the contexts of the Russian language from 1800 to 2019. As a result of the study, it is proved that semantic change of the lexeme “духовность” has occurred during two hundred years of its existence in the language: its meaning has narrowed, the studied lexeme has lost the meaning “the clergy’s activities”; the semantic scope of the word has increased. The semantic scope of the lexeme “духовность” is rather vague. The analysis of contexts of the Russian language has revealed that the word becomes a polysemic and meaningless hybrid construct, which leads to disagreements about the notion of “spirituality”.