Abstract
The paper is devoted to the problem of semantics of proper names. Nowadays, in linguistics, there are different points of view on the nature of the semantics of proper names. This paper states the discovery of a new kind of meaning of proper names - psycholinguistic. This concept is based on the use of experimental methods for studying the meanings of words, which involves an appeal to the consciousness of native speakers. Psycholinguistic experiments were carried out by us in Voronezh. Subjects - 330 students. The method of free and directed associative experiment was used. Various toponyms (“Moscow”, “St. Petersburg”, “Volgograd”), including “Voronezh”, were used as a stimulus material. According to the results of experiments on the stimulus “Voronezh”, a total of 1,055 verbal associative reactions were obtained. Then the semantic interpretation of associative reactions was carried out, which consists in understanding the reactions as linguistic representations of certain signs of the denotation - semantic components. As a result, the psycholinguistic meaning of the toponym “Voronezh” was formulated, which is very different from its meaning in toponymic dictionaries. We call this new kind of meaning psycholinguistic.
Highlights
Proper names actively function in various types of discourse and play an important role in communication between people [1].Studying the nature of proper names, one cannot ignore the problem that affects their meaning, lexical content.Numerous works are devoted to the problem of semantics of proper names [2,3,4,5,6]
We have developed a differential and empirical model of description and lexicographic fixation of the semantics of proper names, which allows identifying psycholinguistic meanings
The general algorithm for identifying and analyzing psycholinguistic meanings consists of 4 main stages, which include: 1) conducting a psycholinguistic experiment with the words studied as stimuli; 2) processing of the obtained associative reactions and construction of associative fields of words; 3) semantic interpretation of associative fields and identification of semantic components; 4) sememic attribution of semes and identification of psycholinguistic meanings; 5) comparative analysis of psycholinguistic and dictionary meanings
Summary
Proper names actively function in various types of discourse and play an important role in communication between people [1].Studying the nature of proper names, one cannot ignore the problem that affects their meaning, lexical content.Numerous works are devoted to the problem of semantics of proper names [2,3,4,5,6]. Proper names actively function in various types of discourse and play an important role in communication between people [1]. Studying the nature of proper names, one cannot ignore the problem that affects their meaning, lexical content. Numerous works are devoted to the problem of semantics of proper names [2,3,4,5,6]. A different understanding of the problem leads to a different understanding of the essence of the phenomenon. There is no definite answer to the question of whether names have their own meaning
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