Distinctive features of motherhood discourse in Russian media

Abstract

This study of modern media devoted to the problems of motherhood discourse is significant and relevant due to both the axiological nature of motherhood phenomenon and socio-cultural features of the existing (present day) media space. Problems of motherhood are of enduring importance. The variety of issues concerning motherhood raised in modern media indicate the relevance and importance of all manifestations of this phenomenon for contemporary society. The purpose of the present study is to identify and reveal the features of media discourse of motherhood in socio-political media (which is a product of cognitive activity of modern Russian society) through the category of interdiscursivity. The material for this research was obtained from media texts of Internet versions of Russian socio-political media Arguments and Facts, Izvestia, Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Moskovsky Komsomolets, and Kommersant, published from 2001 to 2019. The research methodology includes content analysis of online publications, classification and systematization of the research material: media texts, media text studies and description of media discourse on motherhood in the form of a cognitive structure (concept sphere). The present study is the first attempt to interpret maternal media discourse through the category of interdiscursiveness, a fusion of various discourses. The author presents media discourse on motherhood in contemporary Russian socio-political media as a combination of institutional media discourses (political, economic, legal, medical, and religious), each manifesting its own aims and using own linguistic means of presenting information. This approach to describing media discourse emphasizes the interdisciplinary nature of the study and indicates the relevance of its results for various fields of scientific knowledge, primarily journalism and cognitive linguistics.