Gadget vs device: the experience of semantic analysis

Abstract

The subject of the study is the semantics of the lexemes gadget and device in the modern Russian language. The spheres of use of these words, semantic differences and similarities between them, and their stylistic specificity are discussed. As sources of linguistic information about the functioning of lexemes, the data of the Russian National Corpus, the results of an Internet search and a questionnaire were used. The article reveals the multiple meanings of the words gadget and device in the modern Russian language. The YandexGPT neural network was used to verify the selected word meanings. The results obtained do not coincide with the data presented in modern explanatory dictionaries. The word-formative productivity of borrowed bases is noted – non-formal derivatives of different parts of speech are consistently formed from them. A descriptive method was used in the article. Based on the innovative nature of denotative realities and the inconsistent lexicographic description of the corresponding lexemes in modern dictionaries, the article applied an onomasiological approach ("from thing to word"). The scientific novelty consists in the fact that for the first time a comparative semantic study of these lexemes was carried out using the above methods, their regular meanings and stylistic specificity were revealed. The analysis made it possible to draw conclusions: lexical neologisms naming innovative devices are inconsistently described by modern dictionaries, their study is an important task and requires modern research methods with the use of computer technologies; the words gadget and device are hyperonyms in relation to the lexical units of the field "Personal computing devices", they have both semantic differences and similarities and are actively adapted in modern Russian-speaking usage. The communicative relevance of these words is evidenced by the possibility of their indirect ironic use as a means of designating almost any object.