Hic Sunt Dracones: Foreign Space in the English and Russian Worldview as Reflected by the Pejorative Toponymy of the English and Russian Languages

Abstract

The article examines the perception of the foreign space in the English and Russian native speakers’ worldviews based on the pejorative names of foreign countries and cities. Englishlanguage and Russian-language Internet sites were used as the source of data for the research, since this environment is especially favorable for the existence and collection of language material of this kind due to the online disinhibition effect. Based on the analysis of the inner form of the word and the stadial model of the Us—Them dichotomy with a gradual transition from the biological to the cultural, proposed by V. G. Lysenko, an attempt is made to derive the main patterns of making derogatory toponyms, and then to compare the characteristics that foreign lands receive within the English and Russian xenophobic discourse, and, as far as possible, to build a holistic image of the concept of foreign space in the English and Russian collective worldview. As a result of the study, a large number of negatively marked toponyms were found in the English and Russian languages. They show clearly similar features both in the formal peculiarities of word formation and in semantics, however, some specificities are also found, which makes it possible to deduce similarities and differences in the English and Russian perception of the concept of foreign space. In general, a significant similarity between English and Russian pejorative names of places is revealed: in both worldviews, different topoi appear as an ugly, unpleasant place inhabited by people (and sometimes not quite people) demonstrating weird, abnormal eating habits and perverted sexual preferences, where the space itself is distorted and defective.