Interprecedent Semiotic Space, or When the Cannons are Heard, the Muses aren’t Silent

Abstract

The paper focuses on the description of chrematonyms as precedent names of Russian arms domain, developing a special semiotic space in the digital media news discourse and social networks represented in various code formats, readers and participants of which share the same axiological values as the authors of messages. The study aims to analyze the new precedent concepts, which form the new cells in the semantic network and the directions of linguistic cognitive channels generation on the Internet platform for communication. On the basis of the illustrative examples, verbalizing the Russian arms names, that is “Geran” (“Geranium”), “Bal” (“Ball”), “Topol” (“Сottonwood”), “Tishina” (“Silence”), “Burya” (“Tempest”), “Buratino” and “Cheburashka”, the issues of interprecedent links generation and rooting in the intertextual aspect are covered for the first time The description of the specific cases of the new precedent names usage is based on the complex application of such linguistic methods as metaphorical modeling, intertextual, contextual, structural, semantic and discursive analysis. It has been established that chrematonyms as secondary nominations are formed in two ways: they can be semantically derived from common names on the basis of metaphoricaland metonymic meanings, associative links or appear as a result of transonymization from other precedent names. The chrematonyms denoting weapons are of a hybrid type, which combines the features of proper names, nicknames and terms. Textual examples demonstrate pragmatic characteristics of chrematonyms to perform referential, emotive, persuasive, euphemistic, axiological, culturally differentiating and consolidating, and a number of other functions. The models of multiple metaphorical realizations and allusions to literary heritage and modern texts are characterized. The new precedent names and parodies, related to the situations of the Russian weapons usage, are analyzed from the point of view of their linguistic creativity. The main directions and trends of the development of precedent phenomena interactions, the ways of current intertextual domains extention are considered, recent examples of linguistic creativity on precedent resources production are described and the generation of new semantic memory cells and arcs of connections between them (in modern terms) in the Russian semiotic space is demonstrated.