Phraseological units as means of expressing the emotivity in the Tatar language

Abstract

Systematization and description of the arsenal of linguistic means of expressing emotions represent one of the major tasks for linguistics that returns nowadays to the theory of Wilhelm von Humboldt, which in the early XIXth century appealed to study the language in close connection with individual speakers. A logical interest of the researchers to the processes of manifestation of emotions in the language has resulted in the formation of a new scientific field – linguistics of emotions aimed at the emotional environment of the language. In the Tatar language human emotions are verbalized mostly by the phraseological units representing various mental states of a person, one’s inner world. Studying means of expressing emotive vocabulary illustrated by the phraseological units provides an opportunity to present the whole complex of means of the language and the speech, as well as contribute to understanding the mentality and psychology of a Tatar language person. This article covers the Tatar phraseological units expressing negative connotation. The theme group “anger” represents the object of research. The authors have studied the emotional and appraisal semantics of the given group of phraseological units and attempted the revealing the specificity of the way of thinking and the worldview of the Tatar people. The analysis revealed that the phraseological units of the studied group are characterized by a great diversity of lexical, semantic, emotional and appraisal aspects. The emotional and appraisal volume of the phraseological units varies depending on the emotional state of the speaker and on his attitude to the addressee. Cultural and connotative semantics of the phraseological units is closely connected to the Tatar people’s worldview which has formed and has been enriched throughout the life experience.