Semantic and pragmatic potential of Turkmen and Russian personal names

Abstract

This article is devoted to identifying the pragmatic and semantic features of personal names in the Russian and Turkmen languages. In the article personal names are considered in the linguocultural and linguocognitive directions which determines the relevance of the pragmatic-semantic study of personal names. A comparative examination of the analyzed Turkmen and Russian personal names allows us to identify their common and distinctive characteristics and clarify the system of value priorities of different linguistic communities. The study showed that each person is endowed with a name that reveals in the language and in the process of communication their own semantic aura as a set of semantic components that constitutes its associative-figurative basis. In the course of a comparative analysis of Turkmen and Russian personal names associative-figurative complexes were established that underlie the semantics of personal names in Russian and Turkmen languages. Also, a comparison of Russian and Turkmen personal names showed differences in the evaluative halo. The pragmatic potential of personal names is revealed in the fact that they show (at an unconscious level) the attitude of the speaker to the addressee. In the Russian language people are positively evaluated whose names, for example, Daniel, Ilya, Lev and etc., negatively — Kirill, Olga, Svetlana etc. As for the ratio of positive and negative connotated personal names in Russian out of 260 names 39 % positively assessed and 61 % negatively. In Turkmen out of 300 names, 93 % positively assessed and 7 % negatively. In the Turkmen language, as a rule, personal names were positively evaluated which is due to the fact that the names encoded a prediction, a wish for the future. For example, Mekan — wealth, Batyr — courageous, Mahriban — tender, etc. Accordingly, personal names acquire the assessment that is given to people. Names also convey culturally significant information in a given linguistic culture. In Russian linguoculture the female name Ekaterina are associated with Empress Catherine the Great or the male name Peter with Peter I. In Turkmen linguoculture, Muhammed is associated with the prophet, Mahtymguly with the poet, Atabeg with the teachers of the children of the rulers. In Turkmen linguistic culture names can be associated with plants which is not typical for Russian. In Russian linguistic culture associations with the characters of songs, literary works, poems are specific.