Abstract

This article develops the understanding of symbols as a certain type of signs, the meaning of which is established by agreement or habit. There is an opinion that symbols in public discourse are a reflection of values and anti-values of the society, which are formed in the process of mass communication. This article identifies the main features of the characters, including emotional engagement, attachment to a particular act of communication, as well informativeness. The types of meaning are determined, and the mechanism of nomination is explained. The article reveals the concept of semantic competition. M. Edelman’s opinion that value structures can be divided into mono-, bi- and multimodal — depending on the number of values assigned to key symbols. The presidential speeches delivered before the Ukrainian Constitution Day in 2017–2020 were analyzed in this article. Thanks to the content analysis of emotionally colored words, the symbols, which are characteristic for the speeches of P. Poroshenko and V. Zelensky, were identified focusing both on similarities and differences of Ukrainian values and anti-values. This article analyzes the nominations used by speakers to give meaning to key symbols. Aspects of semantic competition of the key symbols are defined here as well. It was revealed that during the tenure of President Poroshenko, other symbols circulated mostly in the Ukrainian public discourse than those during the presidency of V. Zelensky. Among the common key values for both presidents, we can find “Constitution,” “Constitution Day” and “freedom”. There is a semantic competition in their use. Both presidents underline the negative meaning of the term “parliamentary immunity.” Poroshenko expresses the threat using symbols such as “Russian aggressor”, “fifth column,” “corruption,” “Russian Empire” and “war.” On the other hand, V. Zelensky does not use symbols of external threat. It was found that the value structure formed by Poroshenko’s speeches showed signs of bimodality, and the one created by V. Zelensky’s speeches — multimodality.

Highlights

  • Symbols inherent in mass communication and public discourse are the object of study of psycholinguistics, which is an interdisciplinary approach to the study of texts

  • Psycholinguistic methods have formed the basis for defining the main categories of research—symbols, connotations, and value structures, as well as the semantic connections between the concepts used by presidents

  • Poroshenko uses a larger number of symbols — both positively and negatively connoted, compared to V

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Summary

Introduction

Symbols inherent in mass communication and public discourse are the object of study of psycholinguistics, which is an interdisciplinary approach to the study of texts. Presidential speeches are one of the most important type of material for identifying public values. They reflect the cultural and economic orientations of the political leader and his supporters, as well as dynamics of public opinion. Speech analysis makes it possible to identify frameworks, metaphors, symbols and cultural codes that the mass audience utilizes in their thinking process. A cognitive grammar study of the interactive and interpersonal effects of a directive constuction in Polish” (Kochanska, 2018), “Impoliteness, aggression and the moral order” (Parvaresh, Tayebi, 2018), “Globalization, conflict discourse, and Jewish identity in an Israeli Russian-­speaking online community” (Perelmutter, 2018), “The use of positively valued adjectives and adverbs in Polish and Estonian casual conversations” (Vainik, Brzozowska, 2019)

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