Personal Worldview Research Articles

Kui keha kõneleb. Margit Lõhmuse „Sterne” kui vastuhakk normile

When the body speaks. Margit Lõhmus’ Sterne as a challenge to the norm Keywords: feminism, transgressive literature, women’s writing, prose, queer literature Margit Lõhmus’ book Sterne has received attention for its portrayal of the female body and sexuality, which are presented in a hyperbolic and sometimes caricatured way, departing from conventional norms. This allows the book to be placed within the context of queer literature, understood here as literature that challenges norms. In Sterne, gender identity often does not conform to the expectations of heteronormativity, and gender is not simply divided into male and female. Queerness is also evident in the unexpected sources of pleasure, the characters’ appearances, and the depiction of bodies and relationships. Lõhmus intentionally employs obscene language, focusing on women’s bodily experiences and perspectives on the body and sexuality. Sexual encounters are frequently described as empty or disturbing, while a sense of wholeness is found in solitude. Sex with men is often depicted as alienating. In Sterne, the body is presented outside traditional heteronormative frameworks, with sexual pleasure and arousal occurring in non-sexual situations. Humour plays a significant role, especially through surprising metaphors and self-irony. The book’s transgressive nature is also reflected in its form, as Sterne employs colloquial language to ensure the authenticity of the characters and convey their personal worldview. In some stories, Lõhmus’ style mimics online communication, omitting punctuation and using lowercase letters to emphasize linguistic freedom and the contrast between imagination and reality. The book shifts between seriousness, irony, and grotesque scenes, challenging traditional gender roles and literary conventions. Through this, Lõhmus introduces into Estonian literature a queer work where gender is non-binary, and sexuality is freed from heteronormative constraints.

Pastoral care from the pulpit: preaching as therapy for belief sickness

ABSTRACT It is argued that an important function in pastoral preaching is facilitating self-doctoring for belief sickness. Belief sickness is caused by an element in a personal worldview that is unrealistic, unhelpful, and distorted, and which leads to significant emotional and spiritual distress. There is a tradition in philosophy, beginning with Plato and continuing to the present day, in which the role of the philosopher is construed, in part, as providing a cure for illness in the soul. Taking a lead from Kierkegaard, self-doctoring in pastoral preaching is associated with the method of throwing up competing perspectives to stimulate reflection. Preaching methods such as the story-telling approach, the roundtable, and paradoxical preaching are identified as aligning in a general way with the Kierkegaardian technique. A sermon outline is offered that demonstrates the technique in practice. Though the concentration is on method, the vitally important role of the Word-Spirit partnership in inner transformation and healing is also discussed.

Mediator Narration of Memory: US Presidents’ Autobiographies and the Narration of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, 1993–2012

The main argument of the paper is that we should examine mediator-narrative as an agency in narrative construction of memory during conflict. It demonstrates how despite the differences between the US presidents’ personal world views, their strategic narrations of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are strikingly similar. These selective narratives strengthen the image of the US as a peacemaker and benevolent global leader. This narration is achieved by sidelining the detrimental role of the Israeli settlements and security threats, especially the increasing influence of Hamas in the Gaza-Strip. Therefore, this resilient mediator-narrative prevents critical thinking on the conflict and encourages a duplication of such policies.

Why should we punish and how? The role of moral intuitions and personal worldviews for punitiveness and sentencing preferences

ABSTRACT This research investigated the role of moral foundations and broader worldviews in judgments about why and how criminal offenders should be punished. In Study 1, Swedish law students (N = 103) and social science students (N = 130) evaluated how harsh the punishment for crimes that varied across three crime categories and five contexts should be. In Study 2, Swedish adults (N = 161) evaluated eight sentencing goals and thirteen sentencing methods. Humanism and individualizing intuitions were associated with higher punitiveness for crimes that involved a selfish motive or harm inflicted upon the victim and with increased focus on rehabilitation and counseling. Normativism and binding intuitions were associated with higher punitiveness when the damage was primarily material, less leniency when there were mitigating circumstances, and more focus on retribution, deterrence, restoration, incapacitation, denunciation, and imprisonment. The moral foundations predicted preferences concerning sentence goals and methods better while the worldviews predicted punitiveness better. The results show that we need to take both people’s moral foundations and their broader worldviews into consideration to understand why and how they think criminals should be punished.

Worldviews and Religious Education. Modelling a fairly New Relationship

RESEARCH OBJECTIVE: This paper raises the question of how religious education may address the variety of worldviews.
 THE RESEARCH PROBLEM AND METHODS: The concept of worldview seems to be able to reconcile religious education with a society that is both secular and religiously plural. Such education, however, is defined by its focus on religion. Even when religion is seen as sub-category of worldview, religious education still does not include secular worldviews.
 THE PROCESS OF ARGUMENTATION: It therefore first clarifies the concept of worldview by relating it to the German term of “Weltanschauung”. Worldviews represent a comprehensive perspective on the world that originates from an individual’s aesthetic and intuitive understanding of daily life and gives meaning to this life. Then, it delineates the basic didactic characteristics of three models of religious education, namely the denominational, the pluralist-informative, and the interpretative-dialogical models. Based on these models, the paper finally discusses the challenges and obstacles of religious education which attempts to address the plurality of worldviews.
 RESEARCH RESULTS: The analysis shows that none of the models is able to comprehensively grasp this plurality. The advantages and disadvantages of each of the three models, however, indicate that the main tasks of worldview-conscious religious education are to clarify the constitutive rationality of worldviews and to find a balanced representation of both organized and personal worldviews via classroom interaction.
 CONCLUSIONS, INNOVATIONS, AND RECOMMENDATIONS: The realization of these tasks is basically the job of the teacher and does not at all depend on the model of religious education itself.

«THE STATE» AND «LEGALITY» IN THE DISCOURSE OF P.A. STOLYPIN DURING THE REVOLUTIONARY CRISIS OF 1905–1907

The relevance of the research is determined by the need to disclose the political and legal concepts used by P.A. Stolypin during the first Russian Revolution and the beginning of forming the constitutional political system in Russia. Solving this problem makes it possible to better understand the ideas of the Chairman of the Council of Ministers, who played a significant role in developing the government’s reform program during the first Russian Revolution, and assess its compliance with historical time. The novelty of the research lies in studying the influence of historical circumstances on P.A. Stolypin’s ideological design of the course aimed at creating a state governed by the rule of law, as well as at identifying its political values, which determined the main tasks of its activities. The purpose of the study is to study the influence of historical circumstances on the ideological justification of P.A. Stolypin’s state activities during the years of the revolutionary crisis and transformation of the political system in Russia, in the analysis of his political discourse. Materials and methods of the study. The source base of the work was made up of speeches by P.A. Stolypin and deputies of the State Duma in 1906–1907. The work is carried out in the context of the theory of political modernization and the axiological approach, which obliges to identify the system of values that determined the worldview of a historical personality. Study results. In the new Russian historical conditions – the beginning of creating a constitutional state, arbitrariness of left–wing parties, criticism of government policy by Constitutional Democrats – the «healthy forces» in power actualized the task of creating the rule of law, offering their own version of its functioning: representative institutions are engaged in legislative work within their powers and recognize the prerogatives of the emperor. There was there is much concern about the authorities’ choice of means to combat to preserve the statehood and order. In Stolypin’s understanding, the priorities of the government should be to restore order in the interests of all compatriots. He disagreed with the liberals’ view that the government sought to govern on the basis of «exceptional laws,» saying that it was the duty of the authorities to preserve order. The government must fight destructive forces with all measures,» therefore, Stolypin believed, the government can resort to extraordinary means to prevent destruction of statehood and seizure of power by rebels. Conclusions. The formation of the political discourse of the Prime Minister Stolypin was influenced by such historical circumstances as creation of a constitutional political system in 1905–1906, emergence of «healthy forces» in power capable of carrying out reforms, the activities of liberal parties demanding the rule of law, activation of a left-wing radical movement focused on destruction of the existing system. Stolypin thought through and ideologically justified the program, which was based on indisputable national values: integrity and greatness of Russia, strong statehood, legality, welfare and education of people, preservation of culture created by many generations of ancestors. Stolypin’s discourse was defined by the era of transition from autocracy to the rule of law, when a conflict arose between the value system of traditionalists, liberals and radicals. Maneuvering, Stolypin simultaneously formed the ideological foundations of the rule of law and protection of the management system by repressive means.

The depiction of the 1990s in Ukrainian cinema of the 2010s–2020s as a way of national self­identification

The relevance of the study. Understanding of this period — encompassing the collapse of the USSR, the beginning of Ukraine’s independence, and the experiences of contemporary filmmakers during their childhood and youth — remains pertinent and essential.
 The purpose of the study is to examine the stylistic and substantive features of the depiction of the 1990s by Ukrainian filmmakers in films of the 2010s and 2020s, and to prove that this is a way of national self-identification.
 The methodology. The following scientific methods were used: analysis (to process theoretical works, works on the history of art and philosophy, articles by film critics and interviews), comparative (to highlight the peculiarities of each of the domestic directors’ works), deductive (to highlight specific stylistic features from the general Ukrainian film process of the era of independence), synthesis (to highlight the tendency of directors’ approaches to depicting the past as a holistic phenomenon) and generalization (to write conclusions).
 The results. An analysis of the stylistic and substantive features of the depiction of the 1990s in Ukrainian cinema in the 2010s–2020s has revealed that this phenomenon is a way of national self-identification. The main thematic blocks that exist in the field of national self-identification in these films are: a critical look at the system of society; production of life values; deromanticization of the past; coverage of generational trauma; nostalgia for youth and childhood; the problem of national mentality and the past existing in the present; existential issues of the search for meaning; and identity crisis. The main tendency is to depict the formation and maturation of the protagonist in the story model of a coming-of-age film. In each case, the chosen thematic area depends on the way the author expresses his or her personal worldview.
 The scientific novelty of the study lies in the fact that it is the first comprehensive study of the phenomenon of depiction of the 1990s and the period of the first years of independence in Ukrainian cinema after the 2010s, which is a way of national self-identification.
 The practical significance. This study can be useful for further in-depth scientific study of both the trend of depicting the 1990s in cinema and the process of national self-identification. It can also be used in teaching film theory and film history.

Shared Attention as a Revelatory Practice

In order to understand what we are talking about when we talk about joint attention, I will scrutinize how the mainstream view that builds on representational and intentionalist theories of mind is constituted. My aim is to show that much of the theory of joint attention is quite narrowly constructed and comes with tacit disciplinary biases that exclude much of what is existentially important in our practices of sharing our perceptions and guiding others to attend to the world in novel ways. By using the frameworks of classical phenomenology and enactivist theories of mind, I aim to show how we, in our interactions, share our perceptions even with beings that are distinctly different from us. And, that this difference in our personal worldview, our cognitive capacities, and our sensory modalities should be seen as a constitutive aspect of our practices of shared attention. I will articulate attention as a revelatory practice that aids us in discovering a shared world through the plurality, rather than similarity, of our perceptual actions. Attention is, in this sense, not solely driven by subjective intentions; it is also formed and co-constituted by my being addressed by the other.

Language of the Future as an Object of Satire in D. Eggers’s Dystopic Dilogy

Personal worldview can be subjected to linguistic modeling even if the person in question is a fictional character. This research featured the vocabulary invented by the contemporary American writer Dave Eggers for his dystopic dilogy, as well as the role of this fictional language in creating satirical mode. The study involved such methods of cognitive linguistics as component, transformational, and stylistic analyses, analytical description, and semantic fields. The article opens with a review of domestic and foreign publications on the connection between language, social processes, and thinking. The Circle (2013) and The Every (2021) were analyzed for satirical and stylistic devices. The dilogy turned out to be a new type of satire, which combines the postmodern irony and deconstruction with the metamodern openness and optimism. The vocabulary of the future as seen by the author was analyzed for its functions in creating the worldview. Its key features include: neologisms and occasionalisms coined in line with actual word-formation models; contrasting high and low-style vocabulary; euphemisms and modified set phrases. D. Eggers also satirized some real linguistic trends, which, in his opinion, deform the language and affect people’s mind and behavior.

Beyond Personal Beliefs: The Impact of the Dominant Social Paradigm on Energy Transition Choices

Energy transition towards a local resilient energy supply is necessary for energy security. Climate change and the threat of economic collapse are reasons to force society to become less dependent on fossil fuel. Small-scale solutions are expected to be more sustainable, as large-scale integrated networks are featured by complexity and difficult-to-notice vulnerabilities, creating system risks. This paper presents the results of empirical research among a sample of Polish business students (N = 205) on the importance of worldviews for the choice of the energy transition scenario (local solutions vs. large-scale solutions). Worldviews are represented here by the Dominant Social Paradigm (defined for the purpose of this study as the belief that liberal democracy, free markets, and technological development are to solve all type of problems). This study addresses two research questions: (1) Is there a difference in preference for the energy transition scenarios? (2) Does adherence to the Dominant Social Paradigm determine the choice of the scenario for energy transition? The results present a preference for non-cooperative solutions (individual household solutions and large-scale solutions), while no significant relation to the worldviews represented by the Dominant Social Paradigm has been found. The results suggest that preferences for individual and large-scale solutions may be influenced more by institutional factors than by personal worldviews. A policy implication is that a change in the socio-political institutions and strengthening local governance may be a prerequisite for a sustainable energy transition.

Analyzing Reddit Forums Specific to Abortion That Yield Diverse Dialogues Pertaining to Medical Information Seeking and Personal Worldviews: Data Mining and Natural Language Processing Comparative Study.

Attitudes toward abortion have historically been characterized via dichotomized labels, yet research suggests that these labels do not appropriately encapsulate beliefs on abortion. Rather, contexts, circumstances, and lived experiences often shape views on abortion into more nuanced and complex perspectives. Qualitative data have also been shown to underpin belief systems regarding abortion. Social media, as a form of qualitative data, could reveal how attitudes toward abortion are communicated publicly in web-based spaces. Furthermore, in some cases, social media can also be leveraged to seek health information. This study applies natural language processing and social media mining to analyze Reddit (Reddit, Inc) forums specific to abortion, including r/Abortion (the largest subreddit about abortion) and r/AbortionDebate (a subreddit designed to discuss and debate worldviews on abortion). Our analytical pipeline intends to identify potential themes within the data and the affect from each post. We applied a neural network-based topic modeling pipeline (BERTopic) to uncover themes in the r/Abortion (n=2151) and r/AbortionDebate (n=2815) subreddits. After deriving the optimal number of topics per subreddit using an iterative coherence score calculation, we performed a sentiment analysis using the Valence Aware Dictionary and Sentiment Reasoner to assess positive, neutral, and negative affect and an emotion analysis using the Text2Emotion lexicon to identify potential emotionality per post. Differences in affect and emotion by subreddit were compared. The iterative coherence score calculation revealed 10 topics for both r/Abortion (coherence=0.42) and r/AbortionDebate (coherence=0.35). Topics in the r/Abortion subreddit primarily centered on information sharing or offering a source of social support; in contrast, topics in the r/AbortionDebate subreddit centered on contextualizing shifting or evolving views on abortion across various ethical, moral, and legal domains. The average compound Valence Aware Dictionary and Sentiment Reasoner scores for the r/Abortion and r/AbortionDebate subreddits were 0.01 (SD 0.44) and -0.06 (SD 0.41), respectively. Emotionality scores were consistent across the r/Abortion and r/AbortionDebate subreddits; however, r/Abortion had a marginally higher average fear score of 0.36 (SD 0.39). Our findings suggest that people posting on abortion forums on Reddit are willing to share their beliefs, which manifested in diverse ways, such as sharing abortion stories including how their worldview changed, which critiques the value of dichotomized abortion identity labels, and information seeking. Notably, the style of discourse varied significantly by subreddit. r/Abortion was principally leveraged as an information and outreach source; r/AbortionDebate largely centered on debating across various legal, ethical, and moral abortion domains. Collectively, our findings suggest that abortion remains an opaque yet politically charged issue for people and that social media can be leveraged to understand views and circumstances surrounding abortion.

Way of life: A future research agenda for how worldviews impact financial attitudes and behaviors

AbstractThe purpose of this paper is to provide a future research agenda to study how worldviews impact financial attitudes and behaviors. In addition, this paper will help operationalize many of the constructs associated with an individual's values and personal worldview. As a result of this research agenda, researchers and financial planners will move towards developing personal value and worldview identification tools that will help individuals more intrinsically adopt savings goals that help meet their life goals.

Formation of an ecological worldview in the conditions of challenges and martial law and ecocide.

Introduction. In modern scientific discourse, there are two interconnected categories. Firstly, there is the ecologization of worldview, which involves focusing more attention on the current problems of human, societal, and environmental coexistence, while not necessarily creating a philosophically grounded model for resolving the ecological crisis and overcoming unequivocally negative phenomena such as ecocide. Secondly, there is the ecological worldview itself as the highest characteristic of personality, arising from its adaptation to the surrounding world and constituting a system of knowledge about the place of humans in relation to nature. The ecological worldview thus becomes the inner plan of action for humans, based on values, beliefs, convictions, ideas, judgments, and manifested in the active actions of the subject. The relevance of ecological issues is amplified by large-scale warfare, which not only brings a series of eco-catastrophes not only within the territory of Ukraine but also extends far beyond its borders. The article discusses the necessity of philosophical reflection on ways out of the contemporary ecological crisis through the inclusion of the ecological concept in a philosophically and anthropologically oriented paradigm driven by personalism. The goal of the research: formation of an ecological worldview in the conditions of challenges of martial law and ecocide. Methods. The methodology of the research: The methodological basis of the article includes behavioral, comparative, and systemic-structural methods of scientific knowledge. Scientific novelty: the elements of scientific novelty include, firstly, further deepened development of philosophical premises for the formation of an ecological worldview with signs of integrality; secondly, personally motivated search for a conscious path to overcome the contemporary ecological crisis; thirdly, phased formation of an ecological worldview of personality, which includes an increase in empathy towards the natural environment, understanding the possibilities of nature restoration due to a utilitarian approach to its resources. Conclusion, results: the formation of an ecological worldview directly depends on the development of both anthropocentric and ecocentric premises for the partnership between humans and nature, as well as their moral-ethical and axiological content. The differentiation of the concepts of "ecological worldview" and "ecologization of worldview" at the theoretical level contributes to the implementation of an effective model of cooperation between humanity and the environment in practice. The documentation of ecological crimes against nature in Ukraine resulting from the military invasion of the Russian Federation aims to draw the attention of the international community to these issues, as well as to develop effective mechanisms for mitigating the damage inflicted on nature and prevent the repetition of alarming scenarios of human-environment relations in the future.

Implementing Personal Construct Theory to explore divergent approaches to substantive knowledge in RE

AbstractDivergence is not a new phenomenon in RE in England and Wales. A diverse range of aims and approaches have been promoted since RE provision became compulsory in 1944. Approaches include the phenomenological, interpretative, and dialogic with current debates centring around the benefits and challenges of a ‘worldviews approach’. There have been a range of responses to this approach, and implementation has been diverse. It may appear that at the heart of this divergence is confusion over the definition of the term 'worldview' and what this entails for teachers: adding content knowledge and diverse sources. However, this paper argues that the divergence is much more significantly rooted in the nature of ‘substantive knowledge’ and the power dynamics associated with who defines, selects and assesses the validity of substantive knowledge. In current research, I am testing the hypothesis that teachers’ personal worldviews influence their choice of substantive knowledge in RE. Through 142 questionnaires and 21 interviews, this power dynamic is being investigated. Employing Kelly’s (Kelly, Personal construct psychology, Norton, 1955) Personal Construct Theory illuminated teachers’ personal worldviews relating to substantive knowledge in RE. Through the completion and analysis of RepGrids, the teachers revealed they taught the ‘good’ aspects of religions and ignored the ‘bad’. They prized knowledge from lived experience above knowledge provided by religious institutions and some deemed online sources more useful than those from religious institutions. The power to define ‘substantive’ knowledge, once primarily in the hands of religious institutions, has dissipated to embrace definitions from teachers’ personal worldviews. Whilst enabling a diversity of beliefs to be covered, without examination, hegemonic power may risk the validity of the subject. What is needed, in the midst of this divergence, is not a battle for supremacy, and a rejection of one voice over the other, but an acknowledgement of the power dynamics in defining substantive knowledge in RE.

THE CONCEPTUALITY OF THE TEXT AS A MANIFESTATION OF THE ETHNO-CULTURAL CODE OF THE NATIONAL-AUTHOR PICTURE OF THE WORLD

The purpose of the article is to describe conceptuality as a subcategory of the textual category of informativeness, to focus on the linguistic means of expressing this typological feature of the verbal whole. The outlined goal involves the following tasks: to substantiate the existence of conceptuality as a subcategory of informativeness in the categorical hierarchy of the text; to focus attention on conceptuality in the aspect of revealing ethnocultural codes of national and individual author’s pictures of the world; describe key words, lexical repetitions, author’s aphorisms, as well as dedications, epigraphs, titles as linguistic means of realizing conceptuality. The source base of the research is Ukrainian-language artistic verbal objects, from which the selection of units (metaphors, epithets, periphrasis, oxymorons, etc.) was carried out, which reveal conceptuality as a textual subcategory of informativeness. The focus is on literary texts of both classical Ukrainian literature and modern ones — by Ihor-Bohdan Antonych, Ivan Bagryany, Oksana Zabuzhko, Maria Matios, Natalia Nazar, Roman Skiba, Hryhoriy Skovoroda, Vasyl Stus, Lesya Ukrainka, Hnat Khotkevich, Taras Shevchenko. The object of study is Ukrainian poetic discourse and its components (concepts), and the subject is artistic images of Ukrainian poetry and prose as expressions of conceptuality as a type of textual category of informativeness. The result of the scientific search was the deepening of the idea of hierarchical ordering of text categories and subcategories and the definition of conceptuality as an invariant characteristic of the verbal whole, which reflects a separate aspect of the typological feature of the verbal whole. We study artistic and poetic communication in the aspect of a discursive approach as a process in which the result of verbal interaction between its participants is a manifestation of the specificity of the linguistic and national picture of the world of Ukrainians. The conclusion is that the informativeness category represents the text as a communicative unit. The phenomenon of informativeness is caused by the presence of conceptual information in the artistic text, which is projected into the plane of the author — with the idea of the work, into the plane of the reader — with the process of perceiving the text as assimilation of new information and approaching the author’s idea. Ukrainian-language artistic texts are components of the world picture of the ethnos, they contain collective experience, the genetic and evolutionary basis of which is expressed by the textual subcategory of conceptuality. Conceptuality implements the aesthetic idea of the work, harmonizes the theme and plot, determines the selection of language means, etc. The concept is an axiological prism of worldview. Artistic communication is able to reveal the unique culture of the nation, its traditions, customs, mentality, reproduce people’s lives in national-historical originality, and also represent the worldview of the unique personality of the author-addressee. Linguistic means of implementing conceptuality as a subcategory of the text category of informativeness are keywords, lexical repetitions, author’s aphorisms, as well as dedications, epigraphs, titles.

Personal worldviews: lessons from James Fowler

Personal worldviews: lessons from James Fowler

Green Spaces as Healthy Places: Correlates of Urban Green Space Use in Singapore.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, when stress levels were heightened and social connections were threatened, a spike in green space visits was observed. Drawing upon the value-belief-norm (VBN) theory, which explains the influence of personal values and world view on perceived obligations to the environment and to action, relevant correlates were examined in relation to people's psychological wellbeing in a bid to better elucidate this phenomenon. We aimed to explore the associations amongst a number of protective factors for psychological wellbeing and to examine the applicability of the VBN theory to wellbeing rather than environmental behaviour. Our research aim was to understand some of the correlates of the use of urban green spaces in Singapore during COVID-19. In total, 268 adult residents of Singapore completed an online survey measuring proximity/frequency of visits to green space, value orientations, nature connectedness, social connectedness, religious belief, spirituality and psychological wellbeing, along with sociodemographic variables such as age and gender. As predicted by the VBN theory, biospheric value orientation and spirituality were positively associated with nature connectedness. The nature connectedness association with psychological wellbeing was completely mediated by spirituality. Frequency of visits to nature was also positively associated with nature connectedness. Neither proximity to nature nor social connectedness were associated with nature connectedness. An altruistic value orientation was associated only with religious belief. Our results indicate that during uncertain times, people are drawing on either social or nature connections as coping mechanisms to fulfil psychological needs and enhance psychological wellbeing. Spirituality mediates this pathway for nature connectedness but not for social connectedness.

A mental spaces analysis of religious identity discourse

Abstract Religious identity is often viewed as a relatively stable construct, reflecting an individual’s personal worldview. However, individuals living within modern multi-cultural societies often must engage in extensive reflection to orient themselves to faith traditions in ways that are coherent and personally relevant. Although some work has examined the connection between narratives of religious experience, identity and cognition (cf. Richardson, 2012; Richardson & Nagashima, 2018; Richardson & Mueller, 2019), the relationship between thinking and speaking about this identity is still a developing area of enquiry, with important consequences for how religious faith and practice are understood. This article presents a detailed analysis of an interview with a UK-based Jewish woman based on the mental spaces (Fauconnier, 1994) and conceptual blending (Fauconnier & Turner, 2002) frameworks. The analysis shows how mental spaces and the relationship between elements within those spaces emerge over the course of a discourse event so as to constitute a personal account of religious identity. The concluding section furthermore discusses how within- and across-space contrast links are utilized, along with general processes of compression and decompression, to develop a blend that dynamically expresses the interviewee’s religious identity as an integrated and coherent position lying between competing attractor states.

English for lawyers: the design of foreign language training

The study deals with the development and design of the foreign language education program aimed for postgraduates getting a Master of Law Degree at Saint Petersburg University of the Ministry of the Internal Affairs of Russia. The research is needed to build relationships across courses while creating and implementing educational programs. The paper analyzes the concepts interdisciplinarity, interdisciplinary education by researchers of national pedagogical science and foreign researchers. It also highlights the characteristics of interdisciplinary education, develops the structure of an interdisciplinary approach to learning a foreign language, and describes the elements of educational and methodological support of the course. It shows the process of the syllabus development as well as the coursebook creation and conducts a questionnaire. The study has shown that an interdisciplinary approach to teaching a foreign language is carried out through the reliance of a foreign language on specialized courses in order to establish significant, from students point of view, links between courses to develop foreign language communicative competence as well as improve professional knowledge through language, particularly, the ability to find, understand, synthesize and use knowledge of specialized courses through English and in English, expanding the professional and personal worldview.

Лосев Алексей Фёдорович

Alexei Losev (10[22].09.1893, Novocherkassk – 24.05.1988, Moscow), Russian philosopher, philologist and writer, is the creator of a unique religious-philosophical system, which combines the reinterpreted tradition of ancient and medieval thought (Plato and Neoplatonism, Christian apophatic theology of Dionysius the Areopagite, Gregory Palamas, Nicholas of Cusa), the methodology of New European philosophy (German classical idealism, neo-Kantianism, phenomenology of E.Husserl) and the problems of New European philosophy (German classical ideal-ism, neo-Kantianism, phenomenology of E.Husserl) and the problems of Russian religious philosophy of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, from V.S. Solovyov (the idea of universalism) to P.A. Florensky. In the constructive design of Losev’s system the central place is occupied by dialectics, in the multidimensional construction of which each category and all of them together are worked out in the light of each other. Losev’s personalistic ontology is the basis of his philosophy of language (naming as an interpretative - communicative self-discovery of personality), philosophy of myth as a distinctive form of personal worldview (myth as directly experienced and created reality, symboli-cally expressed), and aesthetics (artistic form is “personality as symbol and symbol aspersonality”). Losev was the founder of the philosophy of music in Russia. His multi-volume history of ancient aesthetics represents the history of the entire ancient culture revealed in its symbolic-expressive aspects. The works of Losev, are presentative of the last generation of the Silver Age of Russian culture, became a kind of completion of Ortho-dox religious philosophy in Russia in the 19th and early 20th centuries.