Russian Linguistics Research Articles

Словарь речений из богослужебных книг прот. А. И. Невоструева (отходный — ощущу)

The “Dictionary of Locutions from Liturgical Books” by Protopriest A. Nevostruev, completed in the middle of the 19th century and never published, can be regarded both as a significant achievement of Church Slavonic studies and as a valuable lexicographic source. The manuscript is kept in the Russian State Library. The decrepit state of the manuscript has determined the necessity of its urgent study and edition. The significance of this project is primarily due to the fact that the text of the dictionary is being made accessible to linguists for the first time. The orthography and grammar of the dictionary reflect the linguistic views of the time of its creation and can be of interest for those who study the history of Russian linguistics. This paper contains the last part of dictionary entries beginning in letter O. The characteristic features of the publication of this Dictionary, the lists of sources, abbreviations and symbols were described in detail in the previous issues of St. Tikhon’s University Review. All previously published parts of the Dictionary together with the critical apparatus can be found at the website of St. Tikhon’s University for the Humanities.

Language, education, and transformation in Bianca Marais’s Hum If You Don’t Know the Words

In this article, I analyse Bianca Marais’s debut novel Hum If You Don’t Know the Words (2017). I consider first its relation to the historical events of the Soweto Uprising of 1976, and then examine its methods of composition. The issue precipitating the Soweto Uprising, when hundreds of black schoolchildren were gunned down by the police, was the refusal of blacks in Soweto to be taught in Afrikaans rather than in their home languages. Their revolt was both tragic and triumphant: tragic because of the sacrifice of young lives, triumphant because it marked Sowetans’ new power to insist on their ownership of language. In the spirit of this linguistic autonomy, Marais celebrates the power of language to create intercultural and intergenerational encounters, scripting dialogue which marries social diversity with linguistic elasticity. In this marriage her writing is strongly consonant with the work of the Russian linguist and philosopher Mikhail Bakhtin, whose text Art and Answerability examines the ethics of writing and helps the reader to piece together the agency of the implied author. Searching for the perspectives of the implied author reveals Marais’s political activism as well as her mastery of dialogue. Her novel belongs to the tradition created by writers in the 1970s and 1980s—when apartheid was in full force—to anticipate a post-apartheid world. Marais’s novel illustrates a political, cultural, and linguistic reinvention through its manipulation of narrative.

The Problem of Term Choice for the Linguistic Description of the Concept of Easy Language

The article describes the options for designating the sociolinguistic concept of Easy Language, which appeared in Europe in the second half of the last century. The concept includes rules and norms on the basis of which modified texts are created. The recipients of the modified texts are readers with cognitive peculiarities. Now the concept has different names: "clear language", "plain language", "easy language", "easy to understand language", "easy reading", "simplified language". The article examines the reasons for the diversity of terms in European countries. The relevance of the problem of choosing terms to describe the concept of an easy language in Russia is also grounded. The author draws attention to the experience of creating adapted texts in the field of teaching Russian as a foreign language. It also analyzes the use of the term "clear language" in Russian linguistics in the sense in which it is used in the international concept of Easy Language. The article gives examples of overcoming terminological diversity: the creation of international reference books and bilingual dictionaries.

Внутренняя форма слова в отечественном языкознании XX-XXI веков: обзор становления и употребления термина

The aim of the study is to identify how, over the past decades, the formation, composition, development of the content of the complex and multifaceted term “internal word form” have taken place, to identify the areas of Russian linguistics in which this notion is being actively elaborated, to present the motivated views of philologists studying the internal word form during the XX-XXI centuries. The scientific novelty of the study lies in the fact that the work presents for the first time a comprehensive analysis of philological concepts that explain the nature of such a unique interdisciplinary phenomenon as the internal word form, and also gives the characteristics of new aspects of studying this category. As a result, it is proved that the comprehension of the above notion took place gradually over a long period within the framework of various scientific areas and in the 21st century has reached a new level of linguistic research and generalizations, including interdisciplinary ones.

«Плакатная война» как актуальное явление протестной коммуникации в Германии

The article presents the results of studying of poster vandalism practices as an actual format of protest communication in Germany in the recent decade. This format has not become an independent object of study In Russian linguistics. A review of works on this issue by European linguists is presented. In view of the social significance of the phenomenon of protest and the need to characterize its new genre varieties, against the backdrop of a shortage of works devoted to poster vandalism as a new creative form of dialogue between authorities and citizens, and the growing interest of linguists in visual texts, this study is relevant and topical. The study is aimed at determining the current trends in the poster war in today's Germany, clarifying the classification of types of poster vandalism according to the semiotic resources used, the type of modification of the initial poster, the degree of dialogue of the initial, reactive posters and the surrounding space. This determines the scientific novelty of the study. The material of the study was a sample from the German-speaking segment of the Internet, publications about the activities of creative protest groups, a satirical political party in Germany. Semiotic and contextual analysis, methods of systematization and classification are used. The results show that the new trends are associated primarily with the desire of the subjects of the poster war to legalize it. Two groups of poster war practices are singled out and characterized: the practice of various material distortion of the initial poster itself and the practice of recontextualization, resemiotization of the initial poster without material distortion of its components. The frequency and dialogic nature of the studied communicative practices, the role of the surrounding space in creating the context of reinterpretation are characterized.

Cognitive-Pagmatic Characteristics of Fiction Text on the Material of D.N. Mamin-Sibiryak’s Short Story “Emelya the Hunter”

The researcher attempts to give the cognitive and pragmatic characteristics of fiction text (based on D.N. Mamin-Sibiryak’s short story “Emelya the Hunter”). The aim of the work was to build the model of the cognitive type on D.N. Mamin-Sibiryak’s short story and analyze speech realizations in the text. The novelty of this article is a detailed cognitive and pragmatic study of the constituent elements, a description of the mental and linguistic structure (cogniotype) and the interpretation of the received results in the studying process of the structural and content side of the text of the short story “Emelya the Hunter”. The material for the study and analysis in this research was not only the theoretical and practical positions of the scientific works of a number of Russian linguists studying the understanding of any text of various genres of fiction works, but also the linguistic material itself: the short story of D.N. Mamin-Sibiryak “Emelya the Hunter” in Russian. To achieve the aim of the research the following tasks were solved: 1) to build the structure of the cognitive type of the short story “Emelya the Hunter”; 2) to find the terms related to various scientific disciplines; 3) to find phraseological units; 4) to systematize adjectives; 5) to give a cognitive and pragmatic description of the studied text. The author of the present article used such methods as: 1) continuous sampling of vocabulary; 2) classification; 3) quantitative calculation; 4) interpretive. D.N. Mamin-Sibiryak’s short story “Emelya the Hunter” was studied from various positions. A model of the cognitive type of D.N. Mamin-Sibiryak’s short story “Emelya the Hunter” was shown in the form of a structure with main topics and their interrelationships. As a result, scientific terms in Geography and Biology were identified and systematized; phraseological units were found and comments were given to them; adjectives were found and classified by types and systematized in the table; the quantitative and percentage ratios of adjectives were calculated and presented in the table and diagrams. The results of the study showed that phraseological units reflected the people’s value priorities in a certain metaphorical form. The relevance of the research was determined by the importance of the chosen topic and its theoretical and practical significance for the cognitive direction in scientific research.

RELIGIOSITY OF SECULAR CENTURY IN THE CULTURE OF MODERNISM

This article considers the problem of religiosity in the context of the culture of modernism. The novelty of this research is connected with the fact that this topic is not yet properly explored in Russian philology. The author of the article refers to the legacy of the most important philosophers and writers of the second half of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. In this article the author investigates the phenomenon called ‘’double religiosity’’. The century of progress and positivism has led to elimination of central role of religion in life, but that resulted in paradoxical doubling of religious feeling. This is evidenced by sacralization of creativity, belief in mystical role of the art, the searching for the absolute through the creative act. All of this things are essential indications of literature of modernism and the works of the principal exponents of modernism such as O. Wilde, G. d’Annunzio, J. Joyce etc.

Экспрессивный синтаксис английского языка: систематический обзор

The aim of this systematic review is to identify the key tasks in the description of expressive syntax constructions by the material of the English language. The article deals with the Russian linguists’ papers written within the framework of the pragmatic-oriented approach and devoted to the classification and functioning of expressive syntactic forms. The scientific novelty consists in an attempt to determine the main problems of the expressive syntax of the English language from purely linguistic positions. As a result, the main research problems in the field of the grammatical description of expressive syntax constructions in the English language have been identified and the ways to solve them have been outlined.

FEATURES OF THE HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL SONG TEXTS TRANSLATION INTO RUSSIAN

The article is aimed at the analysis of the requirements for song translation. We have considered the studies of foreign and Russian linguists on song translation, identified the difficulties that a translator may face, translation solutions, and criteria for song translation. We analyzed the lyrics of the song What I’ve been looking for and its official translation performed by Mikhail Cherepnin and then we discovered whether the translator complied with the requirements or not.
 Background. There is a number of translation solutions and rules that allow achieving adequacy in the translation of musical texts and libretto of musicals. The analysis of M. Cherepnin’s translation is made on the material of the text of the High School Musical musical film.
 Purpose. The article considered the features of the translation of a musical text on the example of the translation of the song What I’ve been looking for performed by M. Cherepnin.
 Materials and methods. The material of the study was the High School Musical film and its official literary translation into Russian. We used the method of selection and analysis of theoretical material, the method of pre-translation, translation, post-translation analysis and comparative method when analyzing the text.
 Results. The results of our study showed that M. Cherepnin faced a lot of obstacles when translating the text of this musical film. His main goal was to preserve the singing component of the text, and not its figurative system, which affected the aesthetic and emotional impact.
 Practical implications. The results of our research can find a wide range of applications: they will be useful both for amateur translators involved in the interpretation of musical works, and for professional translators and linguists actively working in the field of song translation and studying it as a phenomenon.

Словарь речений из богослужебных книг прот. А. И. Невоструева (отеческїй — отужденїе)

The “Dictionary of Locutions from Liturgical Books” by Protopriest A. Nevostruev, completed in the middle of the 19th century and never published, can be regarded both as a significant achievement of Church Slavonic studies and as a valuable lexicographic source. The manuscript is kept in the Russian State Library. The decrepit state of the manuscript has determined the necessity of its urgent study and edition. The significance of this project is primarily due to the fact that the text of the dictionary is being made accessible to linguists for the first time. The orthography and grammar of the dictionary reflect the linguistic views of the time of its creation and can be of interest for those who study the history of Russian linguistics. This paper contains the next part of dictionary entries beginning in letter O. The characteristic features of the publication of this Dictionary, the lists of sources, abbreviations and symbols were described in detail in the previous issues of St. Tikhon’s University Review. All previously published parts of the Dictionary together with the critical apparatus can be found at the website of St. Tikhon’s University for the Humanities

Семантические комплексы в российской антропологической лингвистике: смысловые единства и их составляющие

The author examines the notions of semantic binary complexes in Russian anthropological linguistics (linguoculturology) and counter-meanings (anti-concepts) of the highest level of abstractness “unhappiness”, “injustice” and “ungratefulness.” These notions have not yet been given due attention. There is a lack of unity of opinion regarding the essence of the contrasting members of the binomial and regarding the understanding of meaning and antithesis, where there are two main points of view: 1) the anti-concept opposes the concept on any basis; 2) the basis of the opposition of the concept and the anti-concept is exclusively an axiological feature. It is also established that the most significant difference between unhappiness and happiness is the greater specificity of the first, which at the linguistic level is manifested in the ability of the lexeme “neschastje” to take a plural form, which is impossible for “schastje”. If justice is an example of an abstract category, then its “antipode” – injustice is quite concrete: this is a certain state of affairs. Psychologically, injustice is ahead of justice in time of formation, and if for the abstract name “spravedlivost” the plural is a deviation from the norm, then the concreteness of the name “nespravedlivost” is evidenced by the ease with which it takes the form of the plural. The “nominative density” of lexical indicators of gratitude is not particularly high, but it certainly takes place. At the same time, ingratitude has no other means of expression other than those derived from the stem “nespravedliv-“. In the semantics of ingratitude, there are just as many, if not more, characteristics that are not associated with antonymic features common with gratitude. Thus, it can be argued that, psychologically, the formation of opposing pairs of higher-level concepts begins with a more specific negative counterterm, at the same time, the nominative density of the means of expressing the anti-concept does not necessarily exceed the nominative density of the concept.

К вопросу об экспериментальном описании семантики языковых единиц

The article discusses the levels of description of the meaning of a word, among which a psycholinguistic description is singled out, made on the basis of the results of psycholinguistic experiments. The author points out the merits and advantages of the experimental technique, dwelling on the essential points of its application. The psycholinguistic meaning of a word is described as a set of semantic components identified through special processing of experimental results, which are the reactions of native speakers to stimulus words as a reflection of their linguistic consciousness. On specific examples, the article shows the methods of sememе and seme interpretation of the linguistic material obtained in the course of psycholinguistic experiments. The possibilities of this technique are considered and theoretically substantiated when fixing the connotative macro-component of the meaning. The necessity of a comprehensive integrated approach to the description of the semantics of a word, including a generalized lexicographic description, the results of contextual analysis and psycholinguistic experiments, is emphasized. In this case, much attention should be paid to the field approach to the semantic structure of word meanings, since in traditional explanatory dictionaries the arrangement of word meanings does not always correspond to the semantic core-periphery principle. Accounting for quantitative indicators that mark the brightness and, accordingly, a high level of communicative relevance of the associative reactions of the participants in the experiments, is essential for the implementation of the field structuring of semantemes and sememes. The article notes the invaluable contribution of the scientific and theoretical school of Voronezh State University in the field of general and Russian linguistics and personally I.A. Sternin in the development of the theoretical foundations of the psycholinguistic description of the meaning of the word. This direction has been applied in the form of a whole series of “Psycholinguistic explanatory dictionaries of the Russian language” published under the editorship and with the direct participation of the well-known linguist, which contributes to the further progress of psycholinguistic lexicography.

PROPER-LEXICAL DIALECTISMS IN THE LEFT-BANK DIALECTS OF THE HILL MARI DIALECT OF THE MARI LANGUAGE

In the article, on the material of the Ozerki, Arda and Yuksar dialects of the Hill Mari dialect of the Mari language, proper lexical dialectisms are considered. The dialect words are compared with the vocabulary of the Mari literary language and the right-bank dialects of the Hill Mari dialect. Despite the fact that in the 60's, 70's and early 90's of the 20th century, a lot of work has been done to study the lexical richness of left-bank dialects, their current state remains unexplored. This determines the relevance of this work. The study summarizes the new factual material collected by the author of the article in the field. As an additional source, we used dialectological materials of the first- and second-year students of the Department of Russian Philology of the Russian-Hill Mari group of the history and philology faculty of the Mari State University and also the data presented in the works of A.A. Savatkova and L.I. Khlebnikova. The analysis of the material shows that in the studied dialects there are such lexemes that in the right-bank dialects and in the Hill Mari literary language either went out of active use or were replaced by foreign language units. In the Ozerki, Arda and Yuksar dialects, words are quite active, which in the modern literary language and in the speech of the current generation of Hill Maris of the Volga River’ right bank are at the stage of transition to a passive vocabulary.

Margarita N. Kozhina’s Way in Language Studies

This article presents a scholarly biography of Margarita Kozhina (1925–2012), the founder of the well-known Perm School of Stylistics and professor at Perm State University. She developed the theory of functional stylistics, which revealed and described the regularities of stylistic differentiation in literary Russian. In the early 1960s, Kozhina was one of the first researchers in Russian linguistics to study issues of language functioning and form a new scholarly direction, namely speech studies. Based on an interdisciplinary approach, she defined the main categories of functional stylistics. The latter was regarded as the most important component of speech studies. Kozhina’s papers organically entered the episteme of the second half of the twentieth and early twentyfirst centuries. They marked the turn of linguistics from the system-structural paradigm of studying language to the functional one. Kozhina developed the stylistic-statistical method of speech analysis. A statistical survey of the linguistic side of functional styles allowed her to make conclusions about the interaction of linguistic and extra-linguistic factors in speech. Kozhina authored more than 200 scholarly publications, including 8 monographs and the first Russian textbook on Russian-language stylistics. She was a member of the International Committee of Slavists and the editorial boards of several scholarly journals, including Stylistyka (Poland) and Styl (Serbia). The article describes Kozhina both as a prominent theorist and a remarkable organiser of scholarship. She initiated 20 collections of academic works on stylistics, some international conferences, a three-volume collective monograph on the history of Russian scholarly style from the eighteenth to the twentieth centuries, and the first Stylistic Encyclopaedic Dictionary of the Russian Language (a compendium of knowledge on functional stylistics). The author describes Margarita Kozhina as a talented researcher and an unusually strong personality, who managed, having overcome dramatic circumstances, to make an important contribution to European studies of language.

КАТЕГОРИЯ КРАЙНОСТИ В ЛИНГВИСТИЧЕСКОЙ РУСИСТИКЕ: АНАЛИТИЧЕСКИЙ ОБЗОР

There are no scientific papers devoted to the special research of the functional-semantic category of extreme in Russian linguistic studies, it is only mentioned in passing in some scientific works. This article presents an analytical review of the study of the semantics of extreme in Russian linguistics: for the first time, the author has revealed and systematized the points of view of linguists of the XX-XXI centuries on the problem of the existence of means of expressing the functional-semantic category of extreme, which is considered significant and relevant for the Russian mentality and Russian linguoculture. It is revealed that multilevel language units can transmit the semantics of extreme. The systematization of the obtained data leads the author to the conclusion that some particles, pronouns, conjunctions, phraseological units, as well as combinations of some lexical units are able to express the functional and semantic category of extreme.

M. V. Lomonosov’s Phonetic Terminology in German Translations (Exemplified by the Material of “Russian Grammar” and Its German Translation)

The article concerns the study of M. V. Lomonosov’s “Russian Grammar” sections which describe the phonetic structure of the Russian language, including segmental and suprasegmental levels, as well as the corresponding paragraphs in the German translation of this grammar made by Johann Stavenhagen in 1764. The main purpose of studying these text sources is selection of phonetic terminology used by Lomonosov and its comparison with German terminology in the structural and semantic perspective to establish conformity between Stavenhagen’s translation solutions and the author’s intentions in the terminological sphere. The relevance of the work is determined by the fact that at present there are practically no comparative studies devoted to the study of Lomonosov’s grammar and its translation into German in terms of parallel text metalanguage. Russian linguists have mostly focused on the original Russian text published in 1755, plenty of publications being concerned with its description and analysis, as well as with the historical and linguistic aspect of the German version of Lomonosov’s grammar design. The main research methods are those of vocabulary structural, semantic, definitional, and comparative types of analysis. While studying the selected Russian vocabulary, we have identified five thematically different terminological groups: 1) terms characterizing the suprasegmental level of utterance (intonation and prosody), 2) terms nominating articulation organs, 3) terms used to classify vowels and consonants, 4) terms of graphics and orthography, 5) units of articulation. Terminological units found in previous grammatical publications make up its main part. The author’s terminology, introduced for scientific use by Lomonosov himself appear to be a smaller part of the selected vocabulary. When translating the “Russian Grammar”, Stavenhagen primarily resorted to literal translation of phonetic terms employed by Lomonosov, and in some cases to a descriptive way of conveying the semantics of certain Russian terms in accordance with the norms of the German language of that time. A terminological comparative analysis allows identifying a number of orthographic and morphological doublets in the Russian and German phonetic terminological systems. The use of doublets agrees with the author’s and translator’s wish to make a grammar text more understandable to the reader.

Who are you, Mr. Russian preposition?

In this article, a portrait of Russian prepositions as a part of speech is presented. The analysis of grammars and dictionaries has shown that there is no certain list of Russian prepositions and that the image of this part of speech is quite blurry. The author reveals the main “prepositional” blank spots for Russian linguistics: the fast growth of preposition-like units, the lack of objective criteria to separate prepositions and non-prepositions, and a disputable academic (traditional) classification of prepositions. Some feasible solutions for overcoming these research difficulties are suggested, such as the use of descriptive terms and a notion of field, revision of syncategorematic parts of speech and prepositional classifications, as well as searching for reliable tests for membership in prepositions.

DİLBİLİM TARİHİ BAĞLAMINDA RUS DİLBİLİMİN GELİŞİM SÜRECİ

Development of linguistics has gone through various stages until it became an independent science. The universal structure of the language, as well as the features that distinguish it from other languages, form the basis of linguistic research. Linguistics researchers have different views and fields of study on this basis. Throughout the history of linguistics, research on language and the methods used by these researches have led to the emergence of different schools. Scientists who were influenced from each others, used the same methods in the language they studied and from time to time they contributed to the expansion of linguistics by adding on these methods and studies. Similar processes exist for linguistic studies in Russia. Russian linguists, who are followers of the studies in the field of linguistics, have been the founders of new movements and schools, while operating on a similar level to the studies of other scientists. In the beginning, dictionary studies and research in the field of dictionary and grammar studies have evolved into evaluation of nature of language, comparison of languages, evaluating historical aspects, social and spiritual aspects of language. The intensity of studies in the field of linguistics in Russia increased gradually in the 19th century and formed the basis for 20th-century linguistic studies. Russian linguists who carried out their studies in the 19th-century both influenced their contemporaries and became a guided 20th-century linguists. In this respect, the aim of the study is to examine the developmental stages of linguistics in Russia based on the history of linguistics and to reveal these stages in general terms. In addition, the studies of Russian linguists and the development of Russian linguistics in the historical process are mentioned.

‘Nordicity’, ‘Imagined North’ or ‘Concept Sphere of Arctic Discourse’?

The relevance of the study is due to the fact that the Arctic is a unique northern territory of the globe, interest in which has recently increased due to geopolitical reasons, its natural resources and the cultural diversity of the peoples inhabiting it. The question of the content of the terms ‘Nordicity’, ‘imagined / imagination of the North’ in the works of foreign and Russian scientists in the humanities is raised in the article. It is revealed that these terms are associated with an ensemble of concepts and discourses united by the themes of the North and the Arctic, objectified in cultural texts: both verbal and non-verbal. The hypothesis that these terms are equivalent in content and structure to the term ‘concept sphere of discourse’, adopted in Russian linguistics is substantiated in the article. The novelty of the study is seen in the fact that the definition of the terms ‘Arctic discourse’ and ‘the concept sphere of the Arctic discourse’ is proposed. ‘The Arctic discourse’ is defined as a complex discourse representing a set of cultural texts united both by the Arctic and by a broader northern theme; its sign correlates can be various socio-cultural practices. ‘The concept sphere of Arctic discourse’ is understood as a set of concepts and images in a complex Arctic discourse dedicated to the representation of the Arctic as a geopolitical and geocultural space.

Экспрессивный синтаксис в отечественном языкознании: систематический обзор

The purpose of the systematic review is to identify the main areas in the study of expressive syntax in Russian linguistics. Scientific novelty of the paper lies in the fact that it reviews and systematises the works of Soviet and Russian linguists up to 2021, which are devoted to the syntactic aspect of expressiveness research using the material of Russian and foreign languages. The result of the conducted analysis amounts to defining the main areas and identifying the key tasks of this actively developing branch of syntactic research, determining the most discussed expressive syntactic forms, as well as describing the methodology of their research.