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The paper deals with a pre-logical communication contrasted to verbal interaction founded on logical grounds. The material for the study includes archaic incantations, modern superstitions and poetic texts. The methods of interpretative and intentional analysis have been applied. A pre-logical communication is based on the establishment of relations between objects or events devoid of cause-and-effect relationship in reality. Such conceptualization has been described, explained and terminologically fixed as participation by L. Lévy-Bruhl. It is characteristic of a magic worldview which historically precedes logical reality, but remains up to now in certain types of discourse. Psychologically, such explanation is a biased generalization of accidental connection between things. However, such illogical reality representation has a right to exist as it helps people explain the unexplainable. Semiotically it corresponds to transaction of iconic signs to signals or indices. Three types of pre-logical explanation of events in everyday life have been described in this paper, i.e. diagnostic, prognostic and magical. A pre-logical communication in literary discourse may be understood as a demonstration of universal interconnection of things and events making a whole worldview. This interconnection is based on multiple associations and intertextual allusions. Three types of pre-logical worldview may be singled out as creative, metaphoric and intertextual multiplication of reality. A deliberate usage of pre-logical communication in scientific, pedagogical, legal and political types of discourse may be qualified as a manipulative influence, whereas when used in everyday, advertising, recreational and artistic communication it is determined by the intention to broaden the limits of a routine existence.

The paper presents a theoretical substantiation of the concept of «discourse» as the most important ontological category in contemporary linguistics. It further explains the semantic evolution of the concept of «discourse» from philosophical scholasticism to modern humanitarian knowledge. The essence of the notion of «discourse» is unveiled through a number of fundamental oppositions in the ontology of the object of linguistics (the language), with the opposition of system and phenomenon, considered as the two sides of the ontology of language, being the most important of them. In each of its sides, the object strives to achieve ontological integrity. Systemic integrity is opposed to the phenomenological totality of language, which is what the notion of «discourse» is about. Systemic integrity in its material aspect relies on a certain sum of elements that are in structural relation to each other and create the structure of language. The discursive integrity of language in its material aspect is based on a speech fact (a word in its speech status, an utterance, a text), which stands in an interpretive relation to (an)other speech fact(s). An intertextual connection arises between speech facts; one fact follows another in a linear-historical sequence. The sum of speech facts constitutes the wholeness of expressive extent of discourse. In its ideal aspect, integrity is subject to the effects of certain semantic constants. As far as the systemic integrity of language is concerned, such a constant is a linguistic function (cognitive, communicative). In its phenomenological integrity, language is governed by the concept, which is the highest semantic setting of discourse, being the intuition of discourse. The two dimensions of integrity are inextricably linked, and complement each other in the general ontology of language. Combining a set of activity-based and sociocultural approaches to language studies, the contemporary paradigm in the development of linguistics can be characterized as phenomenological. The paper is intended for specialists in the field of general theory of language, and history of linguistics.

In this paper we have analysed a graphic novel “Maus. A survivor tale” by Art Spiegelman as well as some variants of its translations in the framework of theory of multimodal discourse analysis (ADM) (O`Halloran). The article focuses on analysing the corpus of investigation on its language and nonlanguage level. The aim of the research is to explain in terms of the multimodal discourse analysis theory of main principles of graphic novel translation while observing the way of source language graphic novel transmutation and reconstructing its architecture in the target novel. The methods having been applied in the present paper are those of linguistic observation and description, empiric comparison of translation variants and translation results analysis using ADM tools. Applying methods of ADM in the process of analysing graphic novel results from the necessity to respond to the main challenges of ADM theory for the studies in theory and practice of translation, as well as semiotics and general linguistics. The objectives of the article are to outline the iconic-textual structure of the graphic novel under the analysis, to characterise the visual level of the investigated graphic novel, to generalise arising problems to the translator. The concept of multimodality derived from semiotics is being studied in the article explaining the reason for applying the multimodal approach in the study of the graphic novel. Modalities represented in the graphic novel on non-language level are systematised through different types of multimodal phenomena and their relevance for target text meanings transcreation is described. Both visual and language modalities, which are important for the construction of the meaning, are focused attention to and the multimodal phenomena are piled and systematised in the article. The relationship between the visual and written modalities are discussed and the role and importance for the translation process are explained. Until now there are different investigations of the Maus, but there is no investigation from the multimodal perspective. The investigators focuse on the discursive and pragmatic part, as well as on the expressive value of the work, compare the characteristics of the translation; draw attention to the problems of the literary style of the work Maus; study the role of images in the creation of the work. However, there is still no study of graphic novels from the perspective of multimodal discourse analysis. By means of a series of operations of translation techniques the original text is reconstructed in the translation variant. It involves compressing or widening of the original text, removing inconsistencies between different modalities, reinterpreting “language shell” so that a semiotic content could be preserved and the author’s message transmitted without corruption, for that redrawing some characters or chapters, removing, or replacing some visual symbols with different ones. Illustrative material shows a certain logic scheme to follow the process of translation taking into consideration different multimodal phenomena, as well as the absence of some of its constituents. On the one hand, extralinguistic objects engraved in pictures of the graphic novel may present the reason for the translation technique of addition, and on the other hand the absence of some details in the pictures may justify the translation technique of omission. Evaluating functional types of multimodal phenomena also may lead one to adequate selection of synonyms or a phrase to choose in a process of translation having as a “guide” visual image supporting language level of a graphic novel. The term “graphic novel” is specified as well as the difference between terms “comic” and “graphic novel” is outlined. Graphic novel format is proved to assimilate to the literary novel with the content of memoirs, autobiography, history, documentary reports etc. Maus is the first graphic novel dealing with Holocaust theme aimed at the adult audience. According to the definition of the graphic novel, Maus is seen to share discursive mechanisms with visual narrative instruments, embedded in multimodal phenomena. The types of multimodal phenomena are selected in the present investigation and grouped with illustrative examples taken from the corpus. In the framework of ADM theory, the selection of translation techniques and operations are justified, and the reasons for certain translation variants are explained. As it is shown in the paper, graphic novel translation differs from literal one. The most important characteristics of graphic novel translation distinguishing this genre of literature have been outlined: 1) the graphic novel translation unit obligatory consists of both verbal and visual parts; 2) the intonation of the characters of the graphic novel is a part of a style and is taken into consideration in the course of translation; 3) visual part of the graphic novel is presented by multimodal phenomena that influence the strategies of translation. General recommendations for the translation of the historic graphic novel have been given, mainly: 1) for the purpose of collecting information from the visual part. It is recommended to read and discover the entire content of the novel before starting the translation, paying attention to the multimodal phenomena and their types mentioned in this article. Attention is paid to past events, other extralinguistic meaningful objects. An individual language style is translated with the same style and is maintained throughout the text; 2) on the language level, it is recommended to choose at least the sentence as the minimum translation unit of the graphic novel using substitution techniques within the unit as long as the final sentence reflects the same message. However, the largest translation unit can be chosen. Appropriate options are a speech bubble (speech bubbles) or the entire page. Bubbles (speech balloons) often contain colloquial speech, which differs much more between languages than literal text of a book. The ease of colloquial speech is nearly impossible to achieve without the freedom to change the order, composition, and number of sentences. Often, it is not the character-specific phrases that need to be translated, but rather the emotion of outrage or joy, recreating it using the character’s language (such as the speech of the immigrant, the main character, Vladek, or his wife); 3) the use of bold. It is understood that it is not necessary to use bold type in the same units that appear in the original. The most important thing is to convey the same meaning and intonation in the translation avoiding the “word for word” translation; 4) the language style of the author and the characters. The author and the characters of the graphic novel have their own language style, which is part of the meaning. Characters may have their own characteristic expressions and circumstances that explain the choice of phrase translations. After reading the text and visualising the novel, it becomes clearer what type of the target text of the protagonist should be created to remain truthful and sound natural; 5) “Litmus paper”. It is recommended to read the translation after a couple of days without looking at the original text thinking about whether or not the author would choose the same words, style, intonation; 6) Culture references create a certain atmosphere and are translated (6.1) literally as in the example of gefiltefish translation or (6.2) simplification is used the culture in case of translation of the same unit into Russian рыбафиш; 7) translation of anthroponyms and proper names. It is not recommended to translate the proper names of the historical graphic novel taking into account the documentary part of the novel. The same variants of anthroponyms are maintained throughout the text; 8) accuracy is the second priority after avoiding meaning corruption. One should try to preserve accuracy if it is possible, respecting the condition of preserving the meaning without corrupting it. To achieve the effect of equal perception of the novel by the reader both in the original language and in the translation language, two things are needed: understanding what is said in the original text and reconstructing it in the target text. The ADM theory, in this respect, is the tool to achieve the most adequacy and the most accuracy at the same time.

This paper discusses the role of the societal discourse in the construction of breastfeeding practices. It argues that societal discourse is crucial to the constitution of those practices, and that understanding the underlying circumstances of the breastfeeding situation anywhere in the world requires looking not only at the social reality itself but at the discourse that represents, reflects and constructs it. Proposing Armenia as a study case, the paper outlines the various sources of modern discursive practices around the feeding of children in Armenia, including pre-industrial customs, soviet political ideology, and modern Western values. Doing so, it proposes a new approach to studying breastfeeding practices through the prism of various discursive influences.

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Purpose. The paper aims at discovering stylistic and grammatical peculiarities in tourism discourse based on VisitBritain.com text corpus; analyzing its application scope and mission; specifying “tourism discourse” as a notion. Methodology. Used in the paper are general scientific methods (synthesis, generalization), analysis of the text corpus, method of linguistic analysis. Results. The issue of tourism discourse as a separate unit, not a subtype of advertising discourse, remains highly disputable nowadays. The present paper analyses the theoretical basis of notions of “discourse” and “tourism discourse”; determines the levels and communication means in tourism; substantiates the hypothesis on multi-component and multi-modal structure of tourism discourse as a linguistic phenomenon. In the practical part of the research, the author draws special attention to the specifics of the English tourism discourse in terms of typology, lexicology and morphology. The paper concludes by saying that tourism discourse is different from advertising one as well as requires further investigation into the issue. Practical implications. The results presented in the article can be used both in theory and applications, i.e., further inquiry into the pragmatic constituent of tourism discourse and its interdisciplinarity; compilation of corpora of tourist texts in the English language; adaptation of the English tourism discourse for present-day realities and addressees’ demands.

The term system of cognitive linguistics is formed from different areas of knowledge and discursive practices. These terms are usually of English origin. But this system also includes Russian-language words of a commonly used nature, which, as a result of systemthesaurus connections with other terms in scientific communication, acquire the status of a cognitive term. The paper discusses the methodological foundations for understanding these integration processes, which is possible only when considering a system of terms as a form of explication of knowledge at the mental and linguistic levels. The nationwide existence of Russian-language words, possible shades of meaning, which allowed such lexemes to move into a group of terms and replenish the cognitive terminological system, are analyzed. The object of analysis is the original Russian lexemes knowledge and consciousness. The subject of analysis is the components of semantics that have become the basis of the terminological meaning of the indicated lexemes; new systemic connections that arose in the words knowledge and consciousness already as in terms of Russian origin when entering the cognitive terminological system: synonymous, antonymic, hyper- and hyponymic, derivational-epidigmatic. Observation of the functioning of the lexemes knowledge and consciousness in popular and scientific discourses, as well as analysis of the interpretation of these terms in scientific discourse, made it possible to clarify the process of terminology of the commonly used vocabulary of the Russian language. The paper presents the results of using corpus and software tools for modeling the functionality of this knowledge format. The collected information is supported by the results of an associative experiment to verify the data sources obtained through automatic processing. The revealed frequency and specificity of the use of cognitive terms on modern material will allow us to draw meaningful conclusions about a qualitatively new state of cognitive terminology.

The article aims to study the poetics evolution of a great Polish poet and prose writer, Nobel prize winner Czesław Miłosz towards a fundamentally new comprehensive literary form: from “Piesek Przydrożny” (“Roadside Dog” 1997) to “Abecadło” (“Milosz`s ABC`s” 1997) and “Inne Abecadło” (“A Further Alphabet” 1998). The purpose stimulates the usage of the analytical, hermeneutics and receptive methodology, as well as textual analysis. It is stressed that the years of this work publication indicate the writerєі success in his determined search for a form that would be capable, containing immense life material, countless events, lives and artistic-philosophical reflections, to create the picture of the 20th century. The paper highlights why “Piesek Przydrożny” does not meet any requirements for containing the unlimited number of life facts within a text. We’ve noted the organizing function of Piesek in the system of a fictional unity. Moving freely, Piesek made it possible for Miłosz to create a certain series of philosophical pieces (“Ubóstwo wyobraźni”, “Wzniosłość”, “Pieśń dziadowsku”, “Со upadek”, “Powieść”, “Gombrowicz”, “Polski literat”) and several tragic essays – “Ojcowskie kłopoty”, “Zmartwienia historyka” and others. It is proven that while the form of this book contains a variety of material, it still cannot give Miłosz the absolute freedom he was striving for. The writer was determined to find the form which would, according to him, “allow for much freedom”, “not pursue beauty but just register facts”. Considering Е. Brazgovskaya’s findings, the productivity of the alphabet (аbecadło) is proved. The paper expresses the idea that one can treat the alphabet (аbecadło) as a kind of a memoir genre. The innovative structure of “Abecadło”, consisting of essays-novels, is analyzed. The article traces the associative connections which cement 200 essays into a single entity, creating the image of the epoch.

This article deals with two Russian discourse words: tipa and takoj. The aim of the paper is to investigate and identify the functional similarities and the particular features of each one in their colloquial uses. In particular, we focus on two uses of tipa and takoj as an: a) approximator and b) quotative marker. The investigation is based on the spoken subcorpus of the Russian National Corpus. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Juznoslovenski Filolog is the property of Serbian Academy of Sciences & Arts, Institute for the Serbian Language and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article presents the results of research of the category of persuasiveness in academic linguistic works. Persuasiveness is considered in the present paper as a property of discourse, realized by means of verbal influence on the consciousness of the addressee with the purpose of changing his worldview. The urgency of the study is due to the growing interest of the research community to persuasive potential of discourse and mechanisms of verbal impact on the target audience, as well as the crucial importance of studying tactics and strategies of persuasive impact, aimed at inducing the recipient of information to share the views of the addressee. Analysis of the selected research works has shown that, despite the existence of different approaches to the interpretation of the notion «persuasiveness» and the resulting differences of methodical approaches to the study of the phenomenon, the universal meaning of the concept of «persuasiveness» in the linguistic aspect can be reduced to the idea that persuasiveness can be defined as the manipulative use of special language techniques aimed at strengthening the addressee’s arguments. The purpose of the paper is to identify and systematize the dynamics and research directions of the persuasiveness study. The study was conducted on the basis of theses selected form the «DisserCat» electronic scientific library of theses and abstracts. As a result 118 theses, published during 2000-2021 period, were catalogued and analyzed. The obtained results allowed to consider and generalize various approaches to the study of the persuasiveness, as well as to determine the dynamics and vectors of the interest to the studied phenomenon. The following research methods were used in the paper: targeted sampling, qualitative analysis, quantitative analysis, content analysis, statistical observation and processing of sample texts. Visualization was carried out by using Microsoft Office Excel program. A quantitative and chronological analysis of the selected works allows us to conclude that the interest in studying the realization of the category of persuasiveness is far from losing its relevance; on the contrary, from a prognostic point of view one should expect a significant demand for its research.

The article focuses on linguistic hedging which helps avoid sounding arrogant or too certain of what you state in a research article. The relevance of the theme is based on the fact that nowadays the increasing number of Russian-speaking authors make attempts to publish their research articles in international journals. Writing research papers in the English language should follow some rules adopted in the English communicative culture. One of such rules is using hedging as a means of criticism mitigation and a “saving face” strategy. As hedging is not generally used in the Russian scientific discourse it is necessary to teach Russian scholars to apply hedging techniques in their writing. The aim of the article is to investigate the essence of hedging through analysis of sources written both in English and in Russian. The methods used include examination of Russian and English research papers, their comparative analysis, summing up recommendations on hedging in scientific discourse. As a result, the main lexical means of hedging are pointed out. A conclusion is made on necessity to include teaching linguistic hedging into courses of written academic communication for master degree students and postgraduates.

Background. Over the past thirty years, the concept of “discourse” has been closely integrated into many scientific disciplines, and therefore its determination is complicated. Researchers cannot come to a common opinion regarding this linguistic category. An overview of discourse in a diachronic perspective allows us to explore diverse approaches to its study and identify the most relevant definition of this linguistic term. Purpose. In this paper, an attempt is made to interpret the term discourse by examining it in a diachronic aspect. Materials and methods. The research is based on general scientific methods (generalization, analysis) and a descriptive method. Results. As a result of the analysis of the theoretical material, the authors summarize that there is no generally accepted interpretation of this linguistic category in the linguistic literature. The researchers agree and disagree in some ways, which is reflected in the inconsistency of their opinions. However, the review of scientific papers offered in this study makes it possible to get a summary view of linguists on this issue. Summarizing the data gained, the authors give their interpretation of the concept of “discourse”. Moreover, the authors come to the conclusion that a wide range of scientific applications of the term and the vector of scientific integration that is gaining popularity makes a significant contribution to the development of discourse theory as an interdisciplinary field of research. Practical implications. The results of this study can be applied by researchers of scientific discourse, as well as in the preparation of textbooks on academic writing, the style of scientific text.

The paper considers metonymy as a cognitive mechanism widely used in news discourse. Views of different scholars on the concept of metonymy were analyzed in this paper. The problem of metonymy in linguistics is associated with two functions: 1) as a means of creating artistic speech; 2) as a means of nomination. The second part of the paper deals with different trends of metonymic transfer: psychological, logical and semiotic. In the third part, different classifications on the types of metonymic transfer are given. Finally, the fourth part of the paper considers the cognitive approach to metonymic study. The cognitive mechanism of conceptual metonymy operates within a single conceptual domain, one element replacing another. The replacement element is called a vehicle. It opens up access to another conceptual structure called the concept target within a single conceptual domain at the mental level. In news discourse, metonymy is used to express a concept economically. A shift in focus in metonymic nomination creates a positive or negative assessment, distortion of information, and depersonalization of individual referents to influence the reader. Thus, metonymy has a referential function, i. e. it allows one entity to replace another. But metonymy is not only a referential device. It also serves to understand.

Cross-Сultural communication cannot exist without interaction, both oral and written. One of the types of written communication is epistolary text. This paper considers one kind of epistolary texts, the so-called ‘dead letter’, i.e. a letter which cannot be delivered to the recipient because this person does not exist. The author introduces the term ‘phantom letter’ since a corresponding term has not been found in the Russian language, besides the existing English term ‘dead letter’ does not fully reveal the phenomenon under discussion. The materials of the article are 14 personal letters and 24 literary texts in the English language belonging to the cultures of Ancient Egypt, the USA, Great Britain and Israel. The methodology of the research is based on the discourse analysis of the personal and fiction discourses. The following types of ‘phantom letters’ have been studied: letters to the dead, letters to the future generations and literary texts which are letters to some famous historical or fictional characters. Special attention is paid to various reasons why people have been writing such epistolary texts: the writer may do it on practical grounds, as a form of trauma counselling and/or resurrecting the loved one or information. As for the literary texts, the author’s aim is to create a humorous effect since all these letters are parodies. Chronotope is also considered, which is especially important in letters to the dead and letters to the future. Discourse formulas typical for some types of phantom letters have been analyzed. The last part of the paper deals with precedent texts, because understanding of fictional dead letters is drawn entirely from the knowledge of precedent. The conclusion states that there are various types of phantom letters in various cultures, they are normally personal and they are written for various reasons, however, they possess common features. Some prospects for further study in this area are also outlined.

Based on the authors’ experience in analyzing and interpreting Russian works of art in a Slovak university, the paper identifies some of the difficulties that arise in the process of teaching Russian literature, culture and the Russian language. The conducted research pays attention to the discursive factors of the study of works of fiction, while relying on the theoretical foundations of the world-famous researchers of discourse. First of all, the authors focus on five codes highlighted by one of the representatives of structuralism and poststructuralism, the French philosopher, literary critic, esthetician and semioticist – R. Bart. Deciphering individual codes of literary works can motivate students of the Russian language and literature to read independently, which develops their critical thinking, broadens the horizons of knowledge, and also contributes to their professional and personal growth. In classes on the interpretation of texts of fiction in the framework of teaching Russian as a foreign language, various difficulties are often encountered, in particular, with the decoding of the named codes. The purpose of this paper is to comment on these difficulties, highlight the factors associated with the interpretation of the elements of literary discourse, and also offer some solutions which teachers can implement to help Slovak students studying Russian as a foreign language get rid of these difficulties. The article can become an incentive for further observations in this area, contribute to an increase in the effectiveness of teaching Russian literature of the 18th – 21st centuries in Slovak universities.

The paper dwells upon the study of logos as one of the sources of communicative pressure destructiveness. The paper considers peculiarities of realizing logos conflictogenes in various types of discourse: legal, socio-political and artistic. The material for the study is represented by transcripts of the lawyers’ speeches in the courtroom, transcripts of the politicians’ speeches in the parliament and socio-political talk shows, interviews, as well as excerpts from the works of art. With the language norm adopted as a speech standard, it is proposed to single out argumentation as an individual non-rhetorical type of persuasion. Rhetorical types of persuasion distinguish between speech persuasion as a cooperative type and communicative pressure as a confrontational type. Introduction of conflictogenes into one or more components of the speech model qualifies the speech persuasion as communicative pressure. A logos conflictogene is represented by an illogical statement caused by violation of the laws of formal logic. It is concluded that conflictogenes can perform their primary and secondary functions on the basis of which their possible combinations in the communicative pressure speech model are presented. The paper establishes the primary nature of logos conflictogenes. Moreover, their implementation in the speech model leads to the formation of secondary conflictogenes in the ethos. Although logos conflictogenes can realize the primary source of communicative pressure confrontation, most often they are accompanied by primary conflictogenes of the other components in the speech model. As a rule, it is stipulated by the lack of valid arguments which makes the addresser intensify speech persuasion by appealing to the emotional sphere of the addressee’s consciousness. Logos conflictogenes realizing communicative pressure should be distinguished from communicative errors, which are of an accidental unintentional nature and do not serve the pragmatic goal of the statement.

Introduction. The area of intercultural communication with its system-forming theory, empirical research and implementation is gaining currency both in academic research and in the professional training of students. Regarding the latter aspect, there is a need (a) for developing a concept for the training of master’s students with knowledge of foreign languages; (b) for the introduction of new educational practices that successfully combine intercultural communication, foreign language and the modeling of communicative behavior in foreign language communication with its further reproduction in language practice in the students’ native language as well as (c) for the introduction of an educational project using modern technologies in the practice of institutions of higher education. The paper discusses the concept, structure and content of an educational project relying on the experience of higher education in Russia and Germany and aims to work towards an understanding of the social significance of future professional activities, primarily concerning the specific problems as well as of the adequacy of social and professional contacts in intercultural communication. Materials and Methods. Based on the subject, object and objectives of the study, the project’s methodological plan was implemented in the following stages: project planning, development of the fundamental features of the concept; determination of the project’s content; project modeling; introduction to the training of master’s students of various specialties at institutions of higher education. The methodological basis of the project consisted of the analysis of intercultural communication between representatives of the German and the Russian linguocultural community as well as the exchange of experience between them and their comparison. Results. Following the study and the exchange of experience between the institutions of higher education of Russia and Germany, the need for an integrative educational course was revealed, aiming at the improvement and optimization of intercultural communication skills at the level of both professional and personal communication with the goal to prepare master’s students for their future as researchers and practitioners. The educational project presented in the paper drawing on an eponymous integrative course will increase the efficiency of the training of master’s students from various specialized fields and prepare them for successful communication processes with representatives of other linguocultural communities. Discussion and Conclusion. The contents of this paper will be useful for researchers interested in optimizing the preparation of master’s students with knowledge in foreign languages by applying international experience.

The concept of frontier has been formed for a long time and in different directions. The main characteristics of a frontier - its flexible borders, a zone of space development characterised by uncertainty and instability - have proved their importance for understanding and describing the current state of the environment with regard to its social, cultural, communicative and linguistic indicators. The interdisciplinary (transcendental) potential of a frontier is realised in a complementary combination of natural-scientific and humanitarian scholarship. The aim of the present paper is to justify the scholarly integrity of the term frontier discourse the conceptual milieu of which is created through two overlapping multi-layered phenomena: frontier and discourse. The paper names the vectors of expanding the interdisciplinary possibilities of a frontier under the conditions of a discourse approach. Frontier as a flexible border is presented in the Internet communication, the socio-cultural space of the modern city, in the daily behavioural norms of the elite, in the family relations and in many other conceptual spheres the list of which remains open based on the ontological features of a frontier. Based on the examples from Russian and foreign literature, the author demonstrates the role of the frontier modus in the interpretation of literary texts whose plot, style and images are projected onto national history, culture, mentality in the by-border characteristics. Such frontier features as instability, its ability to create an interaction zone, which, under certain conditions, can lead to integration, are important for understanding the problems of modern language, speech and genre norms. The byborder territory is a place accumulating violations of traditional norms and providing the material which is necessary in order to anticipate the arising norm changes. The transformation of traditional genres and the formation of new ones also take place on frontier territories. It is concluded that frontier discourse ensures the understanding of norm movements in genre-stylistic characteristics.

This paper explores one of the central issues of current international discourse : how is world order sustained and maintained, is it shifting and changing, is it being reinvented and reimagined, or are we on the cusp of global disorder and competition among great and small powers? The conventional lens used to examine these questions is that of ‘hegemony’ or ‘dominance.’ This paper discusses how hegemony is conceptualized, what kinds of resources are mobilized (material, discursive, institutional, and performative) in maintaining hegemony, and what the current chessboard of geopolitics looks like in terms of rising and falling powers. Despite a chaotic picture of the train derailed there is also an optimistic end of that story. First we are moving from a unipolar to the polycentric world. Secondly that new world will be less dramatically divided as it will be based on macro-regional arrangements. Thirdly multi-regional arrangements will be closer civilizationally and thus less prone to conflicts. Finally - in order to survive - most probably they will voluntarily keep close ties with other macro-regiond making the system more stable that today.

This research paper presents results of the two years study aimed at eliciting gender segregation among the teaching school personnel in the schools of St. Petersburg. The topic is being elaborated through the lens of the education relationships stakeholders (teachers, parents, learners, school management) own views on the problem. Paper shows that the views of the respondents depend on their age, gender and position in school. The most gender-dependent respondents are pedagogues older than 40 and administration staff. Male teachers are more prone to emphasize gender differences than their female colleagues, whereas high school students’ involvement in the subject learning and their perceptions of the teaching style are not anyhow connected with the gender of the teacher. However, high school students' parents prefer to hire men as private tutors, just as the primary scholars' parents opt for female teachers against their male colleagues.The authors conclude that teachers in St. Petersburg schools don’t identify gender segregation as an apparent problem, as well as the whole system doesn’t struggle with the gender imbalance and gender roles differences.

The proposed research analyzes the external and internal factors that determine the specificity of Solidarity as a community of civil society and driving force of social and cultural changes in Poland. The external factors of these processes are connected with the critical interpretation of social cynicism and ‘Marxist collectivism’ by autonomic group in Polish society. These processes of social corrosion are considered as a social alienation and consequences of social fragmentation in Soviet period. The paper focuses on the danger of collision between national and colonial versions of memory as well as the social challenge of guarantee the possibility of an integral development of man and community. The internal factors actualizes the interpretation of Solidarity as a community of social changes, the positive activities of Catholic church, religious and secular leaders, of their theoretical ideas in the context of evolution of Solidarity from traditional community to modern one based on democratic values, social and economic motivations. The analysis is centered on the theoretical problem of civil trust, and the meaning of cultural, religious, and moral factors in the activities of Solidarity movement. We regard the problematic of Solidarity at the same time from republican and liberal positions. Synthesizing the different approaches to the historical memory, and to the experience of formation and evolution of community, the paper also explores the role and significance of Solidarity in the process of post-soviet values transformation. The article deals with the value prerequisites of moral-normative community in the country of the former socialist camp, the revival of national identity, as well as the elimination of historical contradictions provoked by the communist regime. The study confirms that social changes became possible due to the successful combination of communitarian and liberal foundations of civil society, the elimination of external influences, and achieving autonomy from the Russian and Soviet historical heritage. In the period of Soviet occupation in Poland, throughout two decades a fundamentally important intellectual discourse was formed, which, in spite of the unfavorable political context, became a consolidating and integrating socio-political force that successfully resisted the totalitarian and unifying tendencies of communist regime. Intellectuals, along with the Catholic church, have become a driving force for social change, playing a key role in shaping the social strategy of national development that has changed the social landscape of ‘communist’ Poland.

The monograph discusses the issues of cognitive linguistics, cognitive terminology, linguapragmatics, linguasemiotics and discourse theory. New approaches to the structural and semantic analysis of discourse and terminological systems drawing on the Russian and English language material are considered. The monograph consists of four chapters: “Mediation discourse and PR discourse in the Internet space: some linguistic and pragmatic characteristics”, “The essential characteristic of linguacreativity and the levels of its manifestation in the film discourse”, “The role of colourative terminological elements in the structure and semantics of terminological systems” and “Electronic lexicography and some semantic features of the terminological system of digital photography”. The linguapragmatic characteristics of different types of discourse are given drawing on the material of mediation discourse, PR discourse, and film discourse, the phenomenon of linguacreativity and the levels of its manifestation are described. The paper presents a comprehensive methodological approach to the discourse as a phenomenon, examines the semantic features of terminological units, including their oppositional relations, as well as the specifics of lexicography of terms as one of the ways to order, unify and standardize terminology. The authors use for analysis the terminology systems of botany, zoology, oil and gas production and digital photography in the modern English language. The monograph will be of interest to a wide range of specialists in the fields of cognitive linguistics, discourse theory, and terminology studies.

This article focuses on various trends and linguistic approaches to metaphor studies in Russia (2019-2023). The latter deal with different types of metaphors, process of metaphor formation and the use of metaphors in discourse. The basic methods of investigation include comparative, inductive, generalization and descriptive approaches. The article summarises new results in modern studies of metaphor on data from Slavic, Romance and Germanic languages. In the paper, we show the role of metaphor both as a trope and a cognitive operation in monolingual and comparative studies. Alongside these traditional areas, we discuss the results of metaphor studies in multimodal texts and corpora. Multimodal texts are frequently constructed on the intersection of mental, semiotic and semantic fields. Corpora, which have proved to be a convenient source of recent and reliable data, present another modern sphere of investigation of metaphoric potential in Russian studies. We discuss such important areas of metaphor studies as the interdisciplinary approach, pluralism of methods, critical attitudes to universalism, emphasis on cultural features of communication and discourse, and the blending of rhetorical and cognitive methods.

This special issue explores metaphor across languages, cultures, and discourses, bringing together papers that reflect the diversity and scope of this research area. The aim is to foster discussion and exchange ideas concerning the role of metaphor in conceptualization, persuasion, and the construction of meaning. In this introductory article, we focus on the two main themes: (1) the universality of metaphor versus cultural variations in its usage; (2) the communicative function of metaphor in discourse. Within these main themes, we discuss case studies that highlight specific domains, including universal and cross-cultural variation in metaphor usage, discursive and communicative aspects of metaphor, and multimodal metaphor. In this article, we provide a summary of the contributions of our authors that represent up-to-date research on issues involving metaphor from a wide scope of perspectives and manage to open up a methodological discussion within metaphor studies. Finally, we summarize the main results and suggest a brief avenue for further research.

This paper will illustrate how discourse analysis had been incorporated in Translation Studies. Discourse Analysis originated in Applied Linguistics and refers to the investigation of language in use. Depending on whether the term ‘discourse’ is understood in a narrower or a wider sense, discourse analysis aims at examining the structure and the function of lan­guage in various contexts and/or at revealing patterns of belief and habitual action, as well as social roles and power relations (Critical Discourse Analysis). Since translation can be char­acterised as an act of communication across linguistic and cultural boundaries, with source text and target text representing language in use, concepts and methods of discourse analysis have been found useful for Translation Studies. The paper will provide some examples of such research.

This paper is devoted to basic functional-linguistic analysis of modern English professional and business discourse. The aim of this paper is to look at the phenomenon of modern English professional discourse from a functional-linguistic perspective to discuss key elements of verbal interaction that define rhetorical uniqueness of this type of communication and combine traditions, standards and conventional nature with enough freedom for speakers to express themselves and be creative in composing texts of their own. The author sums up different approaches to the definition of professional communication, singles out and describes major functional features of this type of verbal interaction: goal-setting, functional loading of professional communication, typical participants, chronotopos, forms of verbal behaviour, role and status relations, pragmatic conventions and standardization, etiquette, functional differences between official and semi-official professional discourse, peculiarities of written communication. All the above mentioned functional features of modern English professional discourse impose severe limitations on the speech arsenal available to people. Basic functionallinguistic analysis of discursive fragments reveals what aspects should be further elaborated on in terms of improving the process of strategic planning of speech, selecting proper linguistic means to cause appropriate pragmatic impact on listeners/ readers, work out ways to increase efficiency of rhetoric.

The paper considers semantic categories presented in the ideographic discourse. Research material includes the information retrieval thesauruses reflecting scientific information activities and functional and ideographic dictionaries representing the discourse of training in writing school compositions and the epistolary discourse (letters of Russian writers). The author regards semantic categories as sign units (sign formations) whose content plane is general concepts, and denotation is various language (sign) means forming this general concepts. The article shows that semantic categories, as the result of categorization, reflect properties of the discourse - the functional and communicative field in which it appears, characteristics of the speech subject, character of the relation of the author of the text to its topic and to the addressee, interaction with the language code. The paper discusses the technique of semantic category choice, the formation of their list, their participation in creating the classification schemes of concepts, the opportunities of using ideographic dictionaries to solve linguistic and pedagogical tasks. The article provides the conclusions on the existence and nature of system communications of ideographic semantic categories with such cognitive aspects of the language as a problem situation in word using and understanding, classification of lexical units and concepts, psychology of thinking in language forms, specifics of extralinguistic factors in scientific and language activity in different private discourses.

This paper is dedicated to the study of «stability» ideas existing in the political sphere as one of the key points of official political power discourse. According to the author, the usage of “stability” concept oriented towards various manipulations of the public opinion is compared with the scientific notions expressed in domestic and foreign developments. The paper includes a comprehensive methodological optics: the author offers detailed analysis of the key contemporary concepts of “stability” with detailed presentation of the relevant requirements for the existing political order. The author makes a conclusion about the discrepancy between the meaning of “stability” in the scientific and political spheres. The paper considers such systematical political circumstances as defects in political communication and existing political language (1); political disenfranchisement and reproducing alienation of citizens from their own political rights and ideas about themselves as political actors (2); and as deliberate transformation of quite specific and instrumental discourse of “stability” and “stabilization” into a vague ethical requirement (3). The author assumes that continuing trends in Russian politics (in many ways similar to similar trends in other countries) – such as the gap between the establishment and the rest of society (a); political apathy and even depression of a large part of the population (b); and the ongoing transformation of the information space (c) – are able to exacerbate the problems of the official authoritative discourse with scientific research and even elementary common sense.

The paper provides information to support its title (“Skeptic’s comment…”). The author shares his attitudes towards a new research area of academic writing (AW) and a system of teaching AW. The paper is presented in a form of a dialog between the author and the advocates of AW. In the author’s opinion, these advocates do not answer a number of questions to be asked for including their ideas into the scope of pedagogical knowledge. While admitting the value of analyzing foreign publications on AW, interpreting them and creating a teaching and learning system tailored for our national practice, the author states that the arguments to recognize AW as an independent academic discipline or a new research area are not sufficient. The author supports this idea by a series of speculations expanded in the paper sections to follow. They include doubts about the completeness of methodological arguments (considering the contemporary state of matter in epistemology, attitude towards new type rationality, unique features of cognition in science and humanities, rationale for the relevance of social constructivism for AW, and etc.), and about the insufficient attention towards the contemporary pedagogical methodology. The status of AW is discussed as if sidestepping the national achievements in investigating the language, speech, text (academic), discourse, linguistic and rhetoric conventions, and etc. The skepticism regarding the AW system can also be explained by the fact that the author does not agree with a number of statements denying the figural and publicistic images in an academic style, personal characteristics, opinions, emotional experiences and beliefs; negating the talent, literature expertise and imitation as assistants for academic writing; inferring the impossibility of learning academic writing independently. The author is confused by the insufficient attention towards the investigations on eloquence carried out in the 1980s in our native country (e.g. by S.S. Averintsev, A.K. Avelichev, and etc.); it is clear that the expertise in foreign research does not negate the knowledge about the research in our native country. Through critically analyzing the components of the AW system, the author concludes that AW is to be considered as one of possible technological solutions for the problem of creating a scholarly proper academic text.

The first holophrases of a child’s speech mark the beginning of the development of oral discourse. Various typologies of genres fall mainly into two groups: those that are based on the external criteria (functional-pragmatic, social-pragmatic) towards the text, and those that are based on certain textual traits of the text. Mastering oral discourse also means mastering its genre forms. Children with primary developmental language disorder usually face difficulties in generating discourse text. Their oral discourse acquisition processes are not well studied yet; information regarding Russian-speaking children is particularly lacking. The aim of this paper is to discuss the dynamics of mastering various genres (narrative, description, expository discourse, and instruction) of oral discourse of preschool children with primary developmental language disorder compared with their typically developing peers. To design a situation of natural communication for the subjects and to elicit their personal discourse, an experimental methodology of Simulating a Conversation with a Peer was developed. The study involved 20 children aged 4-5 years with primary developmental language disorder and 12 typically developing peers. All children were assessed three times with an interval of 3-4 months; each wave of assessment included three meetings. The developed corpus of oral personal discourse was transcribed, annotated morphologically, and submitted to linguo-statistical distributive analysis of discourse passages. In addition, narrative texts were evaluated in terms of the elaboration level of the narrative structure. Statistical analysis evidenced significant between-group differences in the distribution of narrative and expository passages and in the elaboration level of the narrative structure. Dynamic characteristics distinguishing children with primary developmental language disorder from typically developing children were revealed.

The subject of the study is the concept of “politeness” in business communication, its lexical and grammatical ways//means of expression in Russian. Particular attention is paid to the social relationship between interlocutors in a communicative situation. The purpose of the study is to describe the concept of “politeness” and identify its linguocultural features. In accordance with the purpose and objectives of the study, the paper analyzes the features of the implementation of the concept of “politeness” in the system of language functions and considers the strategies of positive and negative politeness in speech behavior in the field of business communication. Based on the analysis of the content of the main functions of language, it was concluded that the category of politeness is realized within the framework of the communicative function of language; The study analyzed the strategies of positive and negative politeness and the peculiarities of its implementation within the framework of private//specific individual communicative functions that correspond to various areas of communication. As a result of the analysis of speech behavior strategies in accordance with the rules of politeness, it was concluded that politeness is an important component of business communication, and speech behavior strategies are based on the difference in the cultural values of a particular society and depend on the models of social behavior adopted in it. If the lines of behavior underlying the first of them are associated with the involvement of the interlocutor in the conversation, paying attention to him, then the second strategy contains lines of behavior associated with the provision of freedom to the interlocutor.

This paper deals with the comparative analysis of the possibility to apply both linguo-cognitive and quantitative methods in the study of structure of mental units, e.g. concepts. The current research continues our overall and integrated study of English ecological discourse and is the next in a number of logical research series of this scientific challenge (Ковалик 2017; Ковалик, Тимочко 2018). The study object of this paper is WATER concept in English water management metadiscourse. The research is carried out on the basis of the original text of the EU Water Framework Directive 2000/60 / EC. The aim of the paper is not only to conduct a frame-based analysis of WATER concept using Svitlana Zhabotynska’s methodology of conceptual analysis (Жаботинська 1999) but also to analyse the concept occurrences in the researchable metadiscourse. In the present investigation, the conceptual structure of WATER concept is modelled through basic frame schemas and is considered as an open system. The research takes a new look at the application of linguo-cognitive and quantitative data analyses in the study of WATER concept in English water management metadiscourse.

The paper presents the results of discourse analysis of bikers’ communication. The authors aim to reveal key axiological values in biker subculture, as well as discovering linguistic features in discourse of this social group and characterizing its members’ identity. The study takes a close look at how values are actualized through their linguistic forms in discourse. The research is innovative in that it attempts to employ discourse analysis in order to explore youth subcultures, specifically biker subculture. The paper offers a literature review focusing on biker subculture and covering some aspects of youth discourse in general. The authors provide a theoretical background for using the category of topos to reveal values in biker subculture. The findings include a list of principal topoi that provide a frame for the construction of bikers’ collective social identity. The authors argue that the social category ‘biker’ is constructed through the topoi of ‘bike’, ‘pleasure’, ‘danger’ and ‘brotherhood’. The conclusion is drawn that the biker is discursively constructed as a person who loves life, respects and appreciates peers, treats riding a bike with all responsibility, but who at the same time takes а risk to get excitement. Linguistic resources used in bikers’ communications are various and embrace lexical units of evaluation, references to feelings and emotions, metaphors, a vast number of jargonisms and elements of folklore.

This paper focuses on studying the peculiarities of the linguocognitive actualization of the concept of ecosophy in language education discourses with an emphasis on its cross-cultural ontology in the English language teaching and learning environments of Argentina, Côte d'Ivoire, the Congo, Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria, Peru, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, Ukraine. On the premise of analysing the multidisciplinary essence of ecosophy as deep ecology philosophy, within the methodological framework of cognitive linguistics, ecolinguistics and linguoculturology, the authors substantiate the status of ecosophy as a universal fundamental conceptual constituent of linguodidactic discourses of the twenty-first century, oriented at biospheric egalitarianism to realize the Sustainable Development Goals formulated by the United Nations as the blueprint to secure a better future. As a result of the conducted psycholinguistic experiment centered around elicitation techniques, such quantitatively dominant culturally universal components of the concept of ecosophy as harmony, resilience, and sustainability, together with the conceptual facets content and level, as the basis of better language education cross-culturally have been revealed. Our further conceptual and linguistic analysis has enabled our construing a multi-dimensional matrix as a representation of the concept researched. The data obtained have proved that the conceptual dimension content comprises the conceptual commonalities social life, economics, politics, peace/war/safety, environment, culture, whereas the dimension level embraces the concepts individual/identity, community, state. The matrix serves as a tool for explicating major conceptual highlights of ecosophy in language instruction discourses across eleven countries, thus perspectively contributing to the development of more efficient, culturally relevant linguodidactic methods and media.

Taking into account Durkheim’s declaration about religion as a base for human solidarity, this article aims to trace the dynamics of those mechanisms that allow religion to play this role in transient conditions. The paper demonstrates how E. Durkheim’s theoretical programme is interpreted by one of his followers, the founder of cultural sociology J. Alexander, and how it is used in cultural and sociological methodology. The paper also draws attention to the fact that J. Alexander remains within the paradigm proposed by E. Durkheim, in which cognitive and social structures correlate and interact; however, at the same time he develops the Weberian approach emphasising an important role of such symbolic systems as language, myth, narrative in the organisation of human experience, behaviour and consciousness. J. Alexander draws on both approaches to the understanding of religion, but redefines religion as a discourse or as a series of narratives that transmits, on the one hand, a certain tradition of describing social reality, and, on the other hand, makes possible for this reality to be rewritten and to acquire a different meaning. The paper demonstrates the relevance of E. Durkheim’s basic assumption about the solidifying role of religion and describes the way how the emphasis on the authorising role of religious practices is gradually moving to the sense-building function of religious narratives.

This paper considers television discourse as a variety of genres. In spite of centrality of the visual image in television, this medium uniquely combines visuality with both oral and written varieties of language. Television thus distinguished from print media by its predominantly aural-oral mode of language use. Therefore, it is natural to make emphasis in the envisaged article on the underestimated aspect of television speech -- its intonation. The present research was directed at ascertaining of the linguistic status of prosody in the broadcast and describing speech prosodic organization of the genres under study. Theoretically, this article draws on the works of D. Crystal and D. Davy, J. Kenyon, L. Shcherba, scholars who laid basis for a phonological school of styles -- phonostyles, and whose important theoretical works were a ground for further detailed examination of phonetic styles of spoken speech. The material for research comprises news reading, comments, interviews of the reporters and correspondents, television journalists and newscasters of the leading Russian television channels RTR, NTV and ORT. The bulk of the experimental analysis constituted the recorded samples of broadcast discourse produced by 30 TV journalists in different genres. The amount of experimental material makes up 10 hours of recorded speech. In view of the aims of the investigation, the experimental material was liable to proven methods of prosodic study: auditive and acoustic analysis. It is expedient to outline the specifics of the television genres by means of the listening analyses of the phoneticians. The valid findings can be gained through the further acoustic analyses undertaken of the recorded sampling, highlighting trustworthy facts. The experimental investigation elicited that prosodic parameters are significant forming means of television genres. It appears that a genre is characterized by a specific combination of the definite prosodic features, which are not typical of the other ones. The melody configuration and its range, loudness, speech tempo, segmentation into short or long intonation groups, sort of pauses, their occurrence and duration, choice of nuclear tones and their location -- all these prosodic properties signal genres differences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the 20th century, international discourse has gradually become a hot topic in the study of political science and international relations, and its impact is especially important in new areas such as space, cyberspace and polar regions, where stable rules and governance system have not yet been developed. In this paper, the influence of international discourse is classified as verbal, structural, institutional and moral. Based on this classification, the increasing influence of India's international discourse on its Arctic policy through its verbal expression, national strength, institutional involvement, and sense of values is examined. The difficulty of developing a strategy in the Arctic is due to the fact that India is not an Arctic country, so there is a cautious attitude of the world community towards it. Northern countries believe that India can use the Arctic for additional natural resources or even political benefit. In addition, there is little coverage of Arctic policy in the Indian media and government activities. Therefore, due to the possible misunderstanding by the international community of India's involvement in the Arctic and the country's weak awareness of Arctic issues, its influence on the international Arctic discourse should be improved in several ways: government officials should participate more actively in international organizations (UN, Arctic Council); the media should fully cover the country's activities in addressing Arctic issues; academically, integration of research, creation of special educational programs should be required, etc. Last but not least, the interests of Arctic Indigenous peoples should be taken into account. The resolution of all these issues can enable India to strengthen its position in the Arctic and increase the country’s potential.

The paper presents an attempt to analyze morality from the position of cognitive linguistics. Morality is an integral part of oral discourse viewed as a way of manifestation of social reality. The purpose of the paper is to identify linguistic representations of moral discourse in the literary works of English writers. According to the authors of this research, moral discourse can be represented by a number of specific characteristics and is a standard regulation method of the activities of people linked in various relationships in society. The paper also mentions the participants in moral discourse. The possibility of selection of actions varieties of the members of moral discourse is not excluded. On the basis of the conducted research work the conclusion about the existence of several ways of expressing moral discourse is made. The authors also distinguish the main functions of moral discourse and believe that this kind of discourse can claim to the status of an autonomous unit.

The article traces the main stages of development of the sociology of education in the West and Russia from inception at the turn of XIX-XX centuries the main theoretical approaches and paradigms till the current state of development of this branch of social science. The authors note that the sociology of education is one of the rapidly developing branches of social science. At the same time, it can be identified problems such as a small number of methodological papers, thematic fragmentation, insufficient theoretical analysis and synthesis, study of pre-school, primary, secondary, vocational training and others. The article notes that in has occurred updating the methodological issues in the sociology of education the last decade and, despite the different assessment of her condition, the researchers agree on the need to find new approaches of theoretical study of the formation, which reflects the process of integration in theory and research methodology of macro processes and everyday life of people. The authors conducted an analysis of scientific publications on this subject, one of whose tasks was to determine the degree of popularity of qualitative and quantitative methods in concrete sociological research education. Despite the presence of a large number of scientific papers devoted to the qualitative methodology of sociological research in general in the Russian research practice retained a preference for the use of quantitative methods of collecting primary information; the status of qualitative methods can be defined as an auxiliary for clarifying, interpreting some aspects of quantitative information.

Relevance of the issue: the topicality of the issue of terminology consistency in translations of economic texts is currently emphasized by the Latvian State Language Center and determined by the fact that many economic terms emerged in Latvian and Russian relatively recently, during the transition from a planned economy to a market economy. It remains disputable how to define and assess the terminology consistency in translations of economic texts. The corpus of the study comprises Latvian and Russian textbooks on economics of three generations (1990s, 2000s and 2010s), and in addition to them - bilingual and multilingual dictionaries of economic terms published in Latvia and Russia since 1990. The paper proves that that terminology consistency in translations of economic (and not only) texts can be assessed and compared (between text corpora and time periods) using scientific methodology and a special technique. The method of research are linguistic discourse analysis, which includes both quantitative and qualitative methods. General results, which also form the scientific novelty of this study include: (1) the put forward conceptual understanding of the terminology consistency as the structural component of the overall quality of terminology translation as well as the definition of the terminology consistency in translations; (2) the elaborated original methodology and technique for assessing the terminology consistency in translations not in the categories of ‘good-bad’, but in the conditionally ambivalent categories ‘consistent-inconsistent’ (for the incidental identification of processes occurring in the studied economic discourse); (3) the explained essence of discourse in translation studies, which is the target text within the background processes of the social reality that determine the creation (synthesis) and perception (analysis) of the translation.

The paper offers a critical review of the studies that explore international relations as a discursive construct and focus on strategic use of language in socially meaningful contexts that determine the shaping and developing of international environment. The constructivist approach to the discourse of international relations is based on understanding nation not as an ontological phenomenon but as a social construct of a communicative nature. Along with this basic interpretation of nation, constructivists theorize about the essence of international relations. The authors of the present review claim that - contrary to widespread belief - the constructivist paradigm does not automatically admit the illusory character of international relations. The results of the review aim to prove that the common assumption for constructionists is the idea of discursive and communicative character of international relations. This idea is expressed by the following statement: to know something about international relations as a real phenomenon means to be able to present or model them. In this process, a special role is ascribed to the media as 'public arenas', which host the fight for means and results of representations and symbolic modelling of international relations. The paper distinguishes two major auspicious directions in discourse analysis of international relations: micro- and macro-oriented.

Background. For many decades, the attention of researchers has been riveted to the phenomenon of discourse. Its subjects, key functions and concepts were considered. The grounds for discourse typology were identified. The relevance of the study is explained by the fact that the communicative environment of German entertainment discourse is little researched, and the need for a more detailed analyzing of its constitutive features and strategies. Purpose of this study is to describe lexico-semantic and syntactic means, verbs of various types, used to implement the attention strategy in German entertainment discourse. Materials and methods. The material of this study was the “star” interviews texts posted on the websites of the German publications “Der Spiegel” and “Die Zeit”. The methods of continuous sampling and generalization, as well as the method of semantic analysis, were used in the work. Results. The entertainment attraction, their ability to diversify people’s lives, contributed to the modification, modernization and continuity of many traditions and customs. The paper deals with the types and genres of entertaining discourse, its subjects, and the originality of communicants’ conversation. It is emphasized that one of the most frequent strategies used by participants in the entertainment discourse is the attention strategy. This strategy is implemented through a set of specific constructions (“ich bin / war”; “ich habe / ich habe nicht”; “mein, meine” plus a character trait), verbs of various types (“mögen”, “lieben”; “können”), lexico-semantic and syntactic techniques. Practical implications. The results of the study can be used in lectures on stylistics, pragmatics, imagology.

This paper analyzes the dynamics of usage of the lexical units ксива and малява (types of slip) in Russian criminal discourse. We are led to believe that, despite the large variety in understanding of the term “discourse,” it can be defined as a sphere of human linguosemiotic experience which is determined by the pragmatics of activity carried out within it, the socio-psychological features of the participants of interactions, the specifics of time and space, and topics according to the methodology proposed by O. Leszczak. Nowadays, a growing interest in criminal discourse has been observed and implies “complex research on the discourse about crime, which enables better understanding of its participants, their criminal positions and functions, the problematics and issues for discussions about crime, along with its influence on modern criminology and crime prevention” (Жалинский 2009). All these factors should be taken into account, making the researcher verify the sources of language material in order to avoid distorting meanings in the word usage under study. This is caused by the notional sphere itself, which, in certain types of discourse, can be verbalized by the word group, which may be represented by a word expression, phrase, speech segment, etc. Words and word expressions considered as phraseological units of criminal discourse were analyzed in this paper.

The paper explores the influence of discourse structure on text complexity. We assume that certain types of discourse units are easier to read than others, due to their explicit discourse structure, which makes their informational input more accessible. As a data source, we use the dataset from the MECO corpus, which contains eye movement data for 12 Russian texts read by 35 native speakers. We demonstrate that the approach relying on elementary discourse units (EDUs) can be felicitously used in the analysis of eye movement data, since fixation patterns on EDUs are similar to those on whole sentences. Our analysis has identified EDU outliers, which show shorter time of first fixation than estimated. We arranged these outliers into several groups associated with different discourse structures. First, these are statements with nominal predicates that set exposition of the text or macroproposition and, following those, EDUs that elaborate on the previous statement and signal the beginning of the narrative. Second, they are EDUs that serve as the middle component of a listing or a group of coordinated clauses or phrases. The final group represents EDUs that are part of an opposition, contrast or comparison. Discourse analysis based on EDUs has never been applied to eye movement data, so our project opens many avenues for further research of complexity of discourse structure.

A discourse analysis of the texts (narratives) by medieval European (Plano Carpini, Guillaume de Rubrouck, Riccoldo da Monte di Croce) and Eastern (Al-Omari, Ibn-Battuta) authors addressing the nomads of the Golden Horde has allowed the author of the paper to draw a number of conclusions regarding the mutual perception of nomads, who represented the main part of the Golden Horde society, by the European (Catholic) and Eastern (Muslim) worlds. In particular, from the viewpoint of European narrators, this was a world posing a potential danger to Christian Europe. From the viewpoint of Eastern (Muslim) authors, this world did not deserve any serious attention. As for the Golden Horde nomads themselves, due to their mentality accounted for by their way of life and ideology, they perceived the world around them primarily as an object of mercantile exploitation.

The study of particularities of regional cross-country images of confession and intercultural communication as well as the semantic image surrounding these concepts is vital in today’s social life. The article analyzes denotations and connotations of the terms confession and intercultural communication in the Russian and Japanese sociocultural contexts from the point of view of a new research discourse — glocal religious studies with the focus on vernacular specifics of religiosity in Russia and Japan. The case study methodology includes description and analysis of how various views on certain aspects of religiosity correlate. It makes possible to adjust the theoretical understanding of the problem and weigh it against the variety of real-life communicational practices. The article investigates the complexity and dramatism of communication between members of the ingroup and others. The study bases on the materials from the history, media and academic discourses where in the internal and external of particular communities in the given historic circumstances may not only vary significantly, but also be intentionally marked to divide one from the other. Sometimes this demarcation takes a form of stigmatization that label one’s perspective as not-true or lawless. The paper describes two major types of culture: the first one (ethnocentrism in terms suggested by M. Bennet) derives from the idea that other’s statements are sealed and cannot be translated thus must be destroyed. The second type — ethnorelativism — comes from the idea of affinity and openness. It is presumed that taking one a different perspective and accepting diversity is empowering and gives start to an intercultural dialogue. Common and particular are the two basic viewpoints on any identity, when both positive and negative promotes understanding. The phenomenon of unity as similarity of indistinguishable (like grains of sand) on the one hand, and systemic unity of the different (like people) on the other hand, are considered within the framework of distancing extralinguistic social facts from the term that stand for them. The latter shown as special imaginary unities and descriptions of autopoietic systems.

Taking the example of two 1960s popular spy films this paper explores how social semiotics can make a contribution to the analysis of film music. Following other scholars who have sought to create inventories of sound meanings to help us break down the way that music communicates, this paper explores how we can draw on the principles of Hallidayan functional grammar to present an inventory of meaning potentials in sound. This provides one useful way to describe the semiotic resources available to composers to allow them to communicate quite specific ideas, attitudes and identities through combinations of different sounds and sound qualities, by presenting them as systems of meaning rather than as lists of connotations. Here we apply this to the different uses of music and sound in Dr No and The Ipcress Files which allows us to show how we can reveal different ideologies of spying.

The object of this research is modern political power relations. The discourse is studied in the traditions of postmodernism, including as a ‘picture of the world’, cognitive model, worldview and the limits of what is possible in the thinking and behaviour of individuals. According to the discourse theories, all objects of reality are discursive, that is, any phenomenon is inscribed in a context that gives it full meaning. All objects of the surrounding world can acquire different meanings (or identities) depending on the specific circumstances in which they are immersed. Discourse is a way of ordering reality, a mechanism for determining the values of people. The subject of power in this context is understood as a collective or individual actor who has special access to the discourse and can control it. According to Foucault’s theory, discourse can be identified with power. This research finds that discourse is the most efficient power resource because it touches every part of a person’s existence. The paper explains the problem from both sides: as the development of political discourse theories on the one hand and as the innovative research of modern power relations in a context of discursive technologies on the other hand. The research is based on the works of M. Foucault, T. Van Dijk, L. Althusser, A. Gramsci, E. Laclau and Sh. Mouff, all of whom measured discourse in a variety of ways. Thus, in our research, we used such theoretical methods for analysis, classification and comparison. The analysis of discourse undertaken here has extended our knowledge of political power relations. The findings in this study provide a new understanding of discourse as a cognition that actualises many questions for further investigations. The findings may be of interest for both scholars and students who study political power in general or discourse as a picture of the world in particular.