Linguoculturological Analysis of Woman's Image in the Proverbs and Sayings of the Dagestan Languages

The article is devoted to linguoculturological description of woman's image in the proverbial worldview of the Dagestan languages. The analysis of proverbial expressions revealed androcentric bias of the Dagestan paroemiological worldview where woman, as a rule, appears for an object: mainly for mother, daughter, bride, and wife/mistress. The proverbs representing the image of mother have uniquely positive connotation, while the image of stepmother is traditionally laden with negative context. One of the most important components of the gender worldview is marriage. The role and position of woman in family is represented especially eloquently. Image of wife is one of the most frequent female proverbial images. In the proverbs and sayings a series of warnings and recommendations regarding marriage are represented, addressed mostly to man, which shows the androgenic character of the Dagestan language worldview. Zoomorphic images in the Dagestan culture may have gender compound. The concept of woman, actualized by the Dagestan proverbial units is of a contradictory and inhomogeneous nature. Some attributes represent the moral system and social grounds of patriarchal society, while the other are connected with the fair side of the female origin as a source of life. The woman's image is multifaceted and expresses opposite connotations which may be explained by the enigma of womanhood and its ambiguous interpretation in the national linguistic views of the world.