2014 Vol. 5 №3-4

Based on the verbatim records of V.V. Putin’s public speeches, the authors examine syntactic structures representing different types of interrogative hortative modality in the political discourse. The functional-semantic and communicative features of these structures are identified in the oral speech of the mentioned discourse type.

This article considers the relevant linguistic problem of metalinguistic potential of a natural language and its functions in a literary text in the case of the Russian language. The Russian language and natural languages in general act as a universal cognitive model capable of describing different codes presented in literary texts

This article considers the key provisions relating to the nature and structure of the word in human mental space. The author distinguishes between the word as an asset of an individual (the “living” word) and the word as found in a dictionary. It is concluded that there is a dramatic difference between the mental lexicon and a dictionary as a lexico¬graphic unit.

This article considers the semantics of Russian and Lithuanian zoonym phraseological units and performs their semantic and structural systematisation. The author identifies the cultural linguistic features of fixed expressions containing a zoonym component in the worldview of native speakers.

This article presents an ethnolinguistic study. The magic properties of certain herbs – as seen in the cultural traditions of South, East, and West Slavs – are described in a comparative aspect. The author also examines different herbs that exhibit similar features. It is concluded that the magic properties of herbs are determined by their connection to the chthonic kingdom and the other world in folk consciousness.

The images of nature in the poems of the two national geniuses are considered within the opposition of the horizontal/vertical, which is laden with philosophical and metaphorical semantics. Both poets show that, in the absence of spirituality, the true internal freedom sought by the main characters cannot be attained

This article considers the types of anagrams used by Bulgakov in creating the names of characters. The analysis is based on the novels The White Guard, The Master and Margarita, The Fatal Eggs, Diaboliada, and Heart of a Dog, the play Flight, and various satirical articles and essays.

This article considers the functional features and deep cognitive foundations of ana¬grammatic structures in verbal texts. The traditional perspective on the phenomenon is defined as a general sign-based one: anagrammatic structures are examined in music and mathematics. It is concluded that anagrams are special cognitive universals; anagrammatic structures are possible in semiotic codes with a linear organisation; one of the key functions of anagrams is cognitive – linear texts are perceived as a whole

Based on ample documentary evidence, the author identifies the theoretical and metho¬dological principles behind the development of documentary films in post-Revolutionary Russia, as well as the principles of film text and the correlation between the visual imagery and the text. The role of Dziga Vertov in this process is emphasised. The author proves that Ver¬tov forestalled the development and organisation of modern news.

This article considers foreign policy events relating to Russia’s participation in the Balkan issue in the early 20th century. One of the major considerations behind Russia’s Balkan policy was the possibility of Bulgaria seizing Constantinople and Serbia gaining access to the Adriatic Sea

The problem of anagrams is linked to the paradigm secret of baroque poetry. It is shown that the essence of this poetry is a special type of poetic mimesis reflecting the existential and ontological fracture of being, which manifests itself in the lyrical persona of the poetic subject. Anagrams of the names of 17th century Königsberg poets – Simon Dach, Robert Roberthin, and Andreas Adersbach – comprise an ironical baroque reflection of the new “tacit theology” of poetry, whose mimesis reveals the growing inadequacy of a human being to their true essence and the transition of the word to reaching its eschatological limits set in the Book of Revelation