Philology, pedagogy, and psychology

2018 Issue №4

Historical development of the Pomor North Lexicography: a comparative analysis of the three translation dictionaries

Abstract

The article describes three dictionaries compiled by three outstanding mariners who explored the Pomor North: the “Dictionary of Muscovites” compiled by the French navigator Jean Sauvage in 1586, the “Small Russian- Norwegian dictionary” written in 1907 by polar captain Alexander Kuchin and the “English-Russian Maritime Dictionary” of the Soviet sailor Fedor Shchepetov from Arkhangelsk. A detailed comparative analysis of these sources permits to illustrate different periods of the lexicographical activity in the Pomor North. The three dictionaries were compiled by the people who had got involved in translation and intercultural communication through their professional activities, as they needed specialized dictionaries for work. This influenced the selection of the vocabulary, information structuring, grammatical labels and comments. The revealed deviations from the modern lexicographic requirements shed light on the compilation process and personal professional experience of the compilers. The methodology of this research is based on a diachronic approach to studying the development of specialized maritime glossaries in the 16th and 20th centuries. The research is conducted within the frameworks of integrative translation and linguistic regional studies as a continuation of the project “History of Translation on the Pomor North” supported by the Russian Humanitarian Scientific Foundation.

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Verb collocations of the semantic field «Memory» with the component ‘Vergangenheit’ in the German media

Abstract

The article analyzes verb collocations of the semantic field “Memory” with the component ‘Vergangenheit’, which are commonly used in German media; it describes structural, semantic and syntagmatic characteristics of the verb collocations. The source of the research data is newspaper texts corpus DWDS. The keyword "Vergangenheit" (past) can be characterized by a high syntagmatic potential that indicates the importance of the denoted concept for memory processes comprehension. The author employs a functional-communicative approach, a complex of semasiological and onomasiological methods. The composition of the collocations, the internal organizational structure of the lexical set, subjectivity and objectivity, key words’ functions, internal or external transitivity / intransitivity, structural-semantic models, series of collocations, subject codes, pragmatic components of the meanings of collocations are described. The elements of linguistic and mental memory model are revealed. The author determines the regularities of the analyzed representation of memory and past in the German language, concludes about spatio-activity interpretation of memory (identification of memory operations with movement or activity, operation on an object in this space). It is demonstrated that verb collocations model mnemic situation vividly in accordance with their antropomorphic understanding.

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«Only when asleep you feel alive»: life and death in the Russian linguocultural consciousness (based on Russian proverbs and sayings)

Abstract

The article describes the set of maxims, revealing the attitude to life and death, typical for the Russian linguistic-cultural consciousness, on the basis of Russian proverbs and sayings. The author explains the specificity of these maxims, and provides an additional interpretation of several examples. In conclusion, the author explains the reasons for the general sense of pessimism of the Russians and reveals the fundamental intellectual basis for black humor in the analyzed linguocultural tradition.

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Chrononyms characterisitics in O. Henry’s short story Hearts and Crosses

Abstract

The article focuses on lexical means of expressing time in a short story by O'Henry. The author identifies chronopuncture, chronometric and chronological markers and highlights their functions in the text. The lexical means of chronopuncture, indicating the specific time of the event, dominate in the text structure. These lexical means include indefinite, relatively definite and absolutely definite chronopuncture markers, which help the readers to orient themselves in the temporal continuum of the narrative text.

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