2014 Issue №8

G. H. Miller’s dream dictionary is analysed from the perspective of modern cognitive linguistics. The author examines its cultural characteristics, embeddedness in the context of dreams, the polysemy of the key image, and the possibility of homonymy. Gender dependence and subject-object differentiation are identified as important features of dream interpretations in the dictionary. The author describes three mechanisms of semantic transformation behind the dream interpretation: metaphoric conversion, metonymic shift, and pragmatic extension.

This article identifies the cognitive tactics behind the interpretation of dreams in the ancient Assyrian text known as the Dream Book. Its basic characteristics include belief in the prophetic power of dreams, ritual orientation to men, regard for image polysemy and the use of symbols, employment of such mechanisms as metaphor, metonymy, pragmatic shifts, patronymic attraction, replacements based on the antonym principle. These mechanisms are identified as underlying the formation of symbolic content structures.

This article solves the problem of identifying cognitive tactics developed in literary dreams. These include content dependence on the context, possible reproduction of future events, special significance on reproduced events, symbolic representation, the need for interpreter, etc. The obtained comparative data make it possible to speak of general mechanisms of dreams.