Colour Nominations of Homo Socialis

About the author:

Anna V. Shchetinina, Cand. Sci. (Philol.), Associate Professor, Department of the Russian and Foreign Languages, Russian State Vocational Pedagogical University (Yekaterinburg); anna-73.schetinina@yandex.ru

Abstract:

This article is devoted to the problem of social nominations of a person through colour characteristics. The relevance of the study is determined by the importance of analysing words with social semantics that form the fund of Russian social vocabulary, a full description of which has not been compiled yet. The analysis of adjectives, substantives and phraseological combinations, as well as non-idiomatic composite items, presented in lexicographical sources and newspaper discourse, is made. It is noted that, as shown by a semantic and discursive analysis of the lexis, social semantic multipliers can be localized both in assertive zone of meaning and semantic presupposition. In addition, the social connotations can be represented in pragmatic presuppositions, in particular in newspaper discourse, and they can serve as a source for creating new meanings.

The author analyzes the color nominations of homo socialis, in which the social component is present in assertive and presuppositional zones of meaning. Material is extracted from explanatory dictionaries and includes linguistic facts from different idioms. It is shown that the colour nominations of people were recorded in the dictionaries of different historical periods, but they are most relevant and productive in the present. The author forms ideograms of colour nominations of anthropocentric sphere. Comments are given to the peculiarities of localization of social semantics.

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