The Nature of Chinese and Russian Subcultures in Urban Discourse

The paper seeks to examine the communicative aspect of modern Chinese and Russian urban subcultures. The nominations of urban social groups representing young people in Russia and China and their connection to modern communication practices are viewed from the perspective of urban communication studies, which provides an opportunity for a new comprehension of issues connected with verbal and nonverbal constituents of urban discourse. The indicates that the subcultures in the Russian urban landscape are reflected in such nominations as фрики (freaki), мажоры (majory), хипстеры (hipstery), брейк-дансеры (break-dancery), байкеры (bikery), etc. The Chinese subcultures are known under such names as shamate, xiaoqingxin, tuyayawenhua, erciyuanyawenhua, egaoyawenhua and many others. We argue that in both countries the unity of social subgroups is based not so much on ideological preferences, but rather on lifestyles, hobbies and interests, many of them formed under the Western influence. The subcultures discussed in the research represent a broad panorama of Chinese and Russian social life. They reflect the sociocultural dynamics of attitudes, values and lifestyles influenced by globalization but acquiring nationally specific features, which transform them into unique sociocultural phenomena.

A Study Of The Pragmatic Functions Of Modern Chinese Adverbs “Zhen”, “Zhenshi” And “Zhende”

This research used the Modern Chinese Research Corpus System constructed by Beijing Language and Culture University as the corpus source, and analyzed the pragmatic functions of Modern Chinese adverbs “zhen”, “zhenshi” and “zhende” which are located before the predicate and are used as sentence adverbial. The results show that these adverbs have similarities and differences in pragmatic functions. The adverb “zhen” has four pragmatic functions: one is to confirm authenticity, the other is to express subjective evaluation, the third is to express a high degree of authenticity, and the fourth is to make hypotheses. The adverb “zhenshi” has only one pragmatic function, that is, the subjective evaluation function. The adverb “zhende” has two pragmatic functions: one is to confirm authenticity, and the other is to express subjective evaluation. The adverb “zhenshi” and “zhende” can appear together with the degree adverbs “tai” and “hen”, but the adverb “zhen” cannot appear with the degree adverbs. The adverb “zhen” and the adverb “zhende” can be replaced with each other, and the meaning of the sentence remains unchanged after the replacement.