(Non)pandemic Youth Speak. On Lexical-Semantic Tendencies in the Polish Language of the Youth

This article presents the latest lexical tendencies in the language of contemporary Polish youth. The directions of the dominance of certain meanings were analysed on the basis of the submissions for the Youth Word of the Year contest (2020), as well as the online slang dictionary miejski.pl. The data obtained comes from natural users of the language and is based on their linguistic awareness and intuition. Dominant semantic fields were distinguished, namely human, interpersonal relationships, attitudes towards life, cultural preferences, etc. Coining new terms in these areas is accompanied by expressiveness, humour, and playing with language norms. Despite the occurrence of new words connected with the Covid-19 pandemic, they have not been widely represented among those lexical and semantic units considered interesting and worth mentioning.

BRAGGING AS ONE OF THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF HIP-HOP DISCOURSE

Statement of the problem. The subculture of hip-hop was formed among the African-American population of the United States during a period of poor socio-economic situation. These conditions for the development of hip-hop build a system of values and knowledge, which acts as the foundation of the discursive space of hip-hop. Hip-hop discourse unfolds around the basic concepts of racism, violence and bragging. The concept of bragging is based on the consequences of living conditions in the segregated society of the United States, when African Americans did not have the opportunity to possess certain goods which are available to the white population. After the restrictions having been lifted, high-priced goods have become an element of hip-hop discourse participants’ system of values. The purpose of the article is to identify and systematize the linguistic means of representing the concept of bragging as one of the basic concepts of hip-hop discourse. The methodology of the research is the analysis and summary of works about the basic concepts on the basis of which the discourse is built. Research results. In the article the most common linguistic means of implementing the concept of bragging are identified. The analysis of the song texts of the hip-hop discourse shows that the studied concept is represented mainly through lexical means. Conclusions. The most common ways of representing the concept of bragging are the lexemes of the semantic fields “jewelry” and “financial well-being”. In addition, precedent names are important for the nomination of companies that produce high-value goods, which represent the attributes of success for the participants of the hip-hop discourse. The concept of bragging acts as a basic concept of hip-hop discourse and reflects the specifics of hip-hop discourse. It also determines the perception of the surrounding world by subculture participants.

Leksyka z zakresu wróżbiarstwa i czarów w Nowym wielkim dykcjonarzu Pierre’a Daneta i Dymitra Franciszka Koli

The paper aims to investigate Polish lexis belonging to the semantic fields of DIVINATION and WITCHCRAFT. The material was excerpted from the 18th-century trilingual Nowy wielki dykcjonarz (New grand dictionary). The semantic fields under analysis were divided into subfields. In the case of DIVINATION, the subfields of DIVINATION PRACTISES and PEOPLE FORETELLING THE FUTURE were identified. In turn, WITCHCRAFT was subdivided into MAGICAL PRACTICES, PEOPLE PRACTISING MAGIC and EFFECTS OF MAGIC. The analysis of the retrieved material suggests that the number of individual lexemes is relatively small and usually polysemic, which appears to contradict the popularity and prevalence of divination and witchcraft in the 18th-century Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth as established by cultural historians. The supposed misrepresentation of the semantic fields under scrutiny may reflect the didactic nature of the Polish part of the dictionary.

Attitude Towards Immigrants in the Mass Consciousness of Europeans. Part 3. Some Aspects of the Dynamics of Semantic Fields

In the third part of the article, variations in the characteristics of several features, the receipt of which is disclosed in the first and second parts, are considered on a time series. In order to identify the circumstances of stability and variability of operational reactions-assessments by the mass consciousness of Europeans of interaction with immigrants, as well as the homogeneity of the socially fixed norms of these assessments, they are considered at various levels of structuring the object of research. With the help of correlation and analysis of variance, examples are given of the positioning of countries that are relatively stable and reactive in terms of the nature of their dynamics of assessments, as well as triads of degrees of coincidence of these assessments that are socially anchored on a national scale – dissenting, median, dominant. The method of decision trees analyzes the accompanying typical differentiation of several communication countries, crystallized normative applications of attitudes towards immigrants, with several social characteristics. The analysis of the information leads to the conclusion that the power of differentiation of the emerging assessments and norms of attitudes towards immigrants in connection with economic factors significantly exceeds the influence of both socio-demographic characteristics and transformed forms of consciousness that serve to protect corporate economic interests to the detriment of the common good at the level’s certain communities.

Choroby i ich objawy w XIX-wiecznym Słowniku polsko-łacińsko-łotewskim Jana Kurmina

This article presents an analysis of the names of diseases and their symptoms in Słownik polsko-łacińsko-łotewski (The Polish-Latin-Latvian dictionary) by Jan Kurmin (ed. Vilnius, 1858). The number of excerpted lexical items (377) is presented in 11 semantic fields (from the most expanded to the smallest one): diseases of the motor system, skin diseases, respiratory system diseases, symptoms of multiple diseases, internal diseases, infectious diseases, diseases of the sensory organs, wounds and cuts, digestive system diseases, mental diseases, cardiovascular diseases. The analysis shows that despite the high ability to observe symptoms, the knowledge of treatments remained limited, which is why the dictionary presents mostly diseases that can be easily observed with the unaided eye. The non-professional character of the dictionary is also evidenced by the use of synonymous sequences, vocabulary with indistinct meaning, and descriptive names of diseases.

The Functional Purpose of Slang (Based on Russian and American Slangisms)

The purpose of this article was to identify the specific functions of slang from the standpoint of demonstrativeness, corporatism, and individual creative self-expression. The methods of comparative and cultural analysis were used. As a result, the following specific functions of slang were singled out: demonstrative, corporate, and the function of creative self-expression. Personal identification and social relationships determine the demonstrative function of slang, which is more pronounced in the speech of young people. Slangisms are distinguished by their vividness and imagery, which is caused by the desire of the individual to attract people’s attention and stand out from the crowd. At the same time, the opposition of slang to the established order can have a negative effect, when used ostentatiously. The corporate function of slang is fulfilled by indicating one’s belonging to a certain professional community and asserting one’s right to be considered as “one of us”. Ignorance of special slang hinders a person from fully functioning within a certain “corporation”. The abundance of slang synonyms, as well as the presence of whole sentences and phraseological units in slang, testifies to the creative potential of their inventors. This article provides examples of American and Russian slang units used in various semantic fields, as well as examples of slang homonymy. Comparison of stylistic synonyms confirms the fact that slangisms differ from their neutral and bookish equivalents due to their metaphorical as well as emotional and evaluative nature. The results of the study allow us to conclude that slang has much in common with folk art, in which the changing value orientations of modern society are manifested. We also found that slang holds a dominant position in the framework of non-standard lexicon. Due to the continuous evolution, slang is a rather volatile phenomenon that allows new words and expressions to quickly enter the vocabulary.

Specific features of intersemiotic translation of symbols from the perspective of conceptual and semiotic paradigm

The text of the novel “Inferno” written by Dan Brown and its film adaptation, provide the material for the analysis of symbols and their importance in both art forms. This analysis, which rests on the thesis of the conceptual nature of symbols in any literary text, is made in conceptual and semantic fields, and the concepts denoted by the analyzed symbols are pointed out. Given that the text of the source novel is abundant in symbols of various degrees of textual importance, not all of them were subject of research in this paper. The basic symbol of the source text, the Inferno, was singled out, as well as a number of symbols embodied by novel and film personages. In the research, frequent techniques of intersemiotic translations were analyzed as concerns their role in symbol rendering: omission, typical of the studied case of intersemiotic translation, which can be combined with the technique of addition. In the latter case, the degree of expressive force of the symbol can be considerably altered. The greatest shift in the degree of importance of a symbol is named ‘symbol transformation’, it is observed when symbols (in the given case, symbolic personages of the source text) lose their expressive force and the features of a symbol, i.e., in the process of intersemiotic translation these symbols are lost. The suggested model of analysis can be applied in other cases of intersemiotic translation, and other techniques, together with their combinations, can be found.

ЛЕКСИЧНИЙ АНАЛІЗ ДИСКУРСУ ПЕРСОНАЖА СЕРІЙНОГО ВБИВЦІ В АМЕРИКАНСЬКІЙ ХУДОЖНІЙ ПРОЗІ ХХ СТОЛІТТЯ

Lexical analysis has always been a productive way to study discourse through the semiotic nature of the word and its ability to function as a link between language and reality. The purpose of the article is to explore the lexical level of the discourse of a serial killer character in order to reveal their psychological features and prove their authenticity in comparison with the lexicon research of real serial killers. This study is relevant because the number of thrillers with serial killers in American literature is growing every year, but the discourse of these characters is poorly studied and requires more attention from linguists. The article uses such research methods as the method of lexical and semantic analysis of language units to study the features of language nominations; method of semantic fields, for grouping language units according to their thematic affiliation in microfields; associative method for the distribution of language units to the corresponding microfields; structural method for the separation of units, their classification and interpretation.Results. In the process of lexical analysis of the discourse of the serial killers characters, the words of the characters were divided into three main groups: words denoting mental activity, psychological needs, physiological activity and security. These groups were divided into semantic fields in order to facilitate the process of research. The analysis showed that the largest group of words in most discourses (except for two characters) is a group denoting physiological activity and safety, which corresponds to a study of the lexicon of real serial killers conducted by J. Hancock, which shows that the most important for the life of serial killers is biological component. The lexicon of the two characters (Lecturer and Claiborne), which differ from others by the predominance of words denoting mental activity, can be explained by their high educational and professional level, which shows their high IQ, which is also a feature of real serial killers.Thus, we can conclude that the authors were able to portray the characters plausibly through their lexicon.Key words: discourse, lexicon, semantic field, term, character. Лексичний аналіз завжди був продуктивним способом вивчення дискурсу через семіотичну природу слова та його здатність функціонувати як сполучна ланка між мовою та реальністю. Ця стаття має на меті дослідити лексичний рівень дискурсу персонажа серійного вбивці, щоб розкрити його психологічні особливості та довести достовірність та правдоподібність змалювання його образу в порівнянні з дослідженнями лексикону справжніх серійних убивць. Таке дослідження є актуальним, оскільки в американській літературі з кожним роком зростає кількість трилерів, де ключовими фігурами є серійні вбивці, а от дискурс цих персонажів є маловивченим і вимагає більшої уваги лінгвістів.У статті використані такі методи дослідження, як метод лексико-семантичного аналізу мовних одиниць для вивчення особливостей мовних номінацій; метод семантичних полів, для групування мов-них одиниць за їх тематичною приналежністю в мікрополя; асоціативний метод для розподілу мовних одиниць до відповідних мікрополів; структурний метод для виокремлення одиниць, їх класифікації та інтерпретації.Результати. У процесі лексичного аналізу дискурсу персонажів серійних вбивць слова персонажів було розділено на три основні групи: слова, що позначають розумову діяльність, психологічні потреби, фізіологічну активність та безпеку. Ці групи були поділені на семантичні поля, щоб полегшити процес вивчення. Аналіз показав, що найбільша група слів у більшості дискурсів (крім двох персонажів) – це група, що позначає фізіологічну активність та безпеку, що відповідає дослідженню лексикону справжніх серійних вбивць, проведеному Дж. Хенкоком, яке показує, що найважливішим для життя серійних вбивць є біологічний компонент. Лексикон двох персонажів (Лектор і Клейборн), що відрізняються від інших перевагою слів, які позначають розумову діяльність, можна пояснити їхнім високим освітнім та професійним рівнем. Це засвідчує їхній високий коефіцієнт інтелекту, що також є особливістю справжніх серійних вбивць.Отже, можна зробити висновки, що авторам вдалося зобразити портрети персонажів правдоподібно через їх лексикон, що співвідноситься з дослідженнями лексикону реальних серійних вбивць. Завдяки лексичному аналізу дискурсу вдалося розкрити психологічні особливості характерів персонажів.Ключові слова: дискурс, лексикон, семантичне поле, термін, персонаж.

On the Borrowability of Body Parts

Within recent years, quantitative cross-linguistic research has shown that body parts are one of the least borrowed semantic fields (Tadmor and Haspelmath, 2009a; 2009b; Tadmor, 2009). With body parts showing many similarities to closed classes, it is simple to assume there is little motivation for a language to borrow body part terms into its lexicon. Yet, despite its lower percentage of borrowings cross-linguistically, some languages employ much higher percentages of borrowings for naming the body. The motivations behind such borrowings across languages remain unexplored but can largely be explained by social factors. As Thomason and Kaufman (1988) and Thomason (2008) claim, social factors generally trump linguistic factors as predictors of contact-induced change. This study first discusses proposed inhibitions to lexical borrowing and then examines cases of body part loanwords from various languages showing how they fit into social patterns motivating such borrowings.

The beginnings of Hungarian lexicography. From the first glossaries to multilingual dictionaries

This study aims to present the beginnings of Hungarian lexicography, with a special focus on certain works that are closely connected with Transylvania. The early glossaries, starting with the 13th century, are either marginal or interlinear. The only early source in which glossaries are intertextual, distinguished from the Latin text by underlining, is Sermones Dominicales, a compilation of sermons written in the first half of the 15th century. The vocabularies and nomenclatures under analysis were elaborated between the 14th century and the end of the 16th century, most of them being based on lists of Latin words grouped according to semantic fields. The only work that was elaborated based on the Hungarian lexis is the Nomenclature from Schlägl, a copy dating from around 1405 of a document written a few decades before. Among these vocabularies there are some that could be regarded as the first attempts to elaborate specialized dictionaries. Starting with the 16th century, several dictionaries in which the title-words are arranged alphabetically were identified. However, the early dictionaries are either unfinished or only partially preserved. The most representative dictionaries, mainly multilingual, were elaborated starting with the late 16th century. Our presentation ends with József Benkő’s botanical dictionaries, edited in 1783, which mark the beginnings of modern Hungarian lexicography.