Reading Strategies in Academic Communication (Based on the Harry Potter Series)

This article considers the correlation between reading strategies and peculiarities of academic discourse. Special attention is paid to the upbringing-educational potential of teaching English on the basis of selected materials, namely the seven-book series “Harry Potter” by Joan K. Rowling. The paper discusses a number of ways of sustaining the communicative focus of teaching a foreign language through the prism of a potential reading strategy. It is proved that the series authored by Joan K. Rowling is filled with modern lexical and phraseological means. Texts about Hogwarts magic and spells are exemplary among the works of modern English literary language, because it contains a wide range of thematic material of an instructive nature, which greatly contributes to both teaching and performing basic activities such as reading, speaking, writing, as well as critical thinking, text analysis and the formation of moral values. The study mentions multiculturalism in order to help students master the concept, as well as to realize that each unit of cultural diversity has the right and freedom to exist and respect it. The authors proved that Potterian material is rich in instructiveness and contains such topics as the influence of folklore on modern culture, multicultural manifestations, issues of freedom and slavery, raising “problem children” or interaction with non-biological parents and others. Specific techniques and strategies that are most appropriate for the treatment of the above topics are proposed. These can be text analysis, investigation and comparison of book’s world and modern life, as well as critical thinking. It is seen that effective communication is dialogue and group discussion, the amount of oral and written speech which must be balanced with quality.

SEMANTIC PROSODY OF THE LEMMA VACCINE IN THE MEDIA TEXTS

This paper discusses the results of the corpus-based analysis of the semantic prosody of collocations with VACCINE in the broadsheet ‘The Guardian’. The corpus has been processed with the help of Sketch Engine. Text passages containing collocations with VACCINE have been interpreted in order to state the prosody mode of the collocation in the context. The study mostly pays attention to the nouns modified by VACCINE as most frequently used in the me­dia texts. The dictionary definition of VACCINE defines it as a word with positive semantic prosody. The discourse analysis demonstrates that collocations containing the lemma VACCINE can have positive, negative or neutral semantic colouring, which depends on the contextual meaning of the analyzed passage and which is also based on the semantic prosody mode of other words in the passage, which actually designates and presupposes the mode of the collocations in question. The nouns supply, safety, mask, uptake, access, protection, production, certification used in ‘The Guardian’ articles, having positive semantic prosody in the pattern noun + VACCINE, in general create a positive metaphorical image and defense from Covid-19. However, the nouns hesitancy, misinformation, avail­ability and skepticism possessing negative semantic prosody, are mostly used to describe people’s unwillingness to get vaccinated and their doubts about the effectiveness of the procedure. Collocations with type, mechanism, distribution, usage and VACCINE have a neutral semantic prosody, which shows that such collocations are used in text passages in the surrounding of neither positive nor negative words and the whole passage serves as a state­ment of some facts without being evaluated.

DISCURSIVE PRESENTATION OF WOMEN IN THE 2001-2002 AND 2020-2021 MEDIA TEXTS: A CORPUS BASED ANALYSIS

This paper is devoted to a corpus based contrastive analysis of the lemma WOMEN in “The Economist” articles published in 2001-2002 and 2020-2021 years. Media discourse is seen as an influential tool which, on the one hand, reflects what is going on in the world, but on the other, influences people’s views on different subjects whether they are political or economic ones forming some specific stereotypical images. Gender stereotypes impose certain behavioural models on men and women prescribing social roles as well as outlining their activities and choices in various social and professional fields. The media in its turn is a reflection of gender marked expectations imposed on both men and women by society. The SketchEngine and LancsBox have been used to process the collocates with WOMEN concentrating mostly on the following ones: empower+WOMEN; encourage+WOMEN; help+WOMEN; WOMEN+take; young+WOMEN; WOMEN+and. The corpus analysis together with critical discourse analysis have been applied to interpret the obtained results with further comparative analysis. The study proves that the way how women are depicted in the news stories have changed greatly over the period of 20 years’ time. The media discourse of recent years offers images when women are empowered, encouraged and helped. Women as active agents with the verb “take” are also depicted in the latest articles. The collocates showing WOMEN’s connections are similar for both corpora, which are MEN and CHILDREN. The most frequently discussed topics of the years 2020-2021 touch upon education, career prospects, relationships, defending personal dignity, becoming more independent; while the media discourse of the beginning of 21st century mostly presents fields of education and work. Young women are shown in troublesome situations in 2001-2002 newspaper articles, whereas 2020-2021 young women demonstrate a confident position in society. The further research perspectives can deal with the study of Ukrainian media discourse, which will enable a contrastive analysis of WOMEN discursive representation in British and Ukrainian newspapers.

Textual Coherence and Language Means of Its Expression in German

This article addresses the textual category of coherence and discusses verbal means of its expression. The paper analyzes textual connections that mirror systemic relations between objects, phenomena and processes of a "primary" reality. The paper argues that language units of different levels can be addressed as markers of textual connections which contribute to the semantic organization and shaping the text's formal structure. The paper distinguishes the following types of textual connections: lexical, grammatical, word-forming, stylistic, structural-compositional, etc. Special attention is paid to the phenomenon of word-forming textual connections. The paper highlights patterns of the said units' repetition and interaction within the text. The paper focuses on the binary semantics of derivatives and argues that it is responsible for both explicit and implicit representation of textual connections. In particular, derived nouns employing suffixes -ung and -tion are identified as language markers responsible for explicating diverse textual connections. Text-forming and text-binding functions of suffixed derivatives depend on their systemic characteristics i.e. their semantic motivation, a certain isomorphism of their word-forming structure and semantics, as well as semantic correlations of suffixes -ung and -tion in the language system and in the text. Linear unfolding of the text determines the respective arrangement of text's components. This unfolding of the textual space as a surface structure is determined by the components' local micro-arrangements and quantitative representation of different types of connections in the text field. The paper regards these phenomena as both functional and stylistic characteristics of the text.

German emotional concepts of safety, protection and comfort through the prism of the linguo-cultural opposition of Ordnung ‘Order’ – Chaos ‘Chaos’

This paper considers verbal means of representing concepts of the sphere of emotions within the framework of German language worldview. The article targets conceptualized emotions connected to the notions of safety, protection and comfort. The methodology of analysis employs fundamental notions of linguo-cultural studies, cognitive linguistics and linguo-semiotics realigned along the basic point of M-logic, the theory of myth-oriented semiosis and universalia-oriented studies. Socio-cultural and enthic peculiarities of verbal representations of the emotions belonging to the "comfort quartet" are interpreted as manifestations of the system's (German "national spsirt's") compensating for the fear of the future that appears to the factor of entropy. Ethnic and linguo-cultural features of the «Sicherheit», «Geborgenheit», «Zuverlässigkeit» and «Gemütlichkeit» concepts are addressed as markers of axiological significance and further viewed through the prisom of the «Ordnung ‘Order’ – Chaos ‘Chaos’» opposition. Semantic "nano-myths" encoded in the inner form of the concepts' names are reconstructed via the etymological analysis of the units «Sicherheit», «Geborgenheit», «Zuverlässigkeit», and «Gemütlichkeit». The article discusses the transformation of primal semantic nano-myths correlated with scenarios of Germanic mythology as inchoative matrices projected onto the ethnic worldviews into secondary mythic simulacra unfolding in multiple alternative worlds in the globalized context. Correlations between the emotional phenomena and respective concepts are outlined and specified via a nultidimensional universal model that treats a human being as a biovital and biosocial open system. The highlighted tendency towards construing the said secondary mythic simulacra demonstrates the distortion in the system's (German linguoculture's, worldview's or a national semiospheric segment 's) orientation along the "Order" categorization vector.

EMOTIVES OF SURPRISE IN MODERN ENGLISH POETRY

The paper focuses on linguistic manifestation of emotion of surprise in modern English poetic texts. The study is guided by the statement that emotions – psychosomatic processes – can be fixed in fictional texts (including the poetic ones) in the form of emotives – the linguistic units that manifest emotions and/or feelings of the addresser. The emotion of surprise differs from other basic emotions of a person due to its ambivalence and specific prerequisites to emergence. As surprise comes forth unexpectedly, the study looks for basic situations in the context of poetic texts when emotives of surprise appear. To study the phenomenon, the concept of emotional situation is employed. It marks the circumstances under which the persona experiences the emotion of surprise. The results obtained from the analysis of modern English poems distinguish several emotional situations in which emotives of surprise appear. They occur at the junction of image-bearing spaces of 1) dream and reality; 2) reality and fantasy; 3) expectations and their fulfilment; 4) two contrasting situations in reality. These image-bearing spaces may have either contrasting or complementing features. The defeated expectancy effect that occurs due their interaction manifests itself verbally via the emotives of surprise.

“The deepest depths of human life”: existential motifs in the novel The Road by Cormac McCarthy

The implementation of the basic principles of existentialism in Cormac McCarthy’s novel “The Road” is studied in the article. The author states that this philosophical movement, which explores the problem of human existence, had a significant impact on the formation of world literature and origin of a new literary movement that bears the very same name. The works of American writer Cormac McCarthy are philosophical in nature and cover a great variety of themes such as life and death, freedom, relationship between parents and children, man and nature. The post-apocalyptic novel “The Road”, which brought the author worldwide fame, is considered the pinnacle of his writing skills, as it thematically, compositionally, and stylistically embodies the traditional features of McCarthy’s works. It does not have a large number of characters, which allows readers to pay more attention to the philosophical idea of the novel. The author tries to find answers to the essential questions of meaning and purpose of human existence, which makes it possible to identify a significant number of existential motifs, such as absurdity, forlornness, fear, freedom, alienation, individuality, and so on. The motif of absurdity is manifested through the depiction of an almost completely uninhabitable world, in which cruelty and death prevail. The personages of the novel are devoid of illusions and disappointed in life, especially the older generation; so they just try to survive and keep their individuality. The main characters have a dreadful fear of starvation or violent death, and they are also afraid of losing humanity and hope for a better future. Therefore, fear frees them from the conventions and laws of the hostile world and gives meaning to their existence.

SPEECH ACTS IN PUBLIC FIGURES’ TWEETS ON ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES

This paper presents the detailed analysis and interpretation of the main speech acts used in the tweets of public figures. Our novel findings discover the major types of the speech acts found in the utterances of public figures related to the environment. Based on the studies of numerous scholars and rich theoretical background on speech acts theory, the study touches the aspect of global problems depicted in media discourse with regard to the pragmatic reference to the audience reaction. The methodology of this article begins with the task to collects the data in the English Twitter Corpus from the utterances of renown environmental activists. The highlight of the publication is the classification of these utterances supported by the numerical data. In addition to the illocutionary aspect, perlocutionary effect was identified proceeding from the reaction count. Along with a single and complex speech act, the authors identified the meaning of a complex speech act within the Twitter social networking service. Another major feature of the publication is identifying reversed speech acts used by the public figures for highlighting the importance of the topic raised on their microblogs. The present research explores the perlocutionary effect of the tweets by counting replies on tweets, quote tweets and likes. Having applied quantitative methods, the leading environmental topics were identified judging by the response of the audience. Calculated data is extensively used in the research to show the considerable impact of specific topics on the audience. This research will contribute to a deeper understanding of pragmatic study of social media for more profound arrangement of public figures’ speeches which can be translated to a schema for creating targeted social media discourse.

STRUCTURAL FEATURES OF MODERN ENGLISH COMMENCEMENT SPEECHES

This paper investigates structural features of modern English commencement speeches. In the article, the commencement speech is defined as a speech delivered at the graduation ceremony by outstanding people, who gained national or international recognition in some field (e.g. science, medicine, business or entertainment). We suggest that commencement address belongs to the entertaining-commemorating type of discourse and its main purpose is to show respect and inspire graduates, to honour the beginning of their independent life. To meet the needs of the study Nagorska’s approach to the speech structure has been adapted. The linguist distinguishes three main parts of a speech: Introductory, Basic and Final Communicative Units. The article focuses on the analysis of Introductory (ICU) and Final Communicative Units (FCU). The results of the study show that ICU starts with the greeting (formal or informal, sometimes both to avoid repetition) that is followed by the address to group or individual addressee. The speakers invariably greet and address the graduates but they may deliberately skip address to other members of the gathering. The keynote speakers tend to air gratitude but usually it appears as a reaction to active audience, their applause or excited exclamations, in that case orators deviate from the original text of their speech and spontaneously thank everybody for their warm welcome. The invariable feature of ICU of all the commencement speeches in question is the expression of honour as every speaker is genuinely grateful for the trust and opportunity to share his/her experience and inspire the younger generation. In FCU the speakers repeat the main message of the speech or challenge the students in order to leave a deep imprint on their memory and induce them to life-changing actions. They inspire graduates not to be afraid of failures and hardships, contribute to the community/country and find their true vocation.

"THE ERA OF THE STRONG BUT FEMININE WOMAN”: INTERTEXT IN THE PLAY “THE SISTERS ROSENSWEIG” BY W. WASSERSTEIN

The drama of the American writer Wendy Wasserstein is an important material for literary studies. Of particular interest for the study is the intertextual aspect of her work. The article analyses the interpretation of Chekhov`s motives (on the example of the drama “Three Sisters”) in Wasserstein’s drama on the example of the play “Sisters Rosensweig” (1992). It is determined that the concept of intertextuality in literary studies means the interaction of any text with each other, the superposition of the text on another. The main aspects of intertextuality that are relevant for the analysis of W. Wasserstein’s drama are analyzed and highlighted. Chekhov’s motives are described in the drama “The Sisters Rosenzweig” and the commonalities and differences between Chekhov’s play “Three Sisters” and Wasserstein are highlighted. The ideological-aesthetic and genre transformations of Chekhov’s artistic models proposed by an American woman playwright are analysed. The use of the classification of intertexts rel­evant for the analysis of plays by W. Wasserstein, according to M. Trostnikov is substantiated. In Chekhov’s play adapted by an American female playwrigh, popular plots and motifs receive a different feminist, optimistic sound development that meets the needs of late twentieth-century American society as well as in the con­text of novelty. Chekhov’s motives in Wasserstein’s drama made it possible to assess the degree of intertextuality of the play “The Sisters Rosenzweig”, in particular to find clear components of intertextuality in the drama. Rewriting Chekhov’s drama “Three Sisters” (1901) at the gap of almost a century, American playwright Wendy Wasserstein described the life of the Chekhov sisters in the modern way: successful professionals, two sisters realized themselves at the same time in motherhood and with love. Wasserstein practically preserved the plot, motives, artistic techniques and details in her modern play. The play­wright creates an interesting intertext that captivates the reader with a play on the discovery of “Chekhov style” in the text, the recognition of factual material and fiction.