Language consequences of modern psychological and information warfare in Russian mass-media: problem definition

The paper deals with the urgent and topical issue of political linguistics - the influence of information and psychological warfare on the Russian language. The aim of the paper is to describe the most frequent novices in the modern Russian language and speech which occur due to the domestic information and psychological warfare. The research was carried out on the basis of the mass-media texts, the traditional linguistic research methods were used (analysis and description, contextual and axiological analysis, etc.). As the result of the analysis the authors singled out both new and traditional words and word combinations which simultaneously serve as the weapon and the result of information and psychological warfare. Two groups of language (speech) means were defined: specialized (which perform the relevant evaluative function - either positive or negative) and non-specialized (which change the function depending on the context, the semantic ambivalent words and word combinations). The specialized means include pejorative words and word combinations: political labels, invectives, terribilitisms (bogey-words), delusions (trap-words), negatively connotative words, and euphemisms. Ameliorative means are not characteristic of information and psychological warfare, though words and word combinations are widely used which denote national concepts being the subject of information rivalry. Neutral language means in information and psychological warfare in the Russian language include terms and terminoids, naming various types of rivalries and technologies constituting them. The results obtained contribute to the development of the information and psychological warfare linguistics. Research perspectives encompass the refinement of some points and the analysis of information and psychological warfare language consequences in the light of linguistic ecology.

Features of newspaper headlines in the Russian-language press in Armenia

The coverage of significant world events in various mass media and the attitude of the journalists differ substantially. Newspaper headlines give the opportunity to navigate in the information flow and find the most important and interesting information. The headlines of the Russian-language newspapers in the Republic of Armenia are analyzed. The relevance of the research lies in the need to study headings from the point of view of their functions, grammatical structure, the use of punctuation marks in them, and their semantic components. The aim of the study is to identify and describe the grammatical, semantic, punctuation features and functions of headings in the Russian-language press in Armenia. The following methods were used: continuous sampling, statistical, descriptive, including methods of observation and comparison, component analysis, comparative analysis. The research material included the articles of the newspapers Respublika Armenia and Golos Armenii of June - July 2021. Based on the results of the research, the following conclusions were made: in the Russian-language press of Armenia, all types of sentences are used as headlines; almost all punctuation marks are used in the titles; headings form thematically organized groups. The peculiarities of the headlines of the modern Russian-language press in Armenia are determined by such factors as the tendency of the language to expressiveness, dialogue, democratization, creativity and the author's principle in the design of the heading. Taking into account the tendency to change the proportion of types of speech activity and highlight the most demanded and important at the present time - reading, the study of the linguistic features of the newspaper and journalistic style, in particular the headlines, is very relevant. The results of the study are promising, since they make a significant contribution to the study of the modern Russian-language press in the Republic of Armenia.

Implicit ways to express the author’s opinion in the publicistic discourse of Runet blogosphere

The modern analysis of journalist discourse is based on many extralinguistic factors: ethnocultural characteristics of the social environment, creating and sustaining discourse; conditions of political loyalty and the orientation of journalist discourse to the target audience, sources of discourse replenishment and conditions for its self-development in the general discourse-forming environment. These factors have a direct impact on specific ways of delivering information by the authors of the journalistic message to the individual recipient and the mass audience. The relevance of the research is determined, first of all, by the study of the features of the Russian language functioning on the Internet, which fits into the foremost problems of modern Russian studies. The novelty is associated with the analysis of specific ways of linguistic expression of the authors position in Runet journalism, which have not been specially studied so far. The purpose of the research is to consider the ways of expressing evaluation in the texts of the Runet blogs authors. The article shows that implicit ways of expressing the authors evaluation in the Runet texts have the same function as any other evaluative statements: to specifically influence the addressee. The studied material shows that the evaluativeness of the Runet blogosphere authors statements, closely interacting with expressiveness and emotionality, depends on their subjective perception of information and helps them express their point of view. The article highlights the implicit ways of expressing the authors position, which allow in an implicit but understandable form to convey the meaning of the statement to the recipient. The study used materials from Runet blogs, which most vividly and representatively show the features of the Russian-language network journalistic discourse. When working with speech material, analytical methods were used - descriptive (descriptive-analytical) and contrastive, which revealed the linguistic specifics of journalistic discourse, identified and interpreted intra-contextual and intertextual connections, established communication features. The research approaches of discourse analysis and stylistics were also used. The studied material and the results allow to conclude that implicit ways of expressing the authors position have the same goals as explicit value judgments: they emotionally affect the recipient and accurately convey the meaning of the statement. At the same time, implicitness in the Russian language successfully solves the problem of creating and maintaining the authors individuality. The prospects for this study are seen in further scientific development of various implicit ways of expressing the authors position in Runet journalism for further understanding of new processes in the Russian language, in the formation of journalistic discourse and in Russian communication in the digital space.

Some aspects of the Russian language democratization in modern media

The article is of an overview and theoretical nature, and its subject is the active processes in the language of modern Russian mass media, caused by the democratization of society, especially in connection with the restructuring of the state and political system that took place in the countries of Eastern Europe in the 1990s. Based on scientific publications, as well as on empirical material (modern journalistic text), the authors systematize socio-cultural processes (within the framework of the general trend towards democratization) that have influenced and continue to influence the language of the media: the social construction of reality and the engagement of the media, the polarization of social groups and formations, the displacement of the transmission model of media functioning by the interaction model, the phenomenon of echo chambers. In connection with the influence of the socio-political factor, the authors note the most important dynamic processes in the language of the media, such as depatetization of the language clichs of the era of totalitarianism, neosemantization, the growth of vocabulary related to the sphere of consumerism, the activation of means serving the sphere of dialogical relations, overcoming an overly complex nature the language system, etc. It has been shown that the transition to a model of interaction between the media (with political, religious, public organizations, corporations - on the one hand, and the consumer community - on the other hand) caused the social engagement of media discourses, which in its the queue has caused the growth of labeling, evaluative and expressive text elements. Another important trend is associated with the phenomenon of echo chambers - its reflexes in the language of the media are the specialization of vocabulary and a decrease in the degree of grammaticalization of messages. The aspects of democratization of the language of the media presented in the article in the future can serve as parameters in accordance with which media monitoring can be carried out, including elements of a linguo-critical nature.

Russian language in modern web space: dynamic processes and development trends

This article investigates new language trends in Internet communication. The goal was a comprehensive description of new features that appeared at every level of the language system functioning in the web space. Investigation of new systemic web phenomena has both relevance and perspectives, as the focus of literary language development has shifted from literary texts to web-based texts. The research material included Facebook posts and comments. The material was processed with stylistic methods (contextual, stylistic compatibility, interpretation, etc.). The synchronic analysis was accompanied with elements of diachronic commentary. The analysis also considered the normative aspect, yet the emphasis was made on the evolution of contemporary literary language influenced by digitalization and the growth of the Internet. The important factor in language transformation and development is realization of the creative function of the language in the user-generated content of the informal segment of the Internet. The multiple extralinguistic factors influencing Internet communication are described in details, but it is the creative function of the language and the features of new communication in the Internet space that are of primary importance for the development of the literary language in the Russian segment of the Internet. The study uses examples to prove the scientific hypothesis that new language phenomena on the Internet are not random, but on the contrary are systemic, as they are manifested at every language level. This allows drawing conclusions about the inevitability of transformation of the Russian language in the future, as the language will provide the communication of digital society that is already developing new ethic norms. Considering the trend on strengthening the legal frames for actions of state and transnational actors in the network space, the study of the Russian language and its trends in the Internet as one of the powerful means of soft power makes our study relevant for forming legislative mechanisms aimed at preserving Russian national interests in the international communication. The study is perspective, since it makes a significant contribution to preserving cultural and linguistic identity of Russian citizens in front of the growing international competition and uncertainty. In addition, being a linguistic study, this work deals with the issues of processing information with its increased speed and volume.

The specificity of Russian media neoderivatives reflecting social realia

The involvement of media speech in the society activities determines the relevance of studying the media text components in the extralinguistic aspect. The social conditionality of media neoderivatives contributes to their research in linguopragmatic and socio-cultural aspects. The purpose of the article is to identify the specifics of Russian neoderivatives reflecting current social realities. The research material include lexical and word-formation innovations in the texts of printed and electronic media of the beginning of the 21st century. In the course of the study, the methods of structural and semantic analysis of neoderivatives, word-formation analysis, content analysis, contextual analysis, descriptive and classification methods were used. As a result of the research, thematic groups of neoderivatives reflecting current Russian realities were identified (neoderivatives on pandemic topics; neoderivatives reflecting digital reality, Internet realities, business realities, etc.); the actual word-formation means and methods of creating the considered neoderivatives are determined (the usual methods of suffixation, prefixation, prefixoidation, addition of agglutinative type; the non-usual method of contamination, as well as the non-usual methods of creating polycode neoderivatives, in particular hyphenation, parenthesis, quotation, the use of ideograms and numbers, font and color selections); as a result of contextual analysis of media texts, the main functions of neoderivatives are characterized (nominative, expressive-evaluative, ludic). The conducted research is characterized by the novelty of the speech and language material and identifies the specifics of the socio-cultural and linguocognitive perception of reality in the modern language consciousness of the representatives of Russian society. The results of the research contribute to the solution of practical problems of journalism.

The precedent context of Russian mass media discourse

The role of precedent phenomena in the media space, in the processes of text generation and meaning formation of the media text is studied. Today, the media are modelling the reality. It may differ from the reality as it is, which is not reflected, but presented through diverse interpretations. In interpreting a statement/message, a significant role belongs to precedent phenomena and the underlying knowledge structures. The problems of the media text, a socially significant communicative environment of our time, determined the relevance of the research. The purpose of the study is to characterize the role of precedent units in interpreting the media text (at the level of meaning and significance). The materials of the research are Russian newspapers, the Newspaper Corpus of the Russian Language, the National Corpus of the Russian Language, and internet sources in Russian. The authors used methods of the discursive level, discourse analysis of precedent phenomena, taking into account their extra-linguistic dimension; the cognitive projection of the study assumed linguo-cognitive analysis and linguo-cognitive modeling as modeling the structure of meaning, text formation and sense formation based on precedent units. The study provides a discourse analysis of precedent phenomena taking into account their extralinguistic dimension and a liguocognitive analysis in order to model additional meanings and the structure of the meaning of precedent units. The cognitive approach identified the role of extralinguistic knowledge in forming the meaning of the text and the precedent unit. Thematized (invariant) knowledge shared by communicants is the key to the successful interpretation of the precedent unit and the functional effectiveness of the media text. Prospects: in the future, it seems promising to study the corpus of precedent units relevant to professional and citizen journalism, their structure, differences, spheres of functioning, as well as modeling the meaning of precedent units in social networks, memes, and the blogosphere.

Professional journalistic speech in the media environment

The research deals with one of the most important topics in the field of studying Russian as a foreign language - the diversity of the Russian language media environment. The purpose of the study is to determine its status in Russian-speaking media environment professional journalistic speech, that is its communicative status. The work analyses Russian-language publications of the traditional print press, radio, television, and materials presented in the communicative environment of the Internet: sites of various publishing houses, publics on social networks, blogs, etc. The paper is based on descriptive and comparative analysis. For the first time the content of the concept professional journalistic speech is revealed in the linguistic aspect. The main feature defining the ontology of media speech is the utility - direct involvement in general social life. Media text in its existence is always associated with the time of its publication, has specific coordinates of the social space-time, is created for here and for now. It is this feature of media speech that determines all its lexical and grammatical parameters. The media environment is presented as a space for everyday social communication. It is accompanied by the communicative space of everyday interpersonal communication - conversational speech. The latter thanks to Internet communication technologies actively invades the media speech space. Media speech actively interacts with colloquial speech. The research has shown that professional journalistic speech has always been a systemic element of the media environment, which manifests itself in a wide variety of forms. Numerous private enterprises are adapting professional journalistic speech products to their needs. The media communication environment is open, and in its borders, the printed form of colloquial speech is emerging. The space of non-professional media speech is also emerging - certain types of blogs, news feed Yandex-Zen. In the media sphere, the share of oral speech is constantly increasing. Because of the general trend towards personalization of the general information and analytical stream, the volume of author broadcasting increases. In this situation professional oral journalism requires special attention in the aspect of its non-verbal components of communication. Specialization in author broadcasting needs the technology of teaching Russian oral speech with increased attention to non-verbal components that have a pronounced national identity. The research prospects are primarily associated with dynamically developing local Russian-language speech media systems as verbal and polycode, as their composition is constantly being updated.

Levels of tests of Russian as a foreign language in terms of school age characteristics

The current paper discusses possibilities for school students to successfully pass TORFL-I/B1, TORFL-II/B2 and TORFL-III/C1. The relevance of this article is determined by the fact that despite Russian as a foreign (second) language has been taught within the framework of the TORFL system for more than two decades, there is a shortage of methodological material aimed at preparing school students for TORFL. In addition, the issue of choosing the level of testing in accordance with the level of Russian language proficiency and taking into account age specifics is not sufficiently covered in Russian academic literature. The aim of this paper is to define age reference marks for school students who plan to pass TORFL. The materials to review and analyse were the works of Russian and foreign researchers in the field of foreign (second) language proficiency, language development of children and adolescents, assessment of school students communicative competence, language assessment, and correlation of these data with the requirements for completing tasks of the TORFL-I/B1, TORFL-II/B2, TORFL-III/C1 Writing subtests selected as an example. The paper has resulted in providing recommendations on the choice of examination level for senior and junior school students, within the framework of TORFL-I/B1, TORFL-II/B2, TORFL-III/C1, which can also be used in the development of training courses in Russian as a foreign language for schools. The authors concluded that there is need to develop a new methodological area in testing of Russian as a foreign language system capable to provide guidelines and recommendations for preparing school students for examinations, and designing TORFL training courses and teaching materials according to the school students age.

A study of the speech of bilingual children of Russian Germans living in Germany

The article presents the relevant issue of analysing the common features of the grammar of Russian as language inherited by the second or third generation of migrant children in Europe and in the world. The novelty of the study is in the fact that it compares the speech of children with different dominant languages and, in particular, studies the speech of a group of children from families of Russian Germans living in Germany under dual language inheritance. Their parents have a very rich migration history, as they are, in turn, also heritage speakers of German, the language, which they spoke in their family. In the present paper, the main task will be to identify the common features determined by the contact between Russian as a heritage language and other languages, especially at morphological and lexical levels. For this purpose, a field research project was conducted at the Learning and Integration Centre Dialog e. V. in Reutlingen. The analysis of oral and written works of bilingual children of the last generation of Russian Germans showed not only the common elements of erosion identified in the heritage grammar, but also the special linguistic features caused by the transition from German-Russian to Russian-German inheritance. The influence of their parents language distinguishes them from other groups of Russian students, emphasizes the importance of studying not only childrens, but also their parents speech, as well as teaching standard Russian in the framework of non-formal education.