Issue 2

Modalwort kaum am Beispiel der literarischen Werke von deutschen und russischen Schriftstellern

This article attempts to trace semantic change of the modal word „kaum“ and its meaning in German and Russian languages. Traditionally modal words being much more frequent in spoken than in written language don`t possess grammatical status. In the context this article focuses on etymology, equivalents and combinability with other particles, as well on the introduction of meanings of „kaum“ in pre-, middle- and afterfields.

Cross-cultural Analysis of Phraseological Units of Biblical Origin in the Russian, Spanish, French and English Languages

This article is devoted to the cross-cultural analysis of phraseological units of biblical origin in the Russian, Spanish, Italian, French and English languages. The conducted cross-cultural analysis revealed a range of similarities and differences between phraseological units of biblical origin in given languages, showed general and culture-specific features in biblical phraseology despite the common source that affect the translation of those units from one language to another.

Cognitive aspects of frame-scenario “discreditation” in political discourse (on material of US presidential debates 2012)

The article is devoted to a cognitive analysis of the frame-scenario “discreditation” in the political discourse. The material taken is Barack Obama’s speech in the final US presidential debates on October 22, 2012. As seen from the results, the frame-scenario «discreditation» can be viewed as a series of components. There are five of them: stimulus – approval – criticism – approval – conclusion. Due to conceptual analysis of the two main components, i.e. approval and criticism, it is possible to find out their dominant meanings.

AN AXIOLOGICAL COMPONENT OF THE LINGUO-CULTURAL TYPE “HÉROS COMBATTANT / HERO-FIGHTER”

The life of a hero-fighter as a linguistic and social personality is organized around hierarchically arranged value dominants, which are socially and individually determined and form his conceptual and linguistic pictures of the world. Such dominants are believed to semiotize the hero’s linguo-cultural space, consequently identifying the objectives and priorities of the society, as well as shaping the personality’s outlook.

English-Russian dictionary on plant protection as a means of training bachelor students in agronomy toward translation and vocational competencies

This article deals with the experience of preparing and using special English-Russian dictionary for training the bachelor students in agronomy. The peculiarities of the Russian agricultural education have been taken into account to help BSc students to translate and understand professionally oriented English texts.

Improving the Monologic Skills

This article gives a brief outline of the problem of improving the monologic skills. It provides the features of the monologue and stages of its improving by inductive way. It also studies linguistic and speech exercises playing an important role in training the monologue.

English-Japanese code-mixing in J-pop and J-rock song texts

This article presents the results of a study in the field of contact variantology or World Englishes. It describes the results of the English and Japanese languages contact in Japan’s popular music culture. Phonetic, lexical and grammatical features of Japan English in J-pop and J-rock song texts are presented and analyzed. Code-mixing is examined at the levels of the text, paragraph and phrase.

Foreign Language Learning in Modern Russia and the World: National Peculiarities in Aims, Reasons and Methods

The aim of the research under consideration is to figure out the cultural peculiarities of studying foreign languages in modern Russia. To achieve this aim a survey concerning the aims, reasons and ways of studying foreign languages and cultures was conducted. It was aimed at schoolchildren in Moscow, students, graduates and postgraduates, international students, visitors and trainees of higher linguistic institutions in Russia. Contrastive study of the answers given by the respondents from various world regions helped to single out the peculiarities of foreign language studies in Russia.

Russia’s image in France and the “soft power” of lyric and comic art

The article brings out the problem of Russian lyric and comedy genres being scarcely absent in France. Apart from the objective historical reasons, the problem has its roots in the difficulties of Russian humor and poetry translation and in profound world-view differences that require not only an elaborate translation of these tricky art works, but also a constant enlightening work aimed at the prospective audience.

A Lexicographic Analysis of Conceptual Verbalizators: The Germanic REBEL(L)

This article rationalizes a lexicographic study of the cognitive concept explicators REBEL and REBELL existing in the German language and in American English. Key concept names, or verbalizators, are detected and classified according to their semantic characteristics, including those historically inherent in the words` inner forms. Finally, substantial changes in concept names` meanings are laid out based on a diachronic analysis of a number of dictionary entries.

Challenges in studying regional identity

In the article the author looks into the challenges one faces when trying to explore the notion of regional identity. Firstly, it is a problem of terminology, problem of defining the region and dominants of its development as well as challenges in understanding how regional identity is formed depending on these dominants and region defining. Also problem of natural and artificial ways of regional identity forming is discussed based in historical experience of Russia. The topic of regional identity is considered to be of great interest for discipline of regional studies.

A Corpus-based Approach to Semantics of German Idioms

The article deals with the question, what new information about the semantics of
German idioms can be acquired from computer-readable text-corpora. Illustrative
material is taken from the dictionary articles, which were composed by the author. The analysis of corpora data gives an opportunity to detect meanings, which have not yet been fixed in dictionaries, to reveal, what meanings are the most frequent, and to order them accordingly to their frequency, as well to consider cases of non-idiomatic or weakly idiomatic usage.

Representation of anthropocentrism in the texts of the English- language business press

In the texts of the business press anthropocentrism manifests itself through the so- called communication triangle “author-text-reader” and is expressed by the medium of a variety of means. Among them the structural-grammatical means play an important role because they reflect most clearly the anthropocentric nature of the texts of the business press, help the author get into an indirect dialogue with the reader and affect him or her as appropriate.

Concepts “honneur” – “déshonneur” in the Linguocultural Content of French Phraseologisms

The article presents the results of the research concerning antonymous concepts “honneur” and “déshonneur” and their place in French linguistic picture of the world. These notions represent in a language a semantic unity based on opposite concepts-universals and the ways of linguistic expression. These concepts are reflected in French proverbs and go back to different ages of the development of the French nation. The main aim of the article is to specify the notion “concept” on the basis of the works of Russian linguists, to present the results of the analysis of the paremiological materials of phraseological dictionaries.