The Concept Death in the Ukrainian Cognitive-Linguistic World Picture : Structure, Statics and Dynamics.

Abstract

The thesis is devoted to the study of the language representation of the concept death, which being an important element of any national and cultural community participates in the formation of the cultural norms. The concept is viewed as a cognitive and linguocultural phenomenon. The concept is defined as the mental formation which combines certain concepts, ideas, knowledge, associations, emotions connected with a particular phenomenon. Part of the above elements form the core which is collectively developed and conceptually structured, while others form the individual variable periphery. The basic theoretical principles of national, language and cognitive world picture are clarified and revised, the new empirical material is analysed. The terms “concept”, “image”, “symbol” and “concept” are defined.

The concept death occupies a crucial place in the Ukrainian cognitive-language world picture. The six-stage analysis of the concept death is suggested, which combines cognitive and linguocultural approaches to its interpretation. The concept death is qualified as abstract, nominated, relevant, complex (multi-level), binary (has an antonymic couple ‒ life), universal, stable, primary, teleonic unit. Its motivational, notional, figurative, symbolic, value, associative components are revealed through the analysis of lexicographic sources and the Newest Ukrainian literature.

In addition to naming the concept, the lexeme death has a number of derivatives, synonyms and idiomatic phrases which are included into nominative means of the concept’s linguistic representation. The presence of the voluminous derivational field is a characteristic feature of the concept death in the Ukrainian language; powerful paradigmatic and syntagmatic relationships, which the verbalisers of the concept death form, determine its relevance in the Ukrainian linguocultural studied.

In terms of its structural organisation the concept involves six aspects and we propose a six-stage analysis of the concept death, combining cognitive and linguocultural approaches to its interpretation. Motivational and conceptual components of the concept find their reflection in lexicographic definitions. The figurative and symbolic components are revealed in the metaphorical meanings of the word functioning as general reflections of the particular subject, phenomenon, etc. The value component dominates the concept and can identify the national specific features of each mental formation being revealed at different stages of the research.

Dynamic characteristics of the concept are volatile and limited by consciousness of the collective or individual speaker. The concept as a linguocultural phenomenon is multidimensional, which determines the possibility of different approaches to its structure establishment and is characterised by the presence of universal national-cultural, social, group and individual-personal components.

Motivational features of the death concept were formed in Proto-Slavic and Old Kievan Rus’ periods of the language formation. Motivational features are stored in the form of trite metaphors or in the form of notional features of the concept. The analysis of keywords in dictionary definitions can provide the concept’s meaningful minimum ‒ the direct notional features. Indirect notional features are features expressed through paradigmatic and syntagmatic relations referents of the concept death.

Currently, in the native speakers’ minds the lexico-semantic field of the concept death (based on the results of the free associative experiment) has the following shape: the core of the concept is formed by the thematic groups “life”, “fear”, “unnatural death”, “the end”; the close periphery contains thematic groups which represent “peace”, “natural death”, “grief”, “ritual”, “afterlife” features; the distant periphery is constituted by thematic groups “age”, “symbol”, “time”, “politically marked associations”, “socially marked associations”, “disease”, “color”, “subculture”. The quantitative analysis of the features found in the Ukrainian discourse has shown that their use is not homogeneous. The highest frequency is observed for signs “termination of existence” (20%), “the end” (16%), “execution” (11%) and “ruin” (9%). The signs of “clinical death” (1%), “death of the soul” (1%), “biological death” (0.5%) and “destruction” (0.5%) have the least frequency.

The figurative component of the death concept in the Ukrainian language is predetermined by a number of cognitive features, which serve as the basis for typical metaphorical statements. In the texts of the Newest Ukrainian literature, the figurative aspect of the death concept includes features of animate (vital, anthropomorphic, zoomorphic, vegetative) and inanimate (elements, property, artifacts, substances, food, spatial and temporal features) beings. The concept death is explicated in the texts’ symbolic meaning through anthropomorphic signs (images of a young and an old woman), theomorphic features (soul / spirit, punishment), colour symbols (black, white, purple, yellow, blue); images-symbols (sleep, beginning, cold, darkness).

The concept death accumulates general and specific values. The most widespread in the Ukrainian cognitive-linguistic picture of the world are the following valuable characteristics of the concept death: natural / unnatural, beautiful, heroic, easy, terrible, shameful, ordinary, majestic, sudden. Within the value component of the concept, we single out such universal values as freedom, will, happiness. In the centre of the concept death scenario lies the situation scheme which contains the event itself, its assessment and emotional experience. In the centre of the emotive scenario, there is the emotion associated with the death. In the event scenario, on the contrary, the emotional experience of death is the consequence of the event.