Dysphemisms and ethnic identity

Abstract

Dysphemisms are a multidimensional phenomenon consisting of vulgar or socially unaccepted words. The paper aims to analyse ethnic slurs from the perspective of political correctness, a relatively recent phenomenon that requires the use of a certain type of vocabulary according to various linguistic taboos. The corpus consists of a series of ethnonyms investigated in communicative contexts taken from the written press. The theoretical support of the research is based on socio-, pragma- and psycholinguistics.