Ethno-Cultural Metaphor of Daily Life as a Reflection of the National Language Picture of the World in the English Language

Abstract

The article examines the ethno-cultural metaphor as a phenomenon of cultural studies, reflecting the process of perception of the surrounding reality by a certain ethnos. The real world is perceived by the ethnos through the prism of thinking, comprehended and realized in speech through language. The functional ability of the language to transmit the values of the national culture allows getting an idea of the specific and general mechanisms and ways of implementing the concepts of everyday life by a specific ethnic group. The relationship between language and culture determines the relevance of studying the mechanisms and methods of transmitting the national language picture of the world. The article proposes to explore ethno-cultural metaphors that are often encountered in everyday life. The research material was the American edition of the magazine «Cosmopolitan», the journalistic style of presentation of the magazine is close to the style of communication between people in everyday life. It was revealed that in everyday life, people endow the most common words with metaphorical meaning that convey color designation, a person's relationship with food, with natural phenomena, with everything that surrounds a person everywhere from day to day. The study made an attempt to structure the selected material according to everyday communication and highlight some concepts related to colour designation (colours), natural phenomena night – day, morning – evening, food (here eating periods like breakfast – lunch – dinner – supper can be distinguished as well as concepts food tastes), and other concepts that convey the relationship of a person with his environment. As a result of the analysis of the ethno-cultural metaphor of everyday life, we received confirmation that ethno-cultural metaphors are a significant element of the national language picture of the world, as they convey the value orientations of the ethnos and reflect the mental comprehension of the surrounding reality.