Russian proverbs in linguo-axiological and lexicographic interpretation: Traditions and innovations

Abstract

The aim of the research presented in this article is to develop the concept of a linguo-axiological dictionary representation of proverbs and proverbial concepts in their current state, taking into account various structural and semantic transformations and new axiological components of their meaning. The sources of the material of the study were the paroemiological collections of I. M. Snegirev, I. I. Illustrov, V. I. Dahl, and modern authors; Internet sites; and recordings of live speech of modern native speakers of the Russian language. The development of the lexicographic aspect of the topic was preceded by a comprehensive linguistic analysis of paroemias. The methods of historical-etymological, component, contextual, linguo-axiological analysis reveal their modern semantics and cultural-historical background. The mechanisms of transformations are studied by the method of structural and semantic modeling. The authors’ method of axiologically oriented lexicographic parameterization of the material, developed to solve the research problems, is based on the domestic experience of the dictionary description of paroemias and the authors’ developments in this field. The developed model of the linguo-axiological dictionary representation of paroemias is presented on the material of the proverbial concept “House”, one of the basic concepts of Russian linguaculture. The representation of the paroemiological material in the alphabetical headword dictionary implies the explication of the evaluativeness not only of the original paroemia, but also of its transformations through emotive-evaluative labels, axiologically oriented definitions, and functional-pragmatic commentaries. The transformations of the original proverb are grouped according to structural and semantic models of transformation, which allows us to systematically reflect the transformational potential of the paroemia, to show the dynamics of its formal and conceptual sides, the displacement of its axiological vector. In the thematic dictionary of a new type, the evaluative component of the proverbial concept is reflected by the headings of dictionary macro-entries that convey the general axiological meaning of the group of paroemias. The dictionary macroentries with such axiological headings are grouped within thematic sections in the order from traditional value orientations of linguaculture to new evaluative attitudes represented by new paroemias and proverbial transformations. The emotive and evaluative characteristics of the proverbial material reflecting the new axiologemes allow us to conclude that the neo-paroemias and transformations of traditional proverbs convey the jokingly ironic attitude of nominators to the denial of traditional values rather than their real denial and ridicule. The proposed concept makes a theoretical contribution to the development of problems of linguo-axiological interpretation of paroemias and will find practical implementation in the creating of modern dictionaries of proverbs. The authors declare no conflicts of interests.