GENDER VARIABLE IN REALIZATION OF DIRECTIVE SPEECH ACTS

Author(s): Suzana S. Marković / Language(s): English Issue: 82/2023

This paper deals with the gender variable in realization of directive speech acts, such as requests, suggestions, advice etc. The sample for this small-scale research consists of 328 instances of directive speech acts which are excerpted from the transcripts of selected dialogues of the popular US sitcom Friends and five American feature-length films. Directive speech acts are analyzed using Blum-Kulka et al’s classification (1989) and divided into three broad categories– direct, conventionally indirect, and non-conventionally indirect with many subcategories. The focus of this paper will be on direct strategies typically expressed with imperatives and on conventionally indirect directives usually expressed with interrogative sentences which include a suggestory formula and preparatory strategies, with special emphasis on their use in male and female language. The goal of the paper is to analyze and compare gender preferences in using different strategies for the realization of directives, with the assumption that women will be more thoughtful of the hearer’s face and use indirect forms more frequently than men. This is in line with Holmes’s (1995) characterization of women’s speech as more polite than men’s. The paper will analyze the use of these directive strategies in F-F interactions, M-M interactions, M-F interactions and F-M interactions. The illustrative examples will be analyzed using the theory of speech acts and politeness theory, using qualitative, quantitative and comparative research methods.

Genre and stylistic markers of Ukrainian folk jokes

Author(s): Olena Yemelyanova,Svitlana Baranova,Irina Kobyakova / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2023

This article focuses on the study of Ukrainian social and domestic folk jokes that contain information about the life of people, their habits, customs, traditions, and relations, and ridicule the weak sides of Ukrainians. The research material comprises 311 folk jokes that date back to the second part of the 19th century – the beginning of the 20th century. They are selected from the collection by M.V. Nagornyi (1940) and the book of Ukrainian folk satire and humour (1959). The goal of the research is to study the main genre and stylistic markers of Ukrainian folk jokes. It is noted that Ukrainian folk jokes have a form of dialogue. Ukrainians’ longstanding tradition of self-deprecating humour is also mentioned. The stylistic markers of the texts under consideration are the choice of vocabulary with diminutive suffixes, a wide range of expressive means, and stylistic devices that are a basis for achieving humorous effects. Diminutive suffixes are proved to have acquired specific characteristics in folk jokes giving positive or negative evaluation. Ukrainian social and domestic folk jokes, some of which take the form of joke-stories, are distinguished by precision, witty expression, and concise and dynamically constructed plot. The future research might involve the detailed study of the peculiarities of the Ukrainian social and domestic jokes of the third millennium, focusing on their linguistic and extra-linguistic features.

Празнуваме 10-годишен юбилей на учебника „Медиен език и стил: теория и съвременни практики”, УИ „Св. Климент Охридски“, 2014 г.

Author(s): Iva Ivanova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 15/2024

Gli studi linguistici in "Ricerche slavistiche" (1952-2021)

Author(s): Anna Bonola / Language(s): Italian Issue: 65/2022

The author discusses articles published in “Ricerche slavistiche” from 1952 to 2021 pertaining the field of Slavic Linguistics, so she does not take into consideration the numerous papers devoted to philology and ecdotics. Firstly, she presents essays on lexicon and language variety (§ 1) within the various Slavic languages, then she considers those essays that are more clearly devoted to morphosyntactic phenomena (§ 2). She pays special attention to the evolution of approaches, methods and themes, together with elements of the Italian and international context helping to understand the role of “Ricerche slavistiche” in the spread and development of Linguistics in Italian Slavic studies during the seventy years of the journal’s activity.

SECONDHAND EMBARRASSMENT AND “ISPANSKYI STYD” FROM CROSS-CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE

Author(s): Viorica Lifari / Language(s): English Issue: 36/2024

The research of concepts is a common issue in cross-cultural studies. Recently in the context of the war between Russia and Ukraine the Russian Diaspora from all over the world tries to express their opinion on the created situation as more and more nations worldwide develop a negative attitude towards the Russian and their language. They speak about secondhand embarrassment and “ispanskyi styd” as a feeling they experience. Russian sources insist that the term “ispanskyi styd” (also Spanish shame) used in Russian in the mentioned context is supposed to have entered the Russian language from English in the globalization period. This article is an attempt to clarify the existing terminology in English on the topic and by doing that to identify the role of the concept denoted by the existing expressions among the important cultural values for the Anglophone world. Also the study can help confirm or deny whether the phrase “ispanskyi styd” in Russian has English roots or it has entered Russian via English.

ASPECTS OF THE DOBRUDGEAN TOPONYMY IN THE CONTEXT OF THE ROMANIAN TOPONYMY

Author(s): Camelia Alibec / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 36/2024

Romanian toponymy evolved over the years and millennia from a linguistic point of view. Topical names appeared at certain historical moments and are associated with certain moments in the material and spiritual life of people, leaving a trace of society from different eras. The research of Dobrudgean toponymy highlights current problems and aspects in the general and Romance linguistics. These problems and aspects have materialized in analyses and interpretations of distinct toponymic facts and phenomena, as a result of the complexity of investigation methods and principles at the contemporary level. The way of life of the inhabitants, the relations and the direct links between people and society, etc. played a special role in this process. We can assert that the cities in Dobrogea are very stable, regardless of their ethnicity, and the toponymic names provide an additional proof of the continuity and stability of the Romanian society in medieval and contemporary Dobrogea.

SOME DIMINUTIVE FORMS CONTAINING THE SUFFIX -EL USED ON THE INTERNET IN THE LAST FIVE YEARS (2019-2024)

Author(s): Anda Lăscuș / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 36/2024

The class of diminutives on the online environment is characterized by evolution, mostly a quantitative one, in the sense that it is constantly enriching with recent and neological diminutive forms. In the present article, the term ʺdiminutiveʺ will reffer to words that convey the notion of ʺsmallnessʺ which can be interpreted literally or metaphorically, by adding a diminutive suffix (in our case ʺ-elʺ) to a base word. The aim of the present descriptive study is to make an inventory of some new diminutive forms containing the suffix ʺ-elʺ excerpted from the Internet in the last five years and in this way to illustrate the creativity of Internet users. The focus will be on morphological cathegories of the diminutives: nouns, adjectives, adverbs and interjections. These will be presented along with the context in which they were used, all of them being selected from the virtual space, from different online conversations.

THE PRAGMATICS OF DISCOURSE IN HEALTH CARE AND FOOD ADVERTISING TEXTS- A CROSSLINGUISTIC APPROACH IN TERMS OF ‘DEDICATED’ PHRASES (ENGLISH – ROMANIAN)

Author(s): Andreea DINU / Language(s): English Issue: 36/2024

This article aims to analyze the pragmatics of the advertising discourse. We live in a world in which advertising and the advertising discourse have a major significance. There are advertising messages or discourses with a pure informative purpose, but there are also other patterns, such as: the metalinguistic advertising discourse, the poetic advertising discourse, the advertising discourse with an expressive or emotional function, the advertising message with a conative or phatic function. Some forms of advertising discourse have cognitive and communicative functions. By means of this article, we tried to sketch a general view on the advertising discourse and its functions. We illustrated these theoretical examples with a series of illustrative examples, featuring some of the most famous commercials. To create a brand implies, in the end, concentration, efficacy, efficiency and coherence, all these dimensions and valences being present in the advertising discourse.

LEXICAL MODIFIERS IN THE ROMANIAN JOURNALISTIC DISCOURSE

Author(s): Emanuela Păduraru / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 36/2024

This article aims to present concepts and theories to be used later in the analysis of linguistic sequences containing lexical modifiers which come from the Romanian journalistic discourse. To begin with, an incursion will be made from a theoretical perspective in order to establish the meaning of concepts such as: lexical, grammatical, lexico-grammatical and prosodic modalizers. In the second part of the article, the types of lexical modifiers will be approached semantically, grammatically and pragmatically.

THE RECEIPT OF THE EDITORIAL

Author(s): Eliza Pop / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 36/2024

Starting from the main communication actuators, the transmitter and the receiver, the aim of this study is to analyze the editorial texts from the perspective of the receiver, i.e. the reader. Thanks to the facilities offered by the online environment, we have based our research on the comments found in the dedicated fields on the online pages of the publications from which the corpus was formed. The analysis led to an attempt to categorize messages from readers based on their content or formal layout: we have identified comments that refer to the content of the editorials, comments through which readers question the author of the text, or comments that are published as replies to previous comments on the same text. Regardless of the category these messages fall into, they prove the need for information and the individuals’ concern towards the issues discussed in the press.

EXPLORING SOCIAL REALITY IN ROMANIAN, ENGLISH AND FRENCH ANTONYMIC PHRASEOLOGIES: “SUCCESS” AND “UNSUCCESS”

Author(s): Oana Balan / Language(s): English Issue: 36/2024

This paper examines the social reality and cultural relativity surrounding the concepts of ‘success’ and ‘unsuccess’ across Romanian, English and French phraseologies and the way they are reflective of the values, norms, and aspirations of a society. Drawing upon cognitive linguistics theories, the analysis delves into linguistic expressions and cultural narratives related to ‘success’ and ‘unsuccess’, while also considering the biographies of prominent figures such as Queen Elizabeth II, Coco Chanel and Queen Mary of Romania. By comparing linguistic representations and cultural attitudes towards success and unsuccess in these three languages, this study aims to highlight both the similarities and differences between societies and their perceptions of achievement and failure.

CALQUE AND LANGUAGE IDEOLOGY IN CONTEMPORARY JOURNALISM

Author(s): Ionela-Cristina Bogdan (Sandu) / Language(s): English Issue: 36/2024

The aim of this paper is to show that the calque phenomenon has a major impact on the process of Romanian contemporary journalism, leading to its evolution. This way, the evolution of the press has also had a major impact on the media phenomenon. The process of calque, also known as loan translation, has been a subject of study in terms of enhancing a language's vocabulary through external methods. This aids the formation of fresh terminologies in both general and specialized areas of language.

CULTURAL AND LINGUISTIC RECEPTION OF THE HEART (CASE STUDY: GREEK IDIOMATIC EXPRESSIONS)

Author(s): Ștefan Dumitru / Language(s): English Issue: 36/2024

From the perspective of cognitive linguistics, the Greek idiomatic expressions whose core term is the noun “heart” confirm the cultural representations of it in the most important cultures: headquarters of emotions and feelings, of reason and conscious decisions, of will. The three levels of human consciousness are captured in various ways in the corpus of the sixty-three expressions inventoried. In the present research we highlighted both the correspondences between the two domains established by cognitive linguistics, as well as their essential coordinates. The drafting of similar studies will allow the formulation of conclusions that interest both the study of Greek mentalities (with interdisciplinary developments) and modern directions of language study, such as neurolinguistics.

On Attitudes towards Language

Author(s): Sanja D. Miketić Subotić / Language(s): English,Serbian Issue: 1/2024

The aim of the paper is to present theoretical observations about attitudes towards language through the prism of social psychology and from a sociolinguistic point of view by reviewing the basic terms, perspectives, and research of theoretical and methodological significance for this area of sociolinguistics. At the same time, we will present their usual methodological framework and the importance of research.

Пол, род и език

Author(s): Iveta Tasheva / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 2/2024

The article deals with the question of whether or not there is a feminine language, how we can define it and to what extent it is the result of gender or gender differences. Some specific names and theories are considered, and their functioning is also applied to the language of medicine.

Осъзнавани и неосъзнавани правоговорни проблеми (от перспективата на езиковото консултиране)

Author(s): Milen Tomov / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: Special/2024

The proposed paper presents the results of a study on inquiries to the Language Consulations Service related to orthographic problems. Based on the classification and analysis of the received questions, also taking into account the reasons for seeking specialized linguistic help, the problems of standard language pronunciation are outlined, which are realized by users and accordingly give rise to the need of consultations, and, on the other hand, the orthographic phenomena of which there is a complete lack of user interest. Attention is also paid to the different ways in which the questioners react to the realized orthographic problems – either through a specific enquiry arising from a hesitation or by expressing a critical attitude towards a given orthographic phenomena. Conclusions are drawn regarding the reasons for the very low interest in orthoеpic issues in general among users.

Елизиите в устната реч и тяхното отражение върху българския език на едно второ поколение емигранти

Author(s): Katya Issa / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: Special/2024

The article examines various manifestations of elision in the oral speech of Bulgarian emigrants living in Sydney, Australia. Parts of informal conversations recorded in a domestic setting, using the involved observation method, are presented. Many elisions prevail in them (in the speech of the first generation), in some words without exception, and these words are perceived by the children (second generation) who were born abroad or left very young with their families, as the only (“correct”) option of the correct speaking. Since native Bulgarian abroad often functions only in its oral form and is practiced only within family and friendly gatherings, the children get the impression that these words are spelled the same way and have no other spelling options. Morphological, syntactic, stylistic, and phonetic interferences were found in the speech of the second generation of emigrants. The deformation is also reinforced by Bulgarian lexemes mutilated by elisions. Keywords:

За някои разстройства на детската реч: ранен детски аутизъм, вербална диспраксия на развитието, фетален алкохолен синдром

Author(s): Evelina Grigorova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: Special/2024

The main function of speech is the communicative one, i.e. the transmission of comprehensive information from the speaker to his interlocutor and vice versa. The communicative chain model has long been known in linguistics and its simplified form includes addressee (encoding)→ message/noise→ (decoding)→ addressee. It can be seen that interference could occur on both sides of the communication chain. In this paper, we will briefly describe some problems in communication due to pervasive developmental disorders such as early childhood autism as well as developmental verbal dyspraxia, and fetal alcohol syndrome. A relationship between neural patterns and the disorders under consideration will be outlined in general terms.

Book review

Author(s): Reza Arab / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2023

Humour and the public sphere

Author(s): Giselinde Kuipers,Dick Zijp / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2024

In this article, which serves as an introduction to a special issue on humour and the publicsphere, we argue that humour has become increasingly central to public discourse in the 21stcentury, and that this necessitates a rethinking of the relationship between humour and thepublic sphere in contemporary democracies. In the article, we bring together the dispersedacademic literature on humour and the public sphere, and show how humour and comedyscholars have engaged with the long-standing academic debate around this contested concept,which was coined by Jürgen Habermas in 1962. We also introduce the eleven contributions tothis special issue and situate them within this ongoing debate.