The article discusses the ways in which lexicalization of vertical motion takes place in two satellite-framed languages: Polish and Russian. In this typological category the manner of motion is typically rendered by the verb. The analysis of the descriptions of motion events by native speakers of these two genetically related languages shows that the lexicalization pattern of vertical motion differs

В статье анализируется статус пословиц и поговорок в русской культуре и литературном языке первой трети XIX века. В первом разделе обсуждается амбивалентное отношение к паремиям у ‘шишковистов’ и ‘карамзинистов’. Использование пословиц и поговорок в художественных текстах 1800–1830-х годов (прежде всего, в поэзии) позволяет заключить, что паремии должны были проходить строгий вкусовой отбор. Во второй

This study tests the morphological gradience theory on Russian prefixed verbs. With the help of a specially designed experiment, in which participants were asked to evaluate the semantic transparency of a prefixed nonse verb given in minimal context, as well as to semanticise it by suggesting an existing Russian verb with the same prefix, we offer evidence that these verbs can be analysed as constructional

В статье подробно анализируются три близкие по значению дискурсивные идиомы того и гляди, чего доброго и не ровён час. Цель работы—выявить с помощью анализа корпусных данных семантические, прагматические и сочетаемостные различия между ними. Общая черта значения исследуемых единиц—сочетание признаков оценки степени вероятности предполагаемого события и его негативной оценки, что представляет собой

В статье исследуется конкуренция лично-притяжательных и возвратно-притяжательного местоимений, отсылающих к посессору 1 и 2 лица, в русском языке начиная с XVIII в. На материале Национального корпуса русского языка подтверждено предположение о том, что по сравнению с XIX в. в XXI в. существенно возросла доля возвратно-притяжательных посессоров в 1 и 2 лице. Вопреки ожиданиям, однако, лично-притяжательные

В статье демонстрируется асимметрия между темпоральными значениями слов со значением ‘близкого’ и ‘далекого’, и анализируются ее семантические источники. Одно из основных проявлений этой асимметрии—предпочтительная референция к будущему у слов со значением ‘близкого’ (ср. близкие каникулы = ‘каникулы в будущем’) и к прошлому у слов со значением ‘далекого’ (ср. далекие годы = ‘годы в прошлом’). Однако

The treatment of verbal aspect in Russian grammar and its interaction with lexical semantics are controversial matters. We address these issues from a psycholinguistic perspective. We conducted an EEG study with 14 native Russian speakers processing 160 sentences in the unrestrictedly iterative meaning; the sentences were either correct or contained semantic, morpho-syntactic, or aspectual violations

This article deals with the factivity and effectiveness of Russian propositional speech verbs. Some Russian propositional speech verbs can be factive if their subordinate proposition is always true, and some can be effective predicates if the speech act always accompanies a change of the recipient’s mental state. Russian propositional speech verbs are divided into four groups according to their factivity

The Slavic perfective (pfv): imperfective (ipfv) opposition is based on stem derivation. It creates a complex network of functions for finite and non-finite forms, which largely applies regardless of aspectual pairedness (and actionality groups), since this opposition has classificatory properties. However, can derivationally related stems claimed to represent identical lexical concepts be treated

It has been acknowledged that the null subject of a converbial clause in Russian is canonically controlled by the Nominative subject of a main clause (that is, Nominative subject control). Non-Nominative control has been considered to be ungrammatical. On the basis of two experiments (an acceptability judgement task and speeded grammaticality judgement task), the paper shows that non-Nominative control

This article provides a quantitative corpus-based investigation of the Russian verb rhyme and its change in the Russian poetic tradition from the beginning of the 19th century to the 1960s. Versologists have studied the rhyme primarily as a phonetic entity, whereas morphology also contributes to the rhyme euphony due to the regularity of grammatical affixes. The research focuses on a micro-diachronic

This article describes the current language situation within the Ripky district (‘rajon’) and its rural surroundings. This border area, part of the Polissian geographic macro-region, located between Ukraine and Belarus’, and not far from the Russian Federation, presents a very interesting and intricate language picture. The language situation within this aerea is characterized by an overlapping of

In this paper, we analyse case marking in Russian eventive nominalisations as recently discussed in an article by Pereltsvaig et al. published in this journal in 2018 with regards to two competing theories of case: the Inherent Case Theory and the Dependent Case Theory. We contest the view that Russian eventive nominalisations display ergative alignment and argue that Russian is a nominative-accusative

On the basis of data from the Russian National Corpus, we analyze the meanings and structure of the syntactic construction observed in phrases like durak durakom ‘fool-nom.sg fool-ins.sg’, which we term the ‘NOM∼INS construction’. We argue that the construction constitutes a network of three closely related subcategories, which we refer to as ‘Extreme’, ‘Paragon’ and ‘Discourse Change’. It is furthermore

A lexicographic description of the Russian idiom ⌜kto-kto, a…⌝, that is, its lexical entry, is proposed—according to the methodology of Explanatory Combinatorial Lexicography: its definition (in two formats: verbal, i.e. textual, and formal—as a formal semantic rule of the Meaning-Text type), its GOVERNMENT PATTERN, its syntactic structures and its lexical functions. As an illustration, the paper offers

This article examines one of the oldest conundra of Slavic historical linguistics, namely the relative chronology of the II regressive and the progressive palatalizations of velar obstruents. To do so, it is first of all shown that these palatalizations constitute two discrete innovations and not a single bidirectional change. On the basis of a thorough analysis of the competing hypotheses it is then

In the present article, we offer a detailed reply to alternative interpretations of our explanation of two eleventh-century phrases inscribed many times on the walls of the St. Sophia Cathedral in Novgorod: коуни рони and парехъ мари. According to our previous article in this journal, the phrases have a Semitic origin: Hebrew qūmī ronnī and Syriac /barren̲k mār/, respectively. In both instances new

Morphologically unmarked transitive (or accusative) impersonals, often also referred to as Adversity Impersonals or Elemental Constructions, have long been considered a primarily East Slavic phenomenon, with a somewhat marginal status in Polish. More recent research has claimed that these impersonal constructions also occur in other West Slavic languages and even in Slovenian. The present paper refines

Ambiguity of different types contributes significantly to humor creation, as predicted by incongruity theory This holds for homonymy, polysemy, structural and scope ambiguity, as well as any multiplicity of meanings that arises due to pragmatic factors. A consideration of languages with rich inflectional morphology, such as Russian, further reveals that linguistic humor may be based on the semantic

В словарных изданиях уже и уж часто подаются как синонимы, относящиеся к категории наречий или частиц. Критерии их семантического тождества и общей грамматической классификации, как правило, не уточняются. Сравнительный анализ уже и уж ведeтся в предлагаемой статье с точки зрения лингвистики высказывания и имеет целью показать, что эти единицы не всегда взаимозаменяемы, что передаваемые ими смыслы

This paper addresses the morpho-syntactic forms of ex-neuter-gender of Canadian Doukhobor Russian nouns. Doukhobor Russian is a near-extinct variety of Russian spoken by a small group of elderly Doukhobors (a religious and ethnic minority of Russian origins) residing mostly in British Columbia, Saskatchewan and Alberta. While Standard Russian has three noun genders (feminine, masculine and neuter)

The paper deals with the use of bare nouns in a non-coordination-based context. In the first part, the communicational function of the bare noun construction is analysed as part of a more general use of bare nouns for labelling evoked semantic frames. The specific subset of bare nouns depends on one or more propositions in the left context and provides a speculative categorisation that is usually associated

We present three case studies of the distribution of adjective + head noun (‘adjective’) vs. head noun + noun-genitive (‘genitive’) constructions based on datasets extracted from the Russian National Corpus. Each case study focuses on a different set of non-head referents: case study 1 examines non-heads that are country names (like ‘Norway’ as in norvežskij N vs. N Norvegii), case study 2 looks at

This article reports on a synchronic study of 989 Modern Russian verbs formed with the prefixes vy- and iz-, including standard lexemes, obsolete verbs, and newly-formed coinages culled from the Russian National Corpus. I argue that the hypothesis about the two historical origins of the prefix iz- may explain the ambivalent behavior of this prefix in Modern Russian, which shows both semantic overlap

We apply experimental data to identify contexts in which Russian aspect is categorically determined (‘categorical contexts’) and contexts in which both aspects can appear (‘overlapping contexts’). Traditional analyses suggest that these contexts are distinct and that certain features are typical for each type of context. Such analyses tend to rely on constructed examples typically consisting of a single

Before asking another person to do something, it is common to check whether they are available by asking preliminary questions, or pre-request. Pre-requesting is considered a politeness strategy used to mitigate face threat or avoid committing a request proper at all. This article focuses on analyzing Russian pre-request sequences and demonstrates how they are organized and expanded in particular communities

Based on the data from the Russian National Corpus, the paper studies Russian wh-exclamatives with and without predicates. Firstly, it lists wh-exclamatives with each of the following eight wh-words: do čego, kak, kakoj, kakov, naskol’ko, skol’, skol’ko, čto za. Secondly, on the basis of the corpus frequencies of the established wh-exclamatives, it shows that those wh-exclamatives that involve NPs

The paper aims at offering a descriptive analysis of case under sentential negation in the pre-World War II urban dialect of Lviv, one of the key historical ‘Borderland’ varieties of Polish which developed under strong Ukrainian influence. In this dialect, the direct internal argument in negated sentences could surface either in the genitive or accusative case. This is in contrast to other varieties

A long-standing issue in Russian linguistics concerns the noun in paucal constructions like dva goroda ‘two cities’. Is goroda the genitive singular of gorod, a separate ‘numerative case form’, or a ‘paucal number’? Although stress has figured prominently in the debate, corpus data and informant data regarding stress have received little attention. Based on the accentuated part of the Russian National

The paper deals with the vagaries of linguistic russification among the Ukrainians from the mid-seventeenth century to 1914. The authors explore the major stages in the implementation of the policies of russification in Russian Ukraine, starting with first bans on books printed in Church Slavonic of the Ukrainian recension via the decrees and edicts issued by Peter I together with the Holy Synod to

Difficulties in classifying words as to their morphological source cause us to question whether such a classification should be implemented through a linear morphemic or a whole-word approach. The present paper presents an analysis of which of these approaches could be the most viable account for cases in which the derivative form reflects the following: 1) multiplicity of potential bases; 2) semantic / orthographic

This study proposes a comprehensive typology of constructions with lexical and grammaticalized tip, tipa and po tipu, coupling a full grammatical description to the range of meanings expressed. The main construction types we distinguish between are: (i) binominal constructions, in which tip is either the head complemented by a supertype noun, or in which the supertype noun is a head modified by genitival

The paper deals with many problems related to our understanding of 19th-century Russian. Our main claim is that what may seem straightforward and nearly identical to the contemporary usage often displays significant difference in semantic and syntactic patterns. This difference, however, is usually ‘latent’, and special efforts are needed to unearth it. The paper is focused on one specific construction

Paucal constructions represent a specific sub-area in the grammar of Russian in which a kind of morphosyntactic variation can be found that is unattested elsewhere in the language. This variation occurs in some animate paucal constructions especially when these are in the direct object function. In this position, these constructions can be assigned either the genitive-accusative case (that is, the

Although much has been written about polite forms of address in Slavic, the grammatical expression of respect for a person that does not take part in the conversation has hitherto received little to no attention. Yet this type of honorific reference is widely found in the Slavic languages, especially in dialects and substandard varieties. In the present article I shall distinguish between three types

This is a study of Russian short first names (or ‘hypocoristics’) formed by a truncation of the corresponding full name. I propose that, syntactically, hypocoristics are associated with their own noun head that occupies a particular hierarchical position in a syntactic tree. This noun head is specified for the grammatical feature inflectional [class II]. Evidence comes from a change in the inflectional

Our study deals with the dative reflexive construction identified through a double alternation: a nominative vs. dative marking of the subject and a non-reflexive vs. reflexive form of the verb, as in ja ne rabotaju ‘I do not work’ vs. mne ne rabotaetsja ‘I do not feel like working’. We argue that this construction subsumes two subtypes: subtype 1, taking one-argument verbs such as rabotat’ ‘work’

АннотацияСтатья посвящена анализу употребления конструкции ‘глагол с приставкой под- плюс существительное в винительном падеже без предлога’ (pod-V + NAcc) на материале Национального корпуса русского языка (НКРЯ). В ходе исследования было рассмотрено более 2000 примеров употребления данной конструкции. Основной акцент сделан на развитии существующей методологии исследования семантических и грамматических

This paper concludes a research project on Belarusian-Russian Mixed Speech (BRMS), which is commonly referred to disrespectfully as ‘Trasjanka’. BRMS is practised as a subvariety by millions of people in Belarus, usually in addition to Russian. The findings of the project will be presented in a question and answer format. At issue are 11 questions, which have been widely discussed during the last two

Based on Russian-Chinese corpora, we explored 3 translation universals of Russian ‘kak structures’. We carried out the following analyses: 1. We categorized the structures into 7 groups, with 3 labeled as ‘splittable phrases’ (e.g. so…that) and four, ‘integral phrases’ (e.g. so that). The statistical analysis shows that translation correspondences of these groups differ from one another, which proves

The semantic variations of the Russian adjectives with the suffix -ist- are analyzed from both a formal point of view and by taking the role of the suffix as a relator between the value X expressed by the base of the adjective and the referent Y into account. The meaning of Xist adjectives is determined by the type of coreferential relationship between both values and by the degree of dependency of

The aim of this paper is twofold: it illustrates the benefits of rule-based instead of statistical machine translation, and it provides a starting point for the machine translation of the Russian aspect into English. Rule-based machine translation is still promising, from both a computational and theoretical point of view, because by implementing rules on the computer theoretical assumptions concerning

АннотацияВ статье описываются особенности употребления притяжательных клитик и в древнерусских переводах конца XIV в., происхождение которых связывается с кругом митрополита Киприана. С одной стороны, в переводе Евхология Великой церкви при передаче греческих притяжательных форм и славянские клитики встречаются преимущественно в позиции между определением и определяемым словом и таким образом фактически

The present paper aims to explain the morphological opacity between vrăh (singular form) and vărhove (plural form) ‘peak’ in Bulgarian. Adding a plural suffix -ov- causes a change in the syllable structure of vrăh into vărh-, which is an irregular phenomenon. In order to explain the phenomenon, we not only adapted the Sonority Dispersion Theory, but also examined the respective diachronic phonological

АннотацияВ статье рассматриваются имеющиеся в научной литературе сведения о Захариинском паримейнике 1271 года. Данный уникальный памятник привлекал внимание ученых при изучении своеобразия не только славянских, но и греческих паримейников, а также в связи с Борисо-Глебской проблематикой благодаря включению в его состав особых ‘летописных’ паримей о событиях русской истории. Вместе с тем, актуальной

In 1985, Zwicky argued that ‘particle’ is a pretheoretical notion that should be eliminated from linguistic analysis. We propose a reclassification of Russian particles that implements Zwicky’s directive. Russian particles lack a coherent conceptual basis as a category and many are ambiguous with respect to part of speech. Our corpus analysis of Russian particles addresses theoretical questions about

The present paper investigates the impact of structural ambiguity on humor creation in Russian. A range of jokes is analyzed which are based on the possibility of assigning two distinct structures to the same sentence, which, in turn, results in the emergence of two opposed scripts / scenarios / readings, as is necessary for the creation of a humorous effect. We consider several types of structural

The present paper offers an alternative reading of the Novgorodian birch bark letter N370. As a čelobitie ‘petition’, this letter contains the peasants’ angry voice, which may at the same time be subdued due to their social status. This paper aims to uncover its undertone. I suggest that cto ‘what’ and zaklucka (lit.) ‘for steward’ should form an idiomatic čtoza phrase and the pragmatic nature of the