Collection and informativeness are the essential properties of a language sign, which are the basis of its most important function along with the communicative - the cumulative function. Language in this function is a link between generations, a "repository" and a means of communicating outside-language collective experience.
The most vividly cumulative function is manifested in the field of vocabulary, as it is directly related to the objects and phenomena surrounding reality. The lexical system is more conditioned by the phenomena of the material world and social factors.
First of all, the vocabulary reflects fragments of social experience, conditioned by the main activity of a given people. The existence of these or those lexical units is explained as if by practical needs.
For example, the inhabitants of Chukotka have up to ten names of snow corresponding to its different states, and the Eskimos distinguish even up to 100 different shades of snow. The Arabs used numerous names for different horse breeds, and black tribes in Liberia distinguished themselves by a variety of rice varieties, each with its own name.
Different peoples have different traditions of color designation. For example, representatives of some African tribes distinguish only three colors. The same number of flower names exists in Navajo, with two words for black: black of darkness and black of coal.
Even the names of colours in different languages are peculiar and symbolic. Thus, for example, in Russian gray is associated with mediocrity and everyday life. We say "grey everyday life" about nothing remarkable days. Or we can say "Such greyness" in the emotional assessment of limited people. In England, grey is the color of nobility, elegance, that is, it has completely different connotations.
White color in Russian is the color of purity and joy, the color of robe, the color of snow, at the same time in the East it is the color of mourning.
Even the same physical thing may correspond to completely different semantic descriptions depending on the civilization within which this thing is considered. Therefore, Leontief's statement about the existence of "national meanings" is true.
"It is undeniable that two words in two different languages, denoting the same subject in the culture of two peoples and being the translation equivalents, are inevitably associated with different content, and this allows us to speak of "national senses" of language signs".
The word "dog", for example, is a good example.
A dog is 1) a harnessed animal in the Eskimos; 2) a sacred animal of the Persians; 3) despised in Hindu language as a symbol of lowliness.
The hare is a scythe and a coward of the Russians, but wise and knowledgeable for the peoples of West Africa. The dragon is a symbol of evil in Europe; a symbol of power, health and prosperity in the East.
In some languages, the emergence of a number of words denoting certain concepts, was dictated by some social or historical prohibitions. For example, in the last century in England it was forbidden to say such words as "chest", "leg", even when speaking of chicken, so the phrase "whitemeat" and "black meat" appeared, instead of "to go to bed" was used "to retier to bed". There were no prohibitions in other languages, and no such combinations were recorded
Already nowadays, as a result of the struggle for equality in the United States, the ethnonym Negro and its equivalent Coloured disappeared from the official use and pages of the press. They were replaced by Black and AfroAmerican. The category of citizens, which used to be called the aged (the elderly), is now officially referred to as senior citizens. Similar renaming has also affected sex minorities (for example, gay instead of homosexual).
Certain national and cultural connotations acquire their own names in the language and names. Their specific content is determined by the persons bearing these names, but they tend to perform not only the named functions, but also to denote some quality, property, characteristic features of the person in general. Here you can cite the following passage:
A person can be
- Miserable like the little match girl
- Alike with women and fast with gun like James Bond
A little girl who sells matches on the street (the image developed in English literature in the 19th century) represents deprivation and suffering. On the contrary, James Bond is a Super Agent 007, and he is associated with the idea of a superman, a favorite of women. However, without knowledge of this it would be impossible to understand the whole meaning, which the authors tried to invest in these lines. Requires knowledge of literature, history, traditions of England.
The connection between the history and culture of the people and the language is especially evident at the phraseological level. A large number of proverbs and sayings reflect specific national features, rooted in the history of the people, their life, customs and traditions.
An example from the field of enlightenment is the coming to power in May 1972 of Margaret Thatcher with a conservative policy in the field of education. The Government ordered the abolition of the mandatory free provision of milk to all children in schools. Since then, various organizations of the British education system have tried to reverse this decision by all means, or to find other means to provide milk to children. In newspapers, the articles related to this problem called milk "FREE MILK" and not just "milk". For example, "... to supply FREE - MILK to all 7 to 11 year old...". Thus, the combination of "free milk" was socially rethought and became phraseological; moreover, it acquired a symbolic meaning. "FREE MILK!" was a protest against the government's education policy.
All of the above leads to the conclusion that some layers of vocabulary are more obviously driven by social and cultural factors, while others are less obvious. If the national-cultural content is the core of the phraseological units, it is a kind of connotation in the names of its own.
Thus, it is possible to distinguish three groups from words having a cultural component:
- Equivalent
- Сonnotative
- Background vocabulary
The first are words that serve to express concepts that do not exist in another culture and do not have direct equivalents outside the language to which they belong.
The second is about the words that do not simply point to the subject, but also carry the designation of its distinctive features.
Background vocabulary - words or expressions with additional content and accompanying semantic or stylistic shades, which are superimposed on its main meaning, known to speakers and listeners belonging to a given language culture.