Конотації етнонімів у мовній та культурній свідомості українців

Анотація

Background. Ethnonyms are nominations of other people. In the picture of the world of each people, there are stereotypical notions of “we” and “strangers”. They form a large lexical group. This dictionary can provide extensive information about the linguistic picture of the world of native speakers, their culture, psychology, peculiarities of their perception of other people. The insufficient state of research of Ukrainian informal ethnonyms makes it possible to discuss the relevance of further development of the problem.

Purpose. The purpose of the work is to determine the specific features of processes, which prompt the creation of non-standard nominations of a person according to his / her belonging to an ethnic group. Informal ethnonyms are characteristic of all epochs, all languages, and dialects. Their occurrence can be justified historically, politically and psychologically. The main tasks of the work are to attempt to characterize the motivational peculiarities of ethnonymization of a person in Ukrainian sociolects and to determine the degree and quality of the connotations of such names.

Results. Ways of formation of non-standard ethnonyms in the language are different. The semantic basis for the formation of ethnic nicknames may include proper names typical of a certain nation, as well as some groups of vocabulary that represent categories that are indicative of an ethnic characteristic: peculiarities of appearance, character traits, gastronomic passions, social status, language and singularities of pronunciation, etc. Ethnonym stereotypes national expressions, since it does not denote an individual, but an entire ethnic group with all its inherent features. These language units reproduce ethnic stereotypes as components of linguistic consciousness. The ethnonymic repertoire reflects, first and foremost, direct contacts of the ethnos with other peoples, often neighboring ones.

Key words: ethnonyms, unofficial ethnonyms, motivation, semantic base, ethnic stereotypes.