Abstract: The article analyzes the image of the Chinese werewolf fox, or Huli jing (Chinese: 狐狸精), in Victor Pelevin's novel «The Sacred Book of the Werewolf». The comparison of the main character of Pelevin's work with the images of Huli jing in classical Chinese texts is made. In the center of consideration is the nomination of the heroine, her appearance, habitat, the ability to turn around and impose a hassle, the nature of sexuality, lifestyle. It is established that the image of the werewolf fox in Pelevin is a synthetic image created on the basis of mainly two cultures – Chinese and Russian. At the same time, she was influenced by mystical, religious, cultural and literary Chinese traditions. The writer relies on the components of the image of the Huli jing, borrowed from Chinese books, but offers an expanded and reinterpreted version of them. Pelevin is primarily interested in the desire of the werewolf fox not for bodily, but for spiritual transformation, on the way to which his heroine, relying on eastern philosophy, studies the principles of her mind. The Huli jing of the «Sacred Book of the Werewolf» and the confusion that it induces act as a metaphor for reality as a whole (man, time, space, language, the outside world, etc.). The nature of reality, according to Pelevin's novel, is transformational at its core, and this feature of it is due to its illusory nature. The relevance of the article is determined by the high interest of domestic and foreign literary criticism in the work of Viktor Pelevin and comparative studies (in this case, affecting Russian and Chinese cultures). The novelty of the work is due to the expansion of the concept of werewolf in Pelevin's novel – from the bodily inversivity of the main character to the characteristics of various aspects of reality.

Keywords: mysticism, soteriology, Buddhism, estrangement, transformational nature of reality, modernization, huli jing, Chinese tradition, werewolf fox, Viktor Pelevin

Abstract: The object of research in this article was A. Matveeva's novel "Every Hundred Years", published in 2022 and included in the shortlist of the Big Book Award. A novel with a diary." The specificity of this work lies in the fact that the parallel developing life stories of the two heroines are presented in the form of their personal diaries, one of which is fictitious in nature, and the second is a real diary, which was kept throughout her life by A. Matveeva's grandmother, Ksenia Mikhailovna Levshina. In this regard, the question arises not only about the distinction between fiction and nonfiction literature, but also about what happens to the status of a personal diary belonging to the category of non-aesthetic texts when it is included in the context of a work of fiction, the solution of which became the purpose of this study. The scientific novelty of the study consists in the introduction to the theoretical basis of the study were the classical works of M. Riffater, J. Genette and V. Yser, devoted to the nature of fictionality, as well as general provisions concerning the signs of a fictional text, set out in the work of V. Schmid "Narratalogy". In the process of analyzing the novel, it was revealed that when fragments of the text of real diaries are placed in the context of a deliberately fictitious world, not only the relationship of the image of the character Xenichka to the real referent (K. M. Levshina) is lost, but also the text of her personal diaries lose their connection with factuality and acquire the status of an object of comprehension. The narrated event in the novel, therefore, is not only and not so much the life stories of the two characters, but also the interaction of the factual and fictional, intimate ego-document and novel, the very writing of any text, both artistic and documentary, and the understanding of life as an aesthetic object.

Keywords: narrated event, nonfiction, documentary, factuality, fiction, fictionality, ego document, diary, novel, Anna Matveeva

Abstract: The object of research is the fantasy genre, its artistic world and language. It is noteworthy that, not being satisfied with existing terms such as "occasionalisms", "proper nouns", the authors introduce new concepts. The abovementioned terms are used in the analysis and description of the linguistic features of the fantasy genre, but do not reflect the specifics of fantasy. The subject of the study is mythological sign ("mythoznak") in the fantasy genre. The material for the study is the novel "Neverwhere" by N. Gaiman, from which mythological signs were selected by continuous sampling. They are characterized by the absence of a real denotation and form the denotation space of the pseudo-world in fantasy. The theoretical significance of the work lies in deepening the understanding of the term "mythological sign" (in the context of fantasy). The practical significance of the work consists in the possibility of using the results of the research in the practice of literary translation and for educational purposes. It is revealed that a significant part of the mythological signs are author's nominations, which brings them closer to the occasionalisms. Nevertheless, they are not always created by fantasy authors: conventional language units are also used in the function of mythological signs. In this case, the author changes their structure and semantic content. On the other hand, mythological signs are not always proper names.

Keywords: concept, denotation, Russian language, English language, proper noun, occasionalism, mythological sign, pseudo-world, fantasy, semiotics

Abstract: The article deals with the study of dialect and colloquial elements in English fiction. The main aim of the study is to identify, analyze and characterize the significance of dialect and colloquial elements in modern fiction. The author studies the following terms “dialect”, “dialect words”, “colloquial words”. In the article dialect-colloquial elements are defined as speech units that characterize a certain dialect and are accompanied by some colloquial elements. The examples of dialect-colloquial elements are taken from the following works: “The Secret Garden” by Frances Hodgson Burnett (1911), “When Marnie Was There” by Joan G. Robinson (1967), “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban” by J. K. Rowling (1999). The analysis of the works demonstrates that the functioning of dialect-colloquial elements is observed at different language levels: phonetic, grammatical and lexical. Reduction of sounds, devoicing or voicing of sounds, incorrect reading of the ending ‘ing’ are used at the phonetic level. The lexical level is characterized by the usage of obsolete forms of parts of speech and colloquial words. On the grammatical level a violation of the traditional grammar norms (no ending in the plural, the use of double negation, etc.) is found. The research proves that dialect-colloquial elements help to depict the characters vividly, convey the individuality of their speech, and sometimes serve as a means of satire.

Keywords: dialect words, colloquial words, dialect-colloquial words, phonetic level, grammatical level, lexical level, individuality, dialect, dialectology, fiction

Abstract: In this review, we intend to consider the possibility of analyzing the pedagogical discourse and its axiological component within the framework of the traditions of the third generation cognitive approach. The study of educational and pedagogical discourse is of interdisciplinary nature. Researchers from various areas of social sciences explore categorical, genre, social, linguistic, and other features of educational and pedagogical discourse. We propose to look at axiological component of educational and pedagogical discourse from the perspective of third-generation cognitive linguistics, in which the main function of language is the orientation of individual members of a particular social group. Within the biocognitive perspective, educational discourse is perceived as a part of linguistic interactions in the public sphere. It is suggested that the domain of written texts have a primary position in the public linguistic domains compared to natural language in the consensual domain of personal and family linguistics domains. In the center of this approach lies the understanding of language as a cognitive activity specific to humans as biological species. Both community and its individuals are co-determined in language and through language, and language is viewed as an interpersonal activity far from a stable system of symbols. In the relational domain of linguistic interactions between individual and society social values have a potential to exert an orientational influence on individuals.

Keywords: language function, biocognitive approach, third generation of cognitive science, linguistic interactions, orienting function of language, cognitive linguistics, axiological component, educational and pedagogical discourse, social imperative, socialisation