The Linguistic and Cultural Nature of the Concept of "Patriotism"

Shagbanova Khabiba Sadyrovna Doctor of Philology Professor, Department of Philosophy, Foreign Languages and Humanities, Tyumen Institute for Advanced Studies of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia 625049, Russia, Tyumen region, Tyumen, Amurskaya str., 75 khabiba_shagbanova@list.ru Other publications by this author

The concept of "patriotism" is a multidimensional mental unit that functions in many areas of culture and human activity based on the reception of the worldview. Within the limits of consciousness, the comprehension of this concept and the construction of associative fields are carried out, for which this concept is the center, the logical and semantic dominant. The existence of the concept of "patriotism" is associated with the formation of a collective idea of a specific model of behavior and its implementation in the aesthetic space, and it, as A. Hick notes, is a significant participant in the dialogue between the individual and the surrounding world ^{[16, p. 169]}.

The concept under study is characterized by a value component, which consists in the ability to label fragments of reality and activity of both an individual and groups of society through the prism of given attributes (for example, service in the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation through this approach is interpreted as the realization of the imperative of the individual, directed for the benefit of the Motherland). The concept of "patriotism", being a mental unit, is praxeological in terms of expression, i.e. it assumes activities: protection of the interests of the state, the people, preservation of traditions and culture, education of fundamental values among the younger generation ^{[13, p. 350]}.

Considering the presented concept as a fragment of a naive picture of the world, it is possible to distinguish the results of understanding reality and the reaction of society to specific circumstances. Among the key features of the concept are appeals that realize the internal form in a concentrated way – due to semantic connection, independent of context, as well as appeals of a dispersive property that represents in the addressee's mind the appearance of this nonverbal concept through a set of language units included in its connotative space.

The concept of "patriotism" has a high conceptual stability: in the communicative space, the probability of mismatch of associative connections in the conceptual apparatus of the addressee and the addressee is extremely low and, as a result, erroneous interpretation. Of course, there is an accentuation of certain components of semantics, stating the specifics of the reception of a language unit. The accentuation of a certain element of a linguistic unit from a set of heterogeneous and unequal is inherent in all levels of the language, and is an absolutely inevitable process aimed at both stabilization and conservation of possibilities on the one hand and compensation and expansion on the other ^{[7, p. 28]}.

In addition to lexicographic fixation, accompanied by a wide range of meanings that have developed in the course of history, the concept exists on the scale of personal perception, where at the subjective level it distinguishes one specific meaning from the set that is appropriate in a certain situation. At the level of the text, the concept of "patriotism" functions in the form of sub-components relevant to individual genres and discourses, however, for the most objective perception of linguistic reality, it is necessary to turn to introspection, taking into account the surface-speech and deep-language aspects of functioning ^{[4, p. 204]}.

The presence of a motivated connection between the signifier and the signified is key for linguistics, in connection with which the concept of "patriotism" should be considered as a point influenced by the environment and a point influencing those systems and concepts with which contact occurs. The core of the concept content consists of the meanings recorded in dictionaries, and peripheral meanings are formed by cases of occasional use. The concept under consideration on the basis of nominative density refers to the marginal ones, i.e. those whose nominative density regularly increases, but extremely low activity in terms of metaphorical transfers.

The formation of the linguocultural concept of "patriotism" is based on generalization, i.e. on the translation of the semantic component of their register of phenomena and situations of a particular order into the category of general ones through distancing from particular features. The presented concept is characterized by the ability to nominate actions, activities, thus demonstrating a high polysemy. With all the relevance and social relevance of the analyzed mental-linguistic unit, the problem of exhaustively determining the dominant meaning of the semanteme under study remains debatable, since individuals live in overlapping identities – social, intellectual, political – and none of them dominates individually or regularly serves as a guide for reaction ^{[17, p. 56]}.

In the paradigm of linguoculturology, the concept of "patriotism" reflects constitutive features and conceptual and linguistic specifics in various types of discourse. The construction of a cognitive model of the concept under study through its complex description with an appeal to semantic correlates indicates a wide range of use, high productivity and valence.

The structure of the linguocognitive concept contains factual, axiological and figurative components. Comprehension of an object is possible only when understanding its structure, preserving it in our consciousness, studying it or trying to influence it, therefore, the way to understanding an object (it can be an organism, a system, an event, an action, a theory, etc., etc.) lies through comprehension of the structure ^{[15, p. 124]}.

The factual component involves the verbal formulation of the reaction of the mental state to the situation (or their totality) of vital activity, as a result of which the cognitive-content component is reflected through semantic structures segmenting the content of the concept. Thus, using the concept of "patriotism" in a communicative act, an individual actualizes a set of projective meanings that form the semantic space of this unit of language. The factuality component motivates the manifestation of one of the derivational elements of semantics as significant in the context of situational conditionality.

The perception of the concept of "patriotism" is based on interpretativeness, which makes it possible to fix cases of subjective meanings, and its sentational manifestation represents a situationally dependent mental state, expressed in a specific meaning (nuclear or peripheral), focused on content-conceptual information and a high explanatory status. Factuality is presented in a pair of relevant correlates "the concept of "patriotism" – the intention of the speaker", which illustrates the multi-component semantic and functional potential that can be realized in a variety of communicative situations. The form and meaning in this pair, through a combination of associations and connotations, convey subtext and conceptual information. Conceptual information, in turn, contributes to the disclosure of positive human capabilities, the development of which serves as a catalyst for the formation of a just and healthy society ^{[6, p. 378]}.

The semantic organization of the concept is marked by the structure of society at the pragmatic level, which fixes the studied cultural dominant as a significant nominative unit in the communicative space, indicating certain signs, features of a linguistic personality. Culture acts as a platform within which an endless process of interpretation is carried out ^{[8, p. 224]}. The extralinguistic aspect of the concept of "patriotism" is formed by the conditions of its use and the system of culturally significant associations, as well as the degree of interaction with a certain subsystem of the language. As a rule, when used in speech or text, the addressee's attention focuses not so much on the concept itself, but on the extra-linguistic associations accompanying it, appealing to the national, cultural and historical heritage of the state. The representative meaning of the concept "patriotism" is a semantic iceberg, which has an obvious meaning in the development of one or another semantic component forming the associative background of a linguistic unit. The semantic productivity of the concept "patriotism" is initiated by the inner form of the word and the halo of paradigmatic and associative connections inherent in the addressee's consciousness, and its lexical potential, characterizing the ability to identify conceptual content and a set of cognitive features, is expressed by the cognitive profile ^{[1, p. 109]}.

The concept of patriotism is a linguistic sign with a widely developed ambiguity. The implementation of the component of ambiguity for this semanteme is expressed in the meaningful relationship of semantic derivatives. The onomasiological potential and comprehension of the content of individual meanings, as well as the generality of the form, allow us to state not only logical and semantic proximity, but also the absence of a strictly fixed spectrum of concepts with which interaction occurs. The nuclear value of the studied language unit is similar to a gravitational field with a high density in the center and less active and pronounced gravitational forces in the orbit area, in peripheral areas, nevertheless, the influence of these forces on the correlating, nearby and involved in contacting area of the language does not pass without a trace: such mutual influence leads to a change in the component of the ambiguity of the interacting concept, expansion There are grounds for identifying particular meanings, for fixing semantic development as elements of the logical structure of the word and the nomination tool.

Language, representing a sign system, universal in nature, functions as a translator of specific information decoded by the perceiver's consciousness. Thus, a sign combines two concept–forming elements - a designator and a designator, or a signifier and a meaning. The structure of the concept of "patriotism" has a high independence in relation to the linguistic mechanism that formed their semantic appearance.  The sign as a unit of language under study in the content aspect is based on experience, on the results of practical use, and in the aspect of meaning, meaning is formed by displaying the most frequent ratio of values. Ambiguity, motivated by combinations of internal formal relations with different oscillation limits, does not always project ordered relations of formal values. In this regard, it should be understood that strict commutation of the planes of expression and content is primarily an elusive ideal, and the efforts of researchers to bring both components to a common isomorphic denominator serves as a prerequisite for generating surrealistic units at the level of structure and content.

The abstract name, which is reflected in the concept of the same name, is characterized by regular changes. They are an integral part of natural language and reflection of the totality of changes perceived and evaluated by consciousness in general and the structure of the language material in particular, sporadic or regular appeals to the experience of past eras. Hyperbolization of the aspect of consistency is productive only under conditions of use within a complete system. The concept of "patriotism", experiencing regular cases of correlation of the expression plan with the manifestations of the content plan, thereby loses the opportunity to consistently organize the structure of semantic relationships within the expression plan. The perception of the linguocultural dominant patriotism is largely determined not only by the consciousness of the addressee, but also by the development of the relevant subject area with the fixation of the differences in human practice.

Language seems to be significantly important in the aspect of the design of ideas, in this regard, it should be noted that there are forms that reflect a certain current state of the language sign, state the fixation of the process of acquiring new meanings in the process of communication. But along with this, there are also such units of language that have all the conditions to complement the content of the language sign to reflect a new fragment of reality. The content of the concept of "patriotism" in the context of this study should be considered as a construct formed by an ideal and real component. The ideal component assumes for a native speaker of a language and culture a set of meanings that can be reduced to a common signification, while the real component is conditioned by a set of denotative meanings. Communicative experience makes it possible to carry out the processes of practical distinction and identification of the denotative realization of the ideal component within the cultural and linguistic community in the most uniform manner to the extent that this representative of society is himself integrated into the mental space of a particular system.

The semantics of the presented linguistic sign has no clearly defined boundaries and is dynamic, therefore, the values recorded in dictionaries do not allow us to unambiguously judge the structure of the designation, besides, the definition of the presented linguistic and cultural phenomenon is accompanied by problems of discretization and organization of the internal structure, the key to solving which has not yet been found. The internal structure of mental education is realized in two planes. The variety of meanings of the word, represented on the scale of the usual exploitation, motivates the process of semantic derivation. The usual meaning of a word is a well-known usage that is registered by dictionaries, however, along with considering language as a system of interaction of semantic units, there are also potential meanings of the word, expressed in the possibilities of the development of semantic structure.

The perception of the concept of "patriotism" by consciousness is due to the formation of multiple connections that organize variations in denotation into a system with a single semantic center. One of the cornerstones of multi-component semantic education is the implication connections that allow the functioning of ideal and real entities as manifestations of one mental linguistic and cultural object. The concept of "patriotism" is also implicated for the reason that, being used in certain conditions, motivates the recipient to think about another, adjacent object, suggesting some kind of dependence, logical mutual influence, a component of identification (for example, patriotism – courage, patriotism – heroism). Polysemous words are characterized by implication activity due to the high variety of ontological connections that initiate the implication process. Also, a semantic construct, implicative in nature, presupposes the presence of conversely interrelated designates. The converse features actualized in the asymmetric argumentation of relations and the resulting relations are translated by grammatical or lexical means, however, a variant of semantic expression is also real when the implication forms represent different meanings of one lexeme.

The concept under study, due to its abstract nature, is syncretic in nature, providing information of an evaluative and factual nature, verifying or refuting the system of knowledge / ideas about a particular analyzed object. In this regard, the factuality of the concept of "patriotism" represents an informational semantic field implicitly implemented in speech or text. The recipient, decoding the logical and semantic content of the reported concept at the subconscious level, builds an individual cognitive model of assessing reality, perceiving this knowledge as a fragment of the sphere of setting life-meaning problems of human existence ^{[5, p. 151]}.

Factuality represents the realization of a certain state of affairs in relation to the truthful mental world, naturally reflecting a fragment of the value-cognitive picture of the addressee's world. Considering the concept of "patriotism" as a unit with a high lexical association, we can state its generative nature, relevant in a wide range of discourses. The semantic potential of the concept is realized in the process of combining the meaning of a word with individual or collective experience; the meaning relevant to a particular discourse is derived through component analysis: the material (lexeme) and ideal (sememe) formations are correlated in such a way that on the basis of lexical compatibility, syntagmatic connections, analysis of linguistic and cultural specifics, such components of the concept as the semes of associative, hidden and variable order. In the context of discursive usage, it should be noted that discourse is marked by the phenomena of change, transition and alteration, it serves as a starting point for the development of thought that translates the concept and its aesthetic potential ^{[9, p. 89]}.

Multicomponent mental objects are often represented by abstract formations, the definition of the semantic structure of which is associated with a detailed description, with the creation of diagrams, graphs, diagrams. Projecting the content of the concept of patriotism in the context of linguistic semantics, it is important to correlate the case of a specific use with the intentions of an individual whose intention forms a semantic complex due to a set of explicit and implicit emotional shades: interpretation is one of the key cultural tools accompanying the concept at all levels of its existence ^{[3, p. 366]}.

The culturally significant concept of "patriotism" is described in one of his interviews by Yu. Norstein: "I believe that true patriotism is when a person goes to his death, knowing perfectly well that he is going to his death, and at the same time realizing that he still has a home, his loved ones" ^[2]. This case of usage registers a precedent of intercultural communication, where the concept in question functions as a semantic dominant within the syntagma motivating the behavior of the bearer of a certain worldview. At the same time, the presented concept is universal, adjusted for national, linguistic and cultural specifics and determines the features of the scale of the value picture of the world of language communities and, as a consequence, mentalities interacting in the communicative space. The basic material for the development of the concept's meaning is an idealized cognitive model – a relatively stable mental representation of a certain fragment of the linguistic picture of the world with a certain set of features, details ^{[14, p. 23]}.

To determine the internal structure of an abstract concept, linguocultural or linguocognitive approaches are mainly used, with an emphasis on the reconstruction of content based on the actualization of meaning in the national linguistic and conceptual space. Consciousness is the point of contact of culture, language and the system of values, therefore, mental formations of a collective nature mark the specifics of the corresponding linguistic and cultural continuum. Linguistic semantics tends not to distinguish between the existence of an object in the observer's mind and in the real world, in this regard, the existence of the concept of the representation of an individual is not identified with the ontological fixation of this fact on the scale of the entire language usage ^{[11, p. 398]}.

The reification of the linguistic and cultural phenomenon is carried out by linguistic means, but they are not exhaustive representatives: here no less attention should be paid to the issues of reception of this mental unit by representatives of the ethnic community. The concept of "patriotism" is fixed at the level of consciousness of the bearers of a certain worldview, codified in lexicographic sources and various texts, and objectified by the tools of the Russian language. The description of the semantics of a lexical unit extends beyond the list of meanings, but also needs to indicate the semantic structure of the word, the patterns of meaningful variation of words and a set of potential variative reinterpretations ^{[10, p. 32]}.

The conceptual component of the concept under consideration, in addition to semantic derivatives, includes neutral synonyms that complement the sum of values with differential semantic components. The variety of positive connotations inherent in the components of the concept of "patriotism" testifies to its positive perception in culture and illustrates its comprehension in the minds of the bearers. All this is due to the fact that the process of scientific cognition registers not only the structure of the object, but also numerous socio-cultural factors affecting it ^{[12, p. 109]}.

In the Russian language picture of the world, the linguistic specificity of the concept under study allows it to be interpreted as one of the significant socio-cultural dominants. The presented linguistic unit functions in the aesthetic space as one of the connecting links between the individual and society. The essential features of this phenomenon include praxeology, appeals of concentrated and dispersive properties, high conceptual stability, limit, polysemy.