Notes «umen'shitel'noe» ‘diminutive’ and «uvelichitel'noe» ‘augmentative’ in «Explanatory Dictionary of the Russian Language» by N. Yu. Shvedova

Van Chzhe Postgraduate student; Department of Russian Language; Lomonosov Moscow State University 119991, Russia, Moscow, Leninskie Gory str., 1 zh.wang@mail.ru

Galaktionova Irina Vladimirovna ORCID: 0009-0005-5818-605X PhD in Philology Associate Professor; Department of Russian Language; Lomonosov Moscow State University 119991, Russia, Moscow, Leninskie Gory str., 1 ig@philol.msu.ru

Introduction

The source of information about the words of a particular language for a native speaker of this language is a dictionary, primarily an explanatory one. A person learning Russian uses appropriate bilingual dictionaries, but at a later stage of language acquisition he turns to explanatory dictionaries.

The most popular non-specialist users have always been single-volume explanatory dictionaries, primarily the Dictionary of the Russian Language by S. I. Ozhegov, including in the publications that N. Y. Shvedova worked on. Speaking about the specifics of single-volume dictionaries as opposed to multi-volume ones, N. Y. Shvedova notes: "Large dictionaries are intended for those who work specifically with the language <…>. However, there are a wide range of readers who need the dictionary primarily as a modern practical reference book that is constantly at hand. This is a function of a single—volume dictionary" ^{[1, p. 166]}. She identifies four categories of readers of such a dictionary: a professional "linguist reader who checks the lexicographer professionally for one purpose or another" ^{[1, p. 167]}, and three groups of non-specialist readers: a person reading a dictionary as a book, a native speaker who wants to get specific information about a word, and a foreigner using a dictionary as a a reference book and a textbook.

Readers of any of these categories need an accurate and understandable description of the word, which is achieved, in particular, by using a unified metalanguage. Traditional lexicography demands uniformity in the description of words that are similar in any respect: belonging to the same thematic group, to the same word-formation type, etc. N. Y. Shvedova notes as an extremely undesirable, although understandable, disadvantage of the dictionary "a large number of the most diverse discrepancies in the development of similar words" ^{[1, p. 170]}. The most unified means of description can be considered the marks used in dictionaries, each of which should have a completely specific content.

Describing any property of a word with the help of a mark is also a way to reduce the volume of the dictionary text, thereby resolving one of the paradoxes of the dictionary entry, which N. Y. Shvedova wrote about — the "contradiction between the comprehensiveness of the task" of describing a word in the context of language and the "limited possibilities of the genre" of the dictionary entry ^{[2, p. 621]}.

In Russian lexicography, there is an established litter system that reflects different properties of words and their lexico-semantic variants (LSV) — from grammatical to functional-stylistic, from temporal to expressive-evaluative — and slightly differs in different dictionaries. A fundamental study of litter in the main explanatory dictionaries is presented in the monograph ^[3]. The researchers pay special attention to stylistic and evaluative marks, their change over time, and differences between dictionaries in the qualification of the same units (see, for example, ^{[4, 5]}).

The litter is a convenient tool for describing, among other things, the semantics of certain groups of LSV, namely such LSV derived words that are regularly correlated with producing words, in particular in the case when the derived word contains one or more additional components of meaning, which are indicated by the litter. Such litters did not attract much attention from researchers.

Purpose and methods

Russians Russian lexicography as a whole, a group of litters is studied in this article, using as an example their use in the "Explanatory Dictionary of the Russian language with the inclusion of information about the origin of words" by N. Y. Shvedova (^[6], hereinafter referred to as SH) — a single—volume dictionary aimed at the widest reader and continuing the tradition of single-volume dictionaries, laid down By S. I. Ozhegov. The focus is on the litters of the animals. (diminutive) and took away. (magnifying), attributed to nouns; complex marks, which include a diminutive component, are also involved in consideration. or taken away., and some expressive and evaluative marks.

The purpose of the article is to determine the content of animal droppings. and led away., for which the reader's reasoning is modeled, based only on the materials of the School itself. Such arguments, or at least part of them, can be made by the reader of any of the categories highlighted by N. Y. Shvedova, including foreigners who know Russian to such an extent that they can use a Russian-language explanatory dictionary.

The need to determine the content of the litter arises if the author of the dictionary himself did not explain it in the auxiliary materials, for example, in the preface. There is no such explanation in the School, there is only a list of abbreviations ^{[6, p. VII]}. The lack of explanations indicates that the author considers all the designations used in the dictionary, including marks, to be well-known (for example, studied in Russian lessons at school) or understandable without explanation, simply because the reader knows the general linguistic meaning of the relevant words. It seems obvious that most readers will proceed from the same considerations and will not try to specifically find out what the content of the litter is.

Thus, the article models the reasoning primarily of a linguist reader, as well as an inquisitive lay reader, for which the method of semantic and syntactic analysis of interpretations and the method of comparing litters of words of the same semantic types are used.

Material and discussion

To find out the content of the litter, the reader can rely on the interpretation of the words used as litter (if there are such interpretations), on the litter system as a whole and on the practice of attributing litter to specific words and their LSV.

1. The meaning of the terms diminutive and magnifying

The School has dictionary entries for the adjectives diminutive and magnifying. Let's look at these articles in order to extract from them a meaningful characteristic of the litter.

In SSH, two values are fixed for the adjectives diminutive and magnifying.

The first meanings of each of them refer to one of the meanings of the verbs decrease and increase, respectively. These verbs have two meanings: reduce — "1. Make it smaller (in size, volume, quantity). u. weight. U. load. 2. Make the image smaller" ^{[6, p. 1026]} and enlarge it — "1. Make more (in size, volume, quantity). U. number of participants. U. release of goods. 2. Make a larger (image). U. under a microscope. U. photograph" ^{[6, p. 1014]}; the adjectives diminutive and magnifying in their first meanings correspond to the second meanings of the corresponding verbs; only the word magnifying is illustrated by a combination of magnifying glass.

The second meanings of adjectives are terminological, directly related to the sphere of word formation. The following are the dictionary entries of these adjectives in their entirety, with the exception of information about forms and words derived from them:

Diminutive: "1. See reduce. 2. In word formation: referring to the formation of nouns, adjectives and adverbs denoting a smaller value, a degree of quality, as well as an emotional attitude (e.g. house — house, apple — apple, Vanya — Vanechka, bad — bad, kind — kind, soon — soon, quietly — quietly). U. suffix" ^{[6, p. 1026]};

Magnifying glass: "1. See zoom in. 2. In word formation: referring to the formation of nouns and adjectives denoting a large amount, a degree of quality, as well as an emotional attitude (e.g. house — domishche, big — big, healthy — hefty). U. suffix" ^{[6, 1014]}.

The interpretation of the second meanings begins with an explanation "in word formation", which indicates the terminological nature of the meaning and the scope of its use; the examples given in parentheses show that the listed meanings are expressed using suffixes. The dictionary entry lists three possible meanings of suffixes that they introduce into derived words: a smaller/larger value, a (smaller/greater) degree of quality, as well as an emotional attitude.

The terms diminutive and magnifying used as a litter are obviously the result of the substantiation of these adjectives and, in addition to the semantics of the adjectives themselves, contain a component of the meaning ‘meaning’ (that is, the diminutive noun is interpreted as a ‘diminutive value’); the meaning of the adjective is entirely embedded in the meaning of the derivative noun-term.

Interpreting the interpretations of the corresponding adjectives, the reader must understand for himself how the three meanings, which, as indicated in the dictionary, can be added during word formation, relate to each other. These interpretations can be understood in two ways.

According to the first understanding, the derivative word means either only the magnitude of the object, or only the degree of manifestation of the feature in the object, or only an emotional attitude to the object. This understanding contradicts the general linguistic meaning of the words lesser, decrease and greater, increase, since the expression of an emotional relationship in a word does not reveal any connection with magnitude or degree, that is, with such a parameter, the value of which can be characterized as less or more. At the same time, among the examples of the word diminutive there is a pair of Vanya — Vanechka, in which the derivative word does not indicate the "size" of the person he calls, but expresses only an emotional attitude, thereby supporting this first understanding.

Thus, at the first understanding, the litters are reduced. and he took her away. some words express information about the size or degree (let's call such information parametric), while others do not.

According to the second understanding, the derived word, firstly, denotes the magnitude of the object or the degree of manifestation of a feature in the object, and, secondly, an indication of an emotional attitude is also added to the value of the magnitude or degree (moreover, it is unclear from the interpretation whether it is necessary or can be added); such an understanding is indicated by the syntactic structure of the interpretation, in which the "emotional attitude" component is introduced by the conjunction and as well, rather than joining the previous two separated by commas or using the conjunctions and either or. But this understanding is contradicted by the Vanya — Vanechka pair, where the value of an emotional relationship is not added to anything.

In the second understanding, the parametric meaning of words with such markings is mandatory. This understanding is more consistent with the internal form of the terms, but is not, as we have seen, the only possible one.

This ambiguity of dictionary interpretations accurately reflects the existing scientific discussion about the meaning of words with diminutive and magnifying suffixes, or — in other terminology — diminutives and augmentatives. Researchers note a close relationship between parametric and evaluative meanings in such words, and many of them believe that both types of meanings are always represented in them (see, for example, ^[7-9]). The opposite point of view is also presented (for example, ^[10-12]); its proponents note that the implementation of only a parametric value is characteristic of special conditions (for example, for the official style of speech). The corresponding terms — especially the term diminutive — are widely used in the literature and to designate words expressing only an assessment, but not a parameter (for example, ^[13]).

However, it seems that familiarizing the reader with scientific discussions is still not part of the task of a dictionary aimed at a wide audience, especially since it is impossible to do this in a short dictionary entry. The reader needs a clear definition of the content of the diminutive and magnifying droppings, which, it seems to us, does not receive from the above interpretations.

2. Analysis of the litter system.

The marks in the dictionary do not exist individually, but as a system. Therefore, you need to see if there are any droppings specifically designed to indicate the presence of an emotional relationship in the word to the designated object or to the interlocutor (in other words, emotionally evaluative droppings). In the list of abbreviations of the SS, the marks of iron are found. (ironic), lask. (affectionate), contemptuous (contemptuous), contemptuous (disparaging), pejorative. (derogatory), a joke. (jokingly), as well as complex litters are reduced.- Lask. and reduced.- unich. ^{[6, p. VII]}; in addition, in the corpus of the dictionary there are marks that are not marked in the list of abbreviations: decrease.-neglect. (with the words zdorovishko and toporishko), increase.-neglect. (with katyuga), as well as decrease.- joke. (with a piece of paper).

The presence of separate emotional and evaluative litters in the litter system, as well as the possibility of combining them with litters, is reduced. and led away., which by their internal form indicate the value of the parameter, indicates that the litters have decreased. and he took her away. it should be understood precisely in the parametric value. Then the presence of only litters with the word is reduced. indicates a component of the meaning of ‘small’, but took away. — on the ‘big one’, the presence of also litters of weasels., neglected. or unich. to a positive (=affectionate) or negative (=disparaging, pejorative) emotional attitude towards the named object or to the addressee of the statement. (The content of the litter is a joke, combined with a decrease. in the only case, and iron., which does not give combined litters, we do not touch.) Thus, parametric litters (indicating size or degree) are contrasted with emotionally evaluative litters (indicating an emotional attitude).

It is the purely parametric understanding of litter that is reduced. and he took her away. It is directly based on the common language meanings of the verbs reduce and increase, which means that it most closely corresponds to the ideas of the lay reader. However, this understanding does not coincide with any of the two that follow from the interpretation of the terminological meanings of the adjectives diminutive and magnifying and which were given above.

These understandings given above give a different picture of the relationship within the litter system. Because the litters have decreased. and he took her away. with any of these understandings, they can indicate an emotional attitude, and any one — both positive and negative (there are no indications of the type of assessment in dictionary interpretations of the corresponding adjectives), the role of the second elements of complex litters in this case consists in clarifying the type of emotional attitude, which makes, for example, litters decrease.- unich. and unich. in some cases, synonymous. The synonymy of these litters follows from the interpretation of the adjective humiliating.

SSH specifies two meanings for this adjective, the second of which is terminological and is described as follows: «2. In word formation: related to the formation of nouns — having a tinge of contempt or disdain, often in combination with a diminutive (e.g. house, tipchik, old lady). U. suffix" ^{[6, p. 1029]}. It follows from this formulation that the litter unit, which is the result of the substantiation of this adjective, can indicate not only an emotional attitude, but also a size. Along the way, we note that this formulation does not allow us to distinguish the values of the litter unit. and style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'>contempt, unich. and disdain. (for adjectives, contemptuous and dismissive SH also does not fix terminological meanings).

In the cited article, three examples of words are given for which there should be a litter of unich., without indicating which of them represent only a shade of contempt or disdain, and which also have a diminution. It seems reasonable to see diminution in the word house (cf. incorrect *big <huge > house); this word is fixed in the SH in the dictionary entry HOUSE and really have the mark unich. (and not reduced.-unich.), that is, these two litters turn out to be synonymous. At the same time, the words tipchik and the old lady are poorly compatible with the idea of size, but in this case another thing is important: if the old lady has a unique mark, which can indicate only an attitude, then the tipchik is served in the article TYPE as a diminution. (and not as a unit.). At the same time, the litter is reduced.- unich. It is also used with SSH, and it can be attributed to words that belong to the same thematic groups as those given as examples. So, it is the litter that is reduced.- the words izbenka (cf. with a house) and zhenishok (cf. with an old woman) are unique.

Thus, the analysis of the litter system provides another understanding of the litter content of animals. and he took her away. — purely parametric, however, does not exclude the previously proposed — based on the analysis of the interpretations of the adjectives diminutive and magnifying — their understandings.

3. Analysis of litter in words and drugs.

Identifying the contents of litters based on the analysis of lexical units with such litters is a task for the linguist reader. It is difficult for various reasons, including because the vocabulary array with these marks is very large: in the school, it is reduced only with simple marks. and he took her away. 2272 words are presented (2207 words with the mark decreased, 65 words with the mark increased).

In this article, we will note only the following circumstance concerning the diminutive mark, which is placed with nouns of two groups that are fundamentally different in semantics. The interpretation of the content of a mark depends on the semantics of the generating basis of these nouns.

This litter can be interpreted as expressing a parametric meaning, obviously, only with such derivative words that are formed from nouns denoting objects of size (for example, rope — rope, yard — yard or cot — crib), or signs and other entities that can be characterized by the degree parameter (heat — heat, cold — cold — cold or voice — voice — voice). An analysis of the compatibility of these words according to the National Corpus of the Russian language shows that they always indicate the size or degree (for example, the word courtyard is combined with the adjectives small and small, but does not combine with the adjective large); an indication of the assessment is possible (especially if it is supported in the context by adjectives such as cute, pretty and etc.), but it is not mandatory (it is not present, for example, in contexts such as lilac and bird cherry in bloom; in courtyards and courtyards, the spicy smell of chamomile turns yellow (Yu. P. Annenkov, A Tale of trifles)).

In addition, it is used for derivatives of such words that are incompatible with the idea of size or degree (for example, address — addressee, vodka — vodka or vid — vidik (from the window)). In these cases, this litter cannot have a parametric value and expresses an emotional attitude either to the object designated by the word or to the recipient of the message.

When identifying the content of litters based on the analysis of lexical units with these litters, it should be borne in mind that, as we saw in the example of the words mentioned in the article PEJORATIVE, there may be some inconsistency in their arrangement in the dictionary.

Thus, the practice of attributing litter is reduced. (and also, apparently, led away.) It shows that the SS actually combines both understandings arising from the interpretations of the adjectives diminutive and magnifying, allowing for both the parametric content of these litters, which can be accompanied by an evaluative, and purely evaluative.

Conclusions

The analysis of such an element of the metalanguage as litters is reduced. and the conclusions, the content of which, at first glance, seems generally understandable, shows that this is not entirely true.

These marks are related to the composition of the word (presence it contains a suffix), but is intended to indicate its semantics (the morphemic structure of the word is traditionally not indicated in Russian explanatory dictionaries). At the same time, the school course of the Russian language is addressed to the formal side of the language; concepts such as "diminutiveness" and "magnification" are not studied at school (although combinations of the diminutive suffix and the magnifying suffix are, of course, used). Thus, the reader cannot use his school knowledge, and he has to seek help from the dictionary itself, in which the marks are used.

There are no introductory materials in the school that would explain the content of the litter, which encourages the reader to either rely in his interpretation on the internal form of the words diminutive and magnifying, or refer to the corpus of the dictionary, analyzing the interpretation of the relevant adjectives or the practice of arranging these droppings. As it has been shown, the analysis of both does not allow us to come to an unambiguous conclusion about the content of litter, not to mention the fact that it is unrealistic to require such an analysis from a lay reader.

Scientific discussions, the echoes of which a linguist can see in the interpretations of the terminological meanings of the adjectives diminutive and magnifying, come into conflict with the naive linguistic ideas of a native speaker based on the internal form of these words, which may cause confusion to the average reader. In turn, the foreign reader's litter is reduced. with words like addressee (from address) or vidic (from view), it will make you think that the addressee is some kind of particularly short address, and the vidic is a very small view.

It seems reasonable that all litters, including, of course, the smaller ones. and led away., explained in the introductory materials of the dictionary. V. V. Morkovkin points out the explanation of the content of a litter as an obligatory property of it: "A litter is a lexicographic means itself, explicated in the introductory part of the dictionary (usually in the form of an abbreviated word or phrase), with the help of which the reader is informed that the corresponding linguistic unit (or linguistic phenomenon) refers to a certain set of homogeneous in any in relation to units or phenomena" ^{[14, p. 110]}. In the introductory materials, you can elaborate in more detail on the set of possible semantic components that stand behind the marks of the word. and led away., their relationship to each other and the dependence of the choice of one or more of them on the meaning of the word to which the suffix is attached.

We do not consider ourselves entitled to formulate explanations for litters diminutive and magnifying, corresponding to the practice of placing litters in the school. This is a separate task that goes beyond the scope of this article and requires a complete analysis of the entire corpus of N. Y. Shvedova's Explanatory Dictionary, which only an experienced lexicographer can undertake.