WORDS OF THE EMOTIVE GROUP SHAME IN TEXTS OF A.S. PUSHKIN

Abstract

The article analyzes the use of lexical units belonging to the denotative-ideographic group SHAME (see L.G. Babenko’s “Alphabet of Emotions”) in Pushkin’s texts. This group includes terms for key social emotions related to diminished self-esteem– such as shame, guilt, and embarrassment–making its study interesting not only from a linguistic perspective. A comprehensive analysis of the texts, using the Lexicographic Corpus of A.S. Pushkin’s Texts (LOKLL), enables identification of the units comprising the SHAME group in Pushkin’s language, the presence or absence of their emotive meaning, and their frequency of use. Some differences from modern Russian are also identified. Since the group includes terms for closely related yet distinct negative emotions, special attention is paid to the relationship between the means of naming them. This led to the conclusion that in A.S. Pushkin’s texts, the focus of both the author and the reader is more on the feeling of guilt rather than on shame per se. The obtained results suggest that the lexical classification proposed in the “Alphabet of Emotions” can serve as a solid foundation for the emotive analysis of texts.