MECHANISMS OF SEMANTIC MODULATION IN THE PHRASEMES OF ENGLISH

Abstract

The article describes mechanisms of adaptation, delimitation, and actualization of semic features of the English quantitatives in phraseological context. The relationship between such concepts of semasiology, as «semantic structure of the word», «semantic scenario» and «heurosemic structure» of the meaning of the word has been clarified. A synonymous variation between the concepts of «semantic structure of the word» and «semantic scenario» with the functional priority of the latter term for this study has been established.The term «heurosemic structure of the word» refers not to a set of its meanings and lexicosemantic variants (LSV), but to an individual meaning, which consists of the archiseme, integral, differential, and gradual semes.The necessity of involving English quantitatives into the study of these concepts, i.e. words that, under the influence of phraseological context, while maintaining a connection with their semantic structure / semantic scenario, undergo a rearrangement of semes in the heurosemic structure and even cause a change in the archiseme has been argued.An explanatory interpretation of the process of semantic modulation of quantitatives in English phrasemes has been provided and the operation of such cognitive-semantic mechanisms, as adaptation, delimitation, and actualization has been revealed. The efficiency of each mechanism in the English phrasemic quantitatives from the numerical series one – ten has been determined. It has been noted that the most productive mechanisms of semantic modulation are the adaptation and delimitation of semantic features of quantitatives in the phrasemic context, as well as their combination with the mechanism of actualization of new phraseosemes.Particular attention has been paid to the analysis of those phrasemes with quantifiers, the figurative-symbolic meaning of which reflects the transformation of the archiseme «quantity» allocated for the heurosemic structures of quantitatives from the numerical series one – ten, into the archisemes of «measurement» and «counting». Such tendencies indicate the result of the operation of the mechanism of semantic transformation, and not directly of semantic modulation. The assumption has been confirmed that, despite the semantic shifts in the heurosemic structures of the meanings of quantitatives, which occur under the influence of the phrasemic context, their cultural symbolism is largely preserved and is a producer for new motifs of phrasemic imagery.