I. YAKOVLEV CHUVASH STATE PEDAGOGICAL UNIVERSITY BULLETIN

semantics of toponyms, subordinate bilingualism, free association experiment with stimuli in L2, associative field, template description model, psycholinguistic meaning of a word, L1 interference

The proposed article is devoted to the study of the peculiarities of the representation of the toponyms Voronezh and Moscow in the linguistic consciousness of non-native speakers of English in the context of subordinative bilingualism. In view of the fact that the modeling of geographical space in the mind of an individual is carried out with the help of toponyms, their detailed study is of particular interest to researchers. While studying the semantics of toponyms, the method of a free association experiment with stimuli presented in a foreign language (L2) and the method of semantic interpretation of associative fields were used. In the experiment conducted by the authors, the subjects were the students immersed in an artificial language environment in the process of studying at the university. According to the psycholinguistic experiment, the associative fields of the toponyms Voronezh and Moscow were compiled, the brightness indices of each of the associations were determined, nuclear semes were identified, and the near and far periphery were described. The authors describe in detail the psycholinguistic meaning of the chosen toponyms using the basic template model developed by E.A. Maklakova, and then supplemented and successfully applied by I.A. Sternin and A.V. Rudakova. Within the template model, there was described the denotative macro-component of the meanings of the considered lexemes, which is represented by the indicative and relational parts, the connotative macro-component of the meanings of the toponyms, including evaluative, emotional and functional characteristics. At the next stage of the study, a sememe attribution of associative reactions was made and a psycholinguistic description of the meanings of the toponyms under study was given. In conclusion, the authors assume that the associations obtained from native Russian speakers who answered in L2 are rather stereotyped, which may indicate an insufficient level of foreign language proficiency, as well as a high lexical interference of a native language (L1).

Барабушка Ирина Алексеевна – кандидат филологических наук, доцент кафедры английского языка естественно-научных факультетов Воронежского государственного университета, г. Воронеж, Россия, https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3791-5071, barabashka84@mail.ru

Кривенко Людмила Александровна – кандидат филологических наук, доцент кафедры английского языка естественно-научных факультетов Воронежского государственного университета, г. Воронеж, Россия, https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3089-3175, lyudmilaab@mail.ru