Exploring linguistic and cognitive-communicative aspects of vernacular toponyms: a comparative study of English and Kazakh languages
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Saltanat Davletova
Saltanat Davletova is a Doctoral Student, Department of Foreign Philology, L.N. Gumilyov Eurasian National University, Republic of Kazakhstan. Her research interests include pedagogical science, foreign language, translations studies.
and
Aigul Bizhkenova
Aigul Bizhkenova is a Full Doctor, Professor at the Department of Foreign Philology, L.N. Gumilyov Eurasian National University, Republic of Kazakhstan. Research interest: intercultural communication, cognitive linguistics, pragmatics.
Abstract
The purpose of this study is to investigate the vernacular toponymy of Kazakhstan and the United Kingdom through analysis of their linguistic (phonetic, word-formation, lexical-semantic) and cognitive-communicative features. By considering the features of vernacular content, phonetic, word-formation, lexical, cognitive, and communicative resources in the Kazakh and English languages are compared. It was determined that the toponyms of Great Britain retained the phonetic nature of the English language and loanwords from French and other languages are rarely used. The examination of word-formation resources shows that in the toponyms of Great Britain, the word-formation elements of the English language were most often used; in the Kazakh toponyms, both Kazakh and Russian word-formation resources were used. In lexical-semantic terms, both Kazakh and English languages had approximately the same indicators. Lexical and semantic groups, such as lexemes associated with spatial relations, the association of people on national, social, and gender grounds, historical names, and people’s employment, are identified. Nominations pertaining to sarcastic and metaphorical linkages were also observed from a communicative and cognitive perspective. The statistics were given in tables. This study can be used to compare toponyms in different structural languages and examine the lexical-semantic, linguistic, and cultural nature of toponyms.
About the authors
Saltanat Davletova is a Doctoral Student, Department of Foreign Philology, L.N. Gumilyov Eurasian National University, Republic of Kazakhstan. Her research interests include pedagogical science, foreign language, translations studies.
Aigul Bizhkenova is a Full Doctor, Professor at the Department of Foreign Philology, L.N. Gumilyov Eurasian National University, Republic of Kazakhstan. Research interest: intercultural communication, cognitive linguistics, pragmatics.
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