STRUCTURAL, SEMANTIC AND LINGUACULTURAL PECULIARITIES OF THE ENGLISH IDIOMS NOMINATING SOCIAL STATUS OF A PERSON

Abstract

This paper focuses on the research of structural, semantic and linguacultural aspects of gender idioms denoting social status. The methods of selecting gender-marked idioms from the phraseological fund of the English language, such as structural and semantic ones, have also been introduced. The structural criterion focuses on the selection of phraseological material due to identification of gender information in the structure of an idiom. The semantic one is based on identification of a gender component in the meaning of gender idioms according to special markers. Etymological diversity of the English gender-marked idioms results from historical, cultural and, subsequently, language transformations in the Englishspeaking society. The phraseological units nominating people’s social status are of different origin. The etymological analysis has revealed that they originate from history, antiquity or other languages. Structural analysis has stated that among the idioms-nominations of people by a social status substantive, verb and communicative units prevail. In the course of the research the models of lexicographic representation of gender component of phraseological units meaning that denote a human social status have been represented. The number of the most applicable lexicographic models of gender component representation in the dictionary space of the English language have been stated. During the research, it is defined that English phraseological dictionaries by analogy with standard English dictionaries have ordered macro- and microstructures. In order to study gender-marked idioms one needs to refer to a microstructure of a dictionary, which is represented by a dictionary entry, consisting of an idiom as such, a gloss, a definition and an illustrative example. Also, phraseological nominations, that influence the formation of the idioms, nominating human social status have been analyzed. Complex investigation of the phraseological unit nature is rather perspective as it gives an opportunity to imagine and describe masculine and feminine roles in the modern Englishspeaking society that are reflected in the English language system later.