Conceptualization of the Axiological Opposition Goodness – Evil (خوبیxubi – بدی badi) in the consciousness of the Persian native speakers
Abstract
The objective of the article is to determine the conceptual content of the axiological opposition “good-evil” in the Persian language consciousness based on the cognitive interpretation of the results of psycholinguistic experiment held among the Persian native speakers.
Methods of the research. Two methods of psycholinguistic analysis of word’s semantics have been used, viz.: free associative experiment and the method of direct interpretation of a word meaning. In total 102 persons of different age and social status took part in the experiment. Associative fields of the explored concepts were established based on the results of processing data collected during the 1st stage of the experiment; and their semantic fields were determined after analysis of unabridged predications in the course of semantization of proposed words. Result data were processed using special method of grouping language material based on content-analysis: the benchmark words repeated in the answers of different participants were taken as units of the analysis and regarded as key concept features. At the final stage of the analysis there was performed cognitive interpretation of the data after the principle of “construing” the meaning of linguistic expressions stipulated by Ronald Langacker.
Results. The results of the experiment revealed that the axiological opposition “good-evil” conceptualized in the Persian language consciousness has both universal and ethno-specific features. Moreover, prevailing of the former demonstrates that in the mentality of the Persian native speakers the idea of good and evil totally corresponds to the universal human worldview, where these moral and ethic categories serve as a basis for the system of the personal values.
Conclusions. It was concluded that using the methods of cognitive- and psycholinguistics – the two up-to-date linguistic streams – for examining particularities of conceptualization of different fragments of internal and external human’s world by representatives of variuos ethno-cultural societies, is the best way to determine a set of universal and ethno-specific features inherent in both processes of associating of respondents and the content structure of the examined concepts.
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