Connotative transformations of the collocation common man in the history of the Russian language

The problem considered in the article is connected with the ability of words and standard collocations possessing expressive-evaluative aureoles to signal about the condition of some fragments of collective consciousness. Lexico- phraseological levels of the language is most dynamic due to its immediate connection with man's mentality and social medium. That is why the evolutions taking place in the social medium get materialized in the semantics and/or vocabulary-unit connotations including the most actual ones. These processes often have quite a long history and are able to obtain a broad resonance among speech agents. The purpose of the article is to analyse the historical dynamics of the common man connotation known from time immemorial and topical up to now. The materials borrowed from authoritative lexicographic sources and used in the present research are informative, quotations from mass media are verified and the comparative and comparative-historical methods used in the process of the study have firmly proved themselves as scientifically effective. The main adjectival component common of the collocation initially was syncretical and later became polysemantic. However, with all the diachronic transformations of its semantics, there was always present the meaning fraught with qualifications of the social status of the man who did not possess either considerable material property or administrative powers. But in the Soviet epoch thanks to the efforts of official propaganda the common man (plural: common people) collocation obtained high ameliorative evaluativity, and what is more, it was widely used in respect to foreign ‘class brothers'. After radical demolition of axiological paradigms connected with perestroika reforms there appeared a different predominant social group in Russia, which is usually called the elite. And the common man collocation turned into a nomination of a representative of the lowest, almost marginal and deprived of rights social caste. Since manipulative demands of the people in power must be provided with the necessary verbal tools such collocations began to appear in the para-governmental discourse as ordinary man and ordinary citizen which semantically were similar to the common man collocation, but unlike it they were not loaded with the connotations of the Soviet times. The results of the research are appropriately substantiated allowing to calibrate semantico-connotative evolutions of the common man collocation at various stages of its historical existence. The conclusions, in accordance with the purpose of the article, testify to the processes which due to predominant axiological prescriptions of the ancient Russian and old Russian periods in the history of the language characterized common man as a person having neither material nor significant social status. In the Soviet epoch this collocation received high ameliorative evaluativity, and in the post-Soviet time it lost its high social status. It was gradually replaced with ordinary man and ordinary citizen, which were almost adequate to the archaic ones. The author's contribution to obtaining the results consists in the independent approach and choice of the authentic theme, discovering factual materials and consequent usage of the approbated scientific methods.