Metaphoric medical terms with zoonym component in English and Russian medical discourses

The present study is devoted to the issue of medical condition nominations by means of metaphors with zoonym component in English and Russian medical discourse. The choice of the research topic is determined by the interest in medical terms formed by means of metaphors with zoonym component. It stands to reason that knowledge, understanding and proper application of metaphoric medical terms with zoonym component is an essential part of proficient doctors or healthcare providers. Like many other disciplines, medicine often appeals to metaphor in order to explain complicated notions. Metaphor makes it easier to understand medical terms and helps to avoid long descriptions in medical vocabulary. Many scholars, linguists have researched metaphor, along with those who study medical terminology. The study of professional medical vocabulary is presented in the works of Yu.A. Sotnikov [1], N.V. Goncharenko [2], E.A. Momot, A.A. Martirosyan, A.K. Gazaryants [3]; medical metaphor was studied by O.S. Zubkova [4; 5] and many others. The object of the study is medical conditions nominations by means of metaphors with zoonym component in English and Russian medical discourse. The subject of the study is zoonym compo- nent in medical conditions nominations. The aim of the study is to reveal whether medical conditions are nominated by metaphors with equal or different zoonym components in English and Russian medical discourses.

Materials and methods. We analyzed English and Russian metaphoric medical terms with zoonym component. The method of complete sampling was used to reveal metaphoric medical terms with zoonym components. The method of descriptive comparative analysis developed and used for other linguistic phenomena [6;7] was implemented for medical metaphor analysis. The main material of the study included English-Russian medical dictionaries and comprehensive Russian-English medical dictionaries.

Results. We divided metaphoric medical terms with zoonym component into two groups. The first group of the metaphoric medical terms with zoonym component nominate the same medical conditions and has equal zoonym components in English and Russian medical discourses; the second group of the metaphoric medical terms with zoonym component nominate the same medical conditions but have different zoonym components. For example, English metaphoric medical term with zoonym component – hare lip and

Russian metaphoric medical term with zoonym component – заячья губа nominate the same medical condition that is described as the result of tissues of the face not joining properly during development.

Illness caused by a bacterium with such symptoms as fever, rash, and greatly enlarged lymph nodes is nominated by English metaphoric medical terms with zoonym component – rabbit disease or rabbit fever, in Russian medical discourse, metaphoric medical terms with zoonym component – заячья болезнь, заячья лихорадка are used. Metaphoric medical term with zoonym component – monkey's paw, in Russian medical discourse – лапа обезьяны nominate the same medical condition – alteration in the appearance of the hand resulting from a severe median nerve lesion. One of the symptoms of Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease is described as –stork leg, in Russian medical discourse, metaphoric medical term with zoonym component – нога аиста is used. These metaphoric medical terms with the zoonym component have equal zoonym components and nominate the same medical conditions in Russian and English medical discourses.

Other examples demonstrate that metaphoric medical terms with zoonym component in English and Russian medical discourses may nominate the same medical conditions but have different zoonym components. A deformed human chest with a projecting breastbone in English medical discourse is nominated with metaphoric medical term with the zoonym component – pigeon breast, chicken breast, sparrow breast in Rus- sian medical discourse such medical condition is nominated with metaphoric medical term with the zoonym component – куриная грудь. Zoonyms pigeon and sparrow as components of metaphoric medical term have not been revealed in Russian medical discourse. An acute infectious disease characterized by short-term fever, headache, muscle pain, pinkeye and fatigue in English medical discourse is nominated with metaphoric medical term with the zoonym component – dog disease in Russian medical discourse such medical condition is nominated with metaphoric medical term with different zoonym component – москитная лихорадка. Paresis of hip abductor muscles in English medical discourse is nominated with metaphoric medical term with the zoonym component – goose gait in Russian medical discourse such medical condition is nominated with metaphoric medical term with the zoonym component – утиная походка.

Conclusions . Based on analysis conducted, we can make the following conclusions:

Metaphoric medical terms with zoonym component in Russian and English medical discourses may have both equal and different zoonym components in medical condition nominations. Thus, showing that metaphoric medical terms with zoonym components demonstrate peculiar nature of Russian and English medical discourses. The awareness of national peculiarities may contribute to effective intercultural communication organization and overcoming communication barriers in healthcare intercultural communication.