Regional Linguistic Worldview Modelling Based on the Texts of Arctic Travels of the 18th – 19th Centuries

From the middle of the 18th century, works of scientists of various directions, reflecting travel observations and reflections on nature, everyday life, trades, culture of various territories of the Russian Empire, have been widely published. There are many works that describe the Russian North and the Arctic coast among them. Such works are often used as a source of information by historians, culturologists, ethnographers, folklorists, and specialists in various fields of natural science. Episodically, they are referred to by philologists, identifying ways of depicting local images in the regions [1, Antipova A.S; 2, Dubina L.V.; 3, Kosheleva I.G.; 4, Sudakov G.V.]. However, linguists practically do not study the works of scientists of this period, the only exceptions are dialectolo-gists and language historians, extracting the local words and looking at their semantics in the context of the life and culture of the region [5, Bodrova O.A.; 6, Vologda Text in Russian Culture…; 7, Maslova M.N.]. Such studies significantly expand the understanding of the diversity of life in many parts of the country, and encourage a more diversified study of the works of scientists who travelled across the vast territories of Russia. Their books contain extensive material, interesting for

linguo-cognitive and linguo-culturological studies and for modeling the regional picture of the world.

Theoretical basis

The study of regional uniqueness has noticeably intensified in recent years. On the basis of a variety of both material and spiritual sources, their specific features are determined, principles for identifying regional identity are proposed, and generalizing models are developed [8, Andryushchenko I.A.; 2, Dubina L.V.; 9, Pisachkin V.A.; 10, Biktimirova Yu.V.; 11, Galimova E.Sh., Loshakov A.G.; 12, Shrenk A.I.]. At the same time, many theoretical problems remain debatable in science. Thus, for example, the questions about the status of the regional language picture of the world, about the ways of its modeling, about the correlation with other components of the general language picture of the world (GLP), including the dialectal GLP, are discussed. Scientists are unanimous in saying that the regional GLP is a fragment of the national one. However, the scope and content of the concept itself does not coincide in different works. It is argued, for example, that “the regional linguistic picture of the world is a fragment of the GLP dialect, which is a union of PDS (private dialect systems)” [13, Klimkova L.A., p. 13; see also: 14, Zamyatin D.N.]. The reason for this is that GLPs reflect the specific features of the regions. However, it is obvious that the concepts of dialectal and regional GLPs are identified. The cited author notices this and suggests that within the national GLP, “the regional GLP has a broader character” [Ibid.]. Meanwhile, it remains unknown: at what expense is the content expanded?

The concept of regional GLP began to be filled with new meanings in connection with the active study of the characteristics of urban speech in different regions. It turned out that despite considerable commonality, each region reveals its own specifics. There are many works that describe separate locally coloured linguistic units, primarily at the phonetic or lexical level [15, Gramatchikova N.B; 16, Morozova O.E.; 17, Popov R.V.; 18, Khlybova S.V.]. It seems promising to turn to larger units — texts that are recognized as relevant to certain regions and thus allow one to identify important and relevant features of them. The long tradition of literary studies of images of different parts of the country, created by writers, enriched with the concepts of “supertext” (“hypertext”), is currently continuing. Scientists are trying to understand the ways of creating “an integral geopoetic image that reflects not only and not so much the individual author’s perception of the area, but a collective, generalized, revealing the most important, determining in its spatial picture” [19, Simashko T.V., p. 7; see also: 20, Schmitt-Egner P.; 21, Morozova N.S.; 22; Noeva, S.E.; 23, Northern Text…]. At the same time, the results of the search for meaning significantly depend on the corpus of the studied texts, so it is natural that the criteria for their selection are discussed. G.V. Sudakov believes that such texts should show “pulsation of strong points of cultural memory in relation to historically and culturally significant territory” [4, Sudakov G.V., p. 120].

Consequently, such texts, brought together in a single thematic space (Northern, Siberian, Vologda texts, etc.), reveal the artistic reflection of the national picture of the world.

They also address the issue of formation of actual concepts, it is considered that “this transfers the interest of linguoconceptology and regional linguistics from the research of traditional cultural concepts to the study of concept variants in the specificity of their dynamic existence” [25, Orlova O.V., p. 4]. However, it is more likely that this may not be a complete “translation”, but a special emphasis in the study Clarification of the semantics of cultural prototypes as a matrix of actual concepts (an example of the author: gold, coal as a matrix — oil as an actual concept), output of media-concepts in other spheres including artistic one demonstrate dynamic aspect as an important component in modeling regional GLP [26, Babenko I.V.; 27, Golovneva E.V.; 25, Orlova O.V., etc.].

Thus, if we use the criteria for limiting the material and at the same time set the vector of analysis, then we can identify individual fragments of the regional picture of the world. Carrying out research on the basis of language and texts, it is possible to talk about a fragment of the regional GLP. However, all the diversity of the features of a particular region as a cultural, social and natural space requires the efforts of scientists from different branches of knowledge. At the same time, it seems that the success of such studies largely depends on the unified theoretical foundations adopted by scientists.

In this regard, such an interdisciplinary scientific direction as humanitarian geography, which has been actively recently asserted, is of special interest, [28, Tuan Yi-Fu; 29, Terkulov V.I.]. In general terms, it is defined as a field of knowledge, which “studies different ways of representation and interpretation of terrestrial spaces in the human activity, including mental activity” [28, Tuan Yi-Fu, p. 26]. V.N. Streletskiy believes that “the core of the integration of humanities and geography disciplines” [29, Terkulov V.I., p. 95] is cultural geography. According to the publications, a lot is still in the formation stage: methodological foundations are being clarified, various approaches are being developed, and the terminological apparatus is being formed. At the same time, there is a noticeable increase in the number of works, where ideas of this direction are developed on a specific material [30, Erofeeva E.V.; 31, Kalutskov V.N.; 32, Bell D.S.A.; CHG 1; etc.].

The study undertaken by us is based on the material of texts written by scientists of various specialties and public figures during their travels in the North (or based on their results). These books represent the life of different localities (often the same ones) in the vast northern space observed in the 18th–19th centuries. The texts differ insignificantly in terms of observation time; records are made approximately every 10–15 years. This makes it possible not only to model the regional GLP in the form of certain historical fragments, but also to trace their dynamics.

Material and research methods

Some of the studied texts are multi-volume editions, sometimes their content goes beyond the Russian North. In general, the content of the texts covers a historically heterogeneous period, differs in specific tasks set by the authors, attention to different aspects of life, and sometimes even in the choice of material. This requires the establishment of separate stages of research and the identification of techniques and methods of analysis at each stage.

The initial and important step is the development of criteria for selecting sources, the main of which are the following: the commonality of the real chronotope, the pragmatic content of the text, the presence of the author-subject as an eyewitness of the described lands.

Texts grouped in accordance with the mentioned criteria are subjected to cognitive-discursive analysis. In the course of the analysis, contexts are identified and named in each text on the basis of their semantic dominance. Fragments of different texts with the same name are considered as a single discursive space.

The identified and named discourses are studied using elements of contextual, typological and interpretative methods. Besides, at this stage, cognitive-discursive analysis is accompanied by a comparative analysis in order to identify similarities in the representation of world objects and the author's personal perception of the features of the described region.

The results obtained during the analysis of the discursive spaces of the same name can be presented in the form of particular conceptual models, each of which is taken into account in modeling a particular fragment of the regional linguistic picture of the world.

Research results

The systematization of travel texts is based on the time, spent by scientists in the North, and not the year of publication, since for various reasons manuscripts may have been published much later than they were written. For example, P.I. Chelishchev travelled from May to December 1791, but his book “Travels in the North of Russia” was published only in 1886, and this is not a single case.

Some of the works under study include texts written by other authors. Thus, after the death of I.I. Lepekhin, the fourth volume of the book “Daily notes of a journey <...> through various provinces of the Russian state” was edited by a member of his expedition N.Ya. Ozeretskov-skiy, who included his notes on the White Sea in this volume. In the same volume, he places the description of Novaya Zemlya, provided by F.I. Fomin and V.V. Krestinin. There are similar phenomena in other works, for example, F.P. Litke, highly appreciating the records of his navigator Belyaev, includes his Journal in the chapter “The White Sea Expedition” 2. The heterogeneity of the texts is also due to the fact that many of the books contain archival documents (or extracts from them), historical or statistical references, and stories of local residents.

The structure and content of the studied works is complicated by the fact that the authors often retell or quote the texts of scientists who have visited the same places, and do not always provide them with references. Studying ethnographic sources, O.A. Bodrova writes that the rules of citation are developed at the turn of the 19th–20th centuries. [33, Burykin A.A., p. 292]. However, references are numerous in the studied works of the first half of the 19th century (F.P. Litke, M.F. Reinecke, A.I. Schrenk, etc.), although the inclusion of other people's texts without any reservations is often observed, which requires textual verification.

Thus, texts, arranged in chronological order, make it possible to detect duplicated fragments (often literally), digress from them, and compare the amount of information reported by each of the authors. This makes it possible to identify the features of the sites described by the travellers and to determine what historical, cultural, social, and naturalistic information was provided by each author compared to the others.

The boundaries of the geographical space, represented in the works under study, are not identical. Thus, P.I. Chelishchev travelled from St. Petersburg to the White Sea, along the Dvina to Arkhangelsk and further to the Vologda and Novgorod governorates. The route of A.I. Shrenk ran from St. Petersburg to Arkhangelsk, and then to Mezen, from it to the Ural Range and back. Hydrograph M.F. Reinecke explores the White and Barents Seas and describes their coasts. F.P. Litke studied the eastern part of the Barents Sea, the White Sea, went on an expedition to Novaya Zemlya, examined the features of coastal areas, and also provided information about the life and activities of their inhabitants. The content of these sources, as well as ones not mentioned here, provides a selection of contexts that reveal the realities of the area visited by the travellers over the years.

The most reliable reference point for combining the contexts into a single discursive space can be natural geographical objects: the sea or parts of it, rivers, ridges, mountains, the directions of travel in the world, which are named by the travellers. The above said does not exclude the fact that such landmarks cannot be considered names of settlements, but in the period under study they are few in number and located at a considerable distance from each other. The space between them was not described and was only approximately measured. Their description and characterization of individual geographical features becomes an important task for understanding the characteristics of the Northern Territory and the living conditions of people. This task is consistently performed by travellers. It is worth noting that they often come to the same settlement from different directions, depending on the built (or established) route.

For example, A.I. Schrenk first arrived in the city of Mezen in May 1837 from Arkhangelsk, describing soils, rocks, vegetation, birds, people’s activities, etc. But on May 11, on the way to Mezen, the previously ice-free river turned out to be blocked “an impenetrable mass of ice, which completely blocked our path” [34, Streletskiy V.N., p. 90]. This forced him to change the route slightly and made it possible to include new geographical objects in the description and to tell about the path he managed to get to the place. The second time he arrived there was on October 6, 1837, from Pechora after exploring the Bolshezemelskaya Tundra. Therefore, the Mezen area is described from the other side, from the north-east. Moreover, the swamps of Malozemelskaya Tundra forced the travellers to go not by a straight line, but by a detour, which further enlarged the observation from the north. S.V. Maksimov reached this town in the middle of November 1856, “already covered with deep snow” [35, Maksimov S.V., p. 21], and described the nearby localities, the villages of Semzha and Dolgoshchelye, the Mezenskiy and Kaninskiy coasts of the White Sea, deadly sea crafts, communicated with the Old Believers, talked about the Samoyeds who arrived in Mezen, etc.

Thus, the systematization of contexts based on real geographical objects allows us to consider them as a single cognitive-discursive space, a specific historical discourse, individual fragments of which are dated not just by the year, but by the month and date, even often by the hour of the observed events.

All travellers strive to tell about different aspects of life in the surveyed area, so the discourses established are thematically diverse and multilayered, although they are limited by those realities that may come to the attention of the authors. A comparison of the texts of different authors shows that there are objects that are described by all or almost all authors. At the same time, there are objects that are highlighted in few books. The repetition of the same geographical, social or cultural features in different texts can be regarded as a semantic dominant feature. The thematic and semantic homogeneity of such contexts allows us to identify key concepts and, on this basis, to name the semantic dominant. Often events become such names, for example, ice on rivers, ice on the sea, blizzards in the North, sea fishing of coastal residents , etc., but the names of semantic dominants can also be the names of individual geographical objects: swamps, forests, tundra, birds , etc. or significant settlements — Pustozersk, Pinega, Onega , etc.

The contexts describing objects occurring in a small number of texts can also be presented as semantic dominants, no less significant for the characterization of the region. This is explained by the fact that the scarcity of texts does not mean a small number of contexts, as the reference to certain objects can be dictated by the professional interests of the author. For example, A.I. Schrenk's book contains a significant number of contexts describing rocks, soils and their characteristic vegetation. He made these records and collects herbarium throughout his journey. Therefore, the descriptions he provided are complementary to the information on the terrains, provided by other authors.

Actually, in any semantic dominant, all contexts are meaningfully complementary. A comparative analysis of contexts united by the names of a semantic dominant makes it possible to identify the main parameters of the conceptualization and categorization of objects, to present them in the form of particular models that reflect regional features.

However, the texts under analysis are not dry reports; on the contrary, they are stylistically remarkable for their authors’ personalities. The way they express the direct characteristics of the objects, the way they reflect their different sides, the way they adapt and use local words with semantic differences from literary ones and the structure of the texts help to determine the parameters for the construction of private models.

At the same time, the author often needs a detailed description of entire situations in order to create a picture that is rare for residents of other regions. In such cases, the author aims to describe his own impressions through assessments, metaphors, comparisons. This is done not for giving “artisticness” to the image, but to convey the peculiarities of the observed phenomena.

Let us use examples from the book by F. Litke to show how he describes ice on the White Sea. The author uses figurative expressions to describe the ice as a whole: “ice fields”, “ridge of ice floes”, “ice islands”, “solid ice chain”, “impassable ice”, “ice giants” . He compares the ice with “a ship under sail”, “through the darkness, like ghosts” . The rapid change in its appearance is described by words that allow seeing the ice in different states: “scattered ice”, “thick ice”, “small ice floes”, “large and frequent ice”, “solid ice”, “drifting, rather rare ice”, “dense ice” . Ice is a constant threat: “several other ships <…> were covered with ice <…> and perished there with all the people”; ice “knocked out the stand from under the reserve anchor”; ice limits “the horizon with high, stacked ice mountains, one on top of the other, beyond which nothing was already visible”. Sailors, escaping, are trying to maneuver, “go into the icy bay”. The author adds sound characteristics to the visual ones: the ice, colliding, creates “noise similar to breakers”; “Dead silence was interrupted only by the crashing of waves against the ice, the distant roar of collapsing ice floes” ³ .

Therefore, the examples quoted from the book by one author only, far from being complete, show that the introduction of “semantic dominant” concept enables systematisation of homogenous material and setting parameters, which are used to characterise the object, reflecting regional specificity.

Conclusion

The studied travel texts have significant historical value, covering natural, climatic, social, cultural information of one of the largest regions of the country. However, it is not just the volume of information that is important for us, which has been repeatedly referred to by researchers in different fields. Of interest are the texts themselves, their structural organization, ways of linguistic expression of personal impressions of eyewitnesses of those distant times and events, their as- sessment of the place of the Russian North in the context of the history and life of the country. It opens up the possibility of modeling a regional linguistic picture of the world, relying not only on separate groups of words that appeared due to the need to reflect the realities of the region, but also on texts that reveal past events and unique natural phenomena in their completeness, visibility and versatility.

The methodology of analysis of texts with diverse content presented in the work allows us to approach them differentially, to systematize them in such a way as to produce quite homogeneous discourses in terms of content, which would make it possible to detect the main parameters of conceptualization and categorization of objects of the world, reflecting the most significant aspects life of the region.