Peculiarities of the figurative meanings of the nouns denoting good in modern Ukrainian

Abstract

The paper deals with the study of the nouns’ denoting good figurative meanings in modern Ukrainian. The research has been carried out with the help of the formalized lexical semantics analysis and a thorough analysis of the “Dictionary of the Ukrainian Language” in 11 volumes. The conducted study enables the classification of the lexical units denoting good, disclosing their common and distinctive semantic features in the language under study. The shared peculiarity of the nouns denoting good in modern Ukrainian is their figurative meanings. The lexis under study characterized by figurative meanings takes a special place in the Ukrainian lexico-semantic system. The former reflects universal values of the world community and nationally-specific features of Ukrainian ethnoculture. The lexico-semantic analysis of the nouns’ figurative meanings denoting good in modern Ukrainian has shown that figurativeness is typical of polysemantic lexical units. In contrast, monosemantic words are devoid of the assigned property. Furthermore, the words in question not only complement the aspects of good realization expressed by direct meanings but extend their semantics by additional shades of meaning. Figurative meanings verbalize good as an anthropocentric and socio-pragmatic notion in modern Ukrainian. Thus, the groups denoting a person as a good-doer, his/her inner world, character traits, wishes and desires, personal achievements and success, social recognition, deeds for the sake of others, benefits and advantages, comfortable living conditions, and material values have been singled out. The lexical units under study establish diverse paradigmatic relations with both the words within the lexico-semantic group “good” in Ukrainian and another related lexis.