Conceptualization of the Image of Siberia in Contemporary Travel Literature

The article offers a study of conceptualization of Siberia in the English language picture of the world. The objects of study are the means of linguistic representation, which provide conceptualization of the image of the Russian North. The article considers the literary travel writings by contemporary foreign writers-travelers, who took trips to Siberia, which were resulted in fascinating travelogues. The current investigation is undertaken to analyze the conceptualization of the image of the Russian North in the linguistic picture of the world, which results from analyzing the words, their meanings and associations in the mind of a linguistic identity of the English speakers in the process of thinking about the objects and phenomena related to the Russian North. The concepts were identiёed through revealing the key words by continuous sampling method and set of categories in the result of analysis of the meanings of linguistic units, which represent the ‘’Siberia’’ concept. Thus, foreign travelers associate the Russian North both with the extreme weather conditions, geographical remoteness, inaccessibility and also with rich, but tragic, violent history, the beauty of the northern nature, sincerity and kindness of the Siberian natives, unusual way of their life and extremely harsh living conditions. The research shows that revealed concepts resulted in the creation of the image of Siberia as a distinguished from every other – as a metaphor for cold and remoteness, embodied in oxymoron of oppression and freedom.

• Bolshakova L.P.

• География. Биографии. История

• Гуманитарные науки
• Социальные (общественные) науки