‘Up’ and ‘Down’ in the World Perception of Dialect Speakers: „Heaven – Earth – Hel”

Abstract

The article presents the basic theoretical principles of the interpretation of the term concept and attempts to reformulate it in relation to views of contemporary researchers. The main principles of analysis of the concepts are outlined. The paper offers an analysis of the concepts of UP / DOWN, which represent verbalisation of spiritual culture concepts (the triad heaven – earth – hell). The concept UP is represented by names associated with heaven (гóри небéсні, горá госпóдня, горíшне, гóрниця Сіóнська), the concept DOWN is associated with earth (діл земни́ й, доли́ на світовá, долище, межигори земнí, падíл зéмний, падóлок, юдóль) and hell (діл, долище пресподнє, доли́ на пéкла, преспóдня). On the basis of this, the research made it possible to establish two semantic oppositions: heaven / earth and heaven / hell. An analysis of dialectal and historical materials allowed the author to present the structural-semantic units that form the nominal field of the concepts UP / DOWN. The subject of the study was systematically presented at the supradialectal level, the singularities of the representation of concepts in Ukrainian dialects were explained, and their territorial variation was revealed. Emphasis is placed on the importance of the study of dialect material, as it is the study of dialects that allows the reconstruction of fragments of the dialect image of the world which have not been verbalised in literary language.