https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4017-6997https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4017-6997
Summary: The purpose of the article is to consider a specific group of ergonyms associated with the regional culture, history, development, and geolocation of the Samara region. The article is aimed at finding out the main characteristic features of the names of enterprises and organizations (ergonyms) in Samara.
The author uses descriptive comparative method. To provide the material and examples of ergonym, the methods of association, links and semantic map are used.
The provided description makes us think that the regional peculiarities of ergonyms are an essential part of the national-cultural component. It can be realized with the help of the realities associated with geolocation or specific features of the social, cultural, historical, ethnic development of a state and nation as a whole. It can be concluded that modern trends affect the ergonymic space of a city and its ergonymicon. The national-territorial component is capable of performing a parole function. There are certain ergonymic models associated with territorial identity, including abbreviations and acronyms, as well as contaminations of different types.
The analysis and the study results of Samara ergonyms are supposed to be a valuable material for investigation of proper names of enterprises, institution, firms etc. There are further prospects for studying a number of onomastic issues. The study results can be useful in solving brand and rebrand problems.
Keywords: regional ergonym, onomastics, proper name, national-cultural component, regional linguocultural projections, toponym, hydronym.
Modern onomastic research is based on philosophical and general linguistic traditions of J. Mill, B. Russell, O. Jespersen, and others. In Russian linguistics, the main patterns of the history, development, and functioning of proper names are studied by onomastics (A.V. Superanskaya, N.V. Podolskaya, V.A. Nikonov, V.D. Bondaletov etc.). A.V. Superanskaya classifies proper names into categories, which is supposed to be the key point in modern Russian studies of onomastics. The article uses the term ergonym to denote the proper name of a business association of people, including a union, organization, institution, corporation, enterprise, society, or community (Podolskaya, 1988). It should be noted that the terms ergomynicon and ergonymic space have become widespread following the works of N.V. Podolskaya and I.V. Kryukova.
Despite numerous studies devoted to proper names, ergonyms with regional components are less investigated. This contradiction is explained by the fact that now the global linguistic trends such as retroization, quasi-remotivation and ethnic saturation (Kryzhanovskaya, 2019) are the focus of different scientific studies. The trends affect the ergonymic space of a particular segment of the city onomastic reality. On the other hand, a study of regional linguocultural projections was of particular scientific interest as well. This term was introduced by N.O. Grigorieva. The study classifies complex object names into transnational, national, and regional categories (Grigoryeva, 2016, 144). Regional names allude to the history, location, and culture of a particular territory. For example, the Russian phrase Na dne (at the bottom) for the majority of native speakers in Russia is associated with the drama play written by Maxim Gorky in 1902, while Samara citizens most often associate it with the pub and shops of Zhiguly Brewery. It is interesting that at the end of the 19th century, during the construction of water supply and sewerage systems, prefabricated water wells were placed near the brewery. Now, there is a city water supply station and the ergonym Na dne (at the bottom) could get its name from the method of water intake, i.e. from the bottom of the Volga River. This fact confirms the influence of cultural and territorial specificity on the onomastic space. The linguists Shatalova and Medvedeva think that the system of ergonyms is surely determined by the regional projections of linguoculture (Shatalova, Medvedeva, 2016, 170).
I.Yu. Rusanova supports the idea that “national and cultural components of ergonyms are explicitly expressed by realities, specific concepts, phraseological units, as well as special lexemes-markers” (Rusanova, 2019, 99). We are inclined to complement that the regional specificity of ergonyms is an important part of the national-cultural component realized with the help of realities associated with the object location and the features of its social, cultural, historical, and ethnic development of any state and nation as a whole.
S.A. Pitina mentions that cultural-territorial elements specify the enterprise location component (Pitina, 2020, 91). Moreover, the pragmatic potential of ergonyms with the components reflecting the regional specificity is much greater. N.O. Grigorieva considers the ergonyms with a national-territorial component to be a particular kind of regional lingvoculture. A special set of ergonyms is formed in the regional projection of lingvoculture, including both the elements existing in the given period and relevant to all the representatives of lingvoculture and the units that existed earlier in the ergonymic and communicative space of any region or city (Grigorieva, 2016, 144). The researcher also states that ergonyms are capable of performing a password function, simplifying the conditions of “decoding” for local population, and discovering the same mental verbal base of the nominator and the potential client. Taking into account the conditions, the potential client or customer responds to the password offered by the nominator and becomes more loyal (Artemina, 2015, 1554).
Samara ergonyms with the regional component can offer interesting linguistic material. The city has its own unique precedent names, phenomena, and symbols familiar to Samara citizens. Samara has a glorious history. It started from a small fortress, survived the rebellions of Stepan Razin and Yemelyan Pugachev, and grew as a district town of the Simbirsk province. It was burned down in the 12–13th centuries. Samara is famous for its shipping, merchants, theatres, chocolate, and beer products, as well as restoration by the Red Army under the command of V. Chapaev and G. Gai, the establishment of the Soviet power, and the Czechoslovak corps. Samara became the second capital during World War II and produced the world-famous Il-2 attack aircraft and the MiG-3 fighters. The aviation plant in Samara created the Vostok-1 capsule for Yu. Gagarin. Today, the city has grown into one of the largest industrial, scientific, and cultural centres of the country.
In our study, we consider Samara ergonym patterns relating to the territorial identity. We can see that the identification of objects is in their correlation to the space and history of Samara and the Samara region. The most frequent names of commercial and social organizations of the city (about 3000 examples) also have a regional component. These names include the word Samara or its derivatives and are associated with the city and represent the example of “titular nomination” (Zamyatin, 2013). Several enterprises of different profiles (about 17) have the same name. Some names have undergone graphic transformations such as the SamaRA hotel.
M.V. Golomidova finds ergonyms to be a part of the urban language. They form the information and communication resource, significant for the city’s image (Golomidova, 2015, 186). The history of enterprises, institutions and firms has a fundamental influence on the regional ergonymicon. The component Samara prevails among official and business establishments as an ergonym part. Such ergonyms are intended to demonstrate long history, reliability, and stability e.g. Samara Zoological Park, Samara Energy College, Samara District, Samara Regional Court, Samara Engineering College, Samara Diagnostic Center, Samara Phlebology Center, Samara Bakery Plant № 2, Samara Duma.
The word Samara and its derivatives as an ergonym part act as a linguistic marker of stability and monumentality of the organization. This fact motivates the owner or nominator of a new business to choose the ergonym with a regional component, thus contributing to a positive image of the organization for a potential client or customer, for example, Samara Business Center (a law firm).
A specific group of Samara ergonyms includes the names of organizations engaged in the manufacturing of certain products. In order to create the illusion of an enterprise with a “long history”, nominators apply the methods of abbreviation and acronyms, as well as contamination of different types. These methods used to be popular in the Soviet linguistic tradition e.g, USSR, Aeroflot. The tracing of such ergonymic traditions is caused by the extralinguistic factors, in particular, by the fact that “the main production in Samara was during the Soviet period” (Khramkov, 2000). It is associated with the typical citizen within the specified historical period. T.O. Prokofieva points out that “the formation of complex abbreviated words, often with a toponymic component, is obligatory for Soviet ergonymy nomenclature” (Prokofieva, 2014, 245).
The examples of complex abbreviated words as part of an ergonym with the regional component include the following names: Volgaburmash (a plant), Samara-SpetsEnergoServis (a multi-profile company), Samara CIP (metal products), Samarametaloplast, Samara-Stroydormash (repair shop), SamaraPozhServis (fire-fighting equipment), Samaranefteprodukt (petroleum products), Samaralacto (dairy products 1932–2010, today the Danone Group), SamaraObschepit (catering equipment), SpetsTransSamara (transport company).
Compound abbreviated words as an ergonym part can not only create an illusion of a long history but trigger additional associative chains due to a combination of 2–3 words, allowing to reveal name pragmatic potential and determine the field of the organization activity or sphere e.g. SamSTU (Samara State Technical University). N.V. Nosenko explains this by the fact that at the level of semantics, the breaking of established semantic links sets the conditions for programming the interpretation of a complex abbreviated ergonym by the addressee. Those lexemes became the basis for a derivative ergonym (Nosenko, 2007, 107). The findings presented in the article suggest that the so called Soviet linguistic tradition to abbreviate names of enterprises is still popular and Samara is often used as a part of regional ergonym.
On the other hand, there is a tendency to use international or well-known words as Art, Group, VIP, Plaza, News, City, Corporation as an abbreviated part and ergonyms present either the contamination or abbreviation type e.g. Volganews, Samart (theatre), VIP Master, Matreshka Plaza, Volga Plaza, Security Group, Volga Group, Blesk Corporation, Art Design, Mega City etc.
The names of urban enterprises and organizations with the words indicating the peculiarities of their geographical location and the proximity to the Volga River, the Zhiguli and Ural Mountains, and Samarskaya Luka (river curve) are less frequent. For example, there are more than 300 ergonyms with the word Volga and more than 150 with its derivatives, about 100 names with the word Zhiguli and more than 15 names with the word Luka. The organizations with the same names are engaged in different activities. In particular, the name Volga is given to a health spa, hotel, trading company, medical company, retro restaurant, supermarket chain, stadium, sofa factory, real property agency, tattoo studio, law firm, and many others.
It is also necessary to consider the elements found in associative links with the local toponym (a proper name of a place or geographic name), in particular, the hydronym (water object name) Volga as a part of the institution name (ergonym). The mentioned links show the regional specificity of the Samara ergonymy. Let us point out the core, near and far periphery of the concept Volga (Fig. 1) The method of association field provides us with a range of examples found among the Samara ergonyms. The core of the field is river. The near periphery is manifested in the words bank, wave, cruise, water, wind. The far periphery includes such words as bottom, port, storm, fish, boat. The far periphery of boat is presented by the names of boat crew and vessel parts and is followed by associations with the sea.
Fig. 1. Core, near and far periphery of the concept Volga
In the course of our study we have found the following examples of ergonyms in Samara: River, Riverflot63, Samara river port, River quarter, Two rivers, Aquamarine, Aquatic, Aqua terra, Wave, On wave, the 5-th wave, Volga place, CruisGIS, Cruiser, Volga Cruise, Your Cruise, Volga Wind, North Wind, South Wind, Samara Embankment, On the Embankment, Boat-Samara, Sail, White Sail, Sailboat, Frigate, AF Yachting, Boat River, Volga Yacht Service, Vodohod, Volga-Fleet-Tour, Bank, Volga bank, Golden bank, Green Bank, High Bank, Clean bank, Storm Kayaks, Storm, Fishman, Soroga, Black Perch, Beluga, Samara-Port, Dock service), New Harbor, Old Harbor, Beer Harbor, Quiet Harbor, Boatswain, Wooden Boatswain, Starship, Pilot, Captain, Captain Club, Samara Captain, Navigator, Cabin Boy, Steering Wheel, Seaman, Seagull.
In general, it can be concluded that 1) modern trends such as retroization, quasi-remotivation and ethnic saturation affect the ergonymic space of a particular segment of the urban onomastic reality; 2) the cultural-territorial specificity influences the onomastic space and city’s ergonymicon; 3) the national-territorial component is a particular kind of regional linguoculture ergonym capable of performing a password function; 4) there are certain ergonym patterns relating to territorial identity, including abbreviations and acronyms, contamination of different types; 5) the analysis of Samara ergonyms presents valuable material and further prospects for the study of a number of onomastic issues; 6) the role and meaning of names reflecting the regional, ethno-cultural component in the formation of the linguistic world view and the linguistic favour of Samara citizens are substantial. We are inclined to think that regional ergonyms form the ethno-cultural distinctiveness, as well as popularizing, preserving, and reintegrating local history motives; they also motivate the younger generation to study the history of their region.
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Received: 25.12.2021. Verified: 01.09.2022. Accepted: 21.09.2022.