Comparative analysis of classical naming in Chinese and Russian

Van Shikhao ORCID: 0009-0006-5472-0566 Postgraduate student, Department of General and Russian Linguistics, Peoples' Friendship University of Russia 119571, Russia, Moscow region, Moscow, ul. Leninsky Prospekt, 148, sq. 205 wsh1533951634@gmail.com

Introduction

With the development of modern countries, there is an increasing need for effective intercultural communication. It is well known that people communicate with others mainly through language, which expresses the greatest amount of information to us. Therefore, there is no doubt that people value language information highly. Names play a special role in communication, since it is by name that communicants address each other. Russian Russian and Chinese names are studied in this article, an attempt is made to study various cultural and psychological attributes in both Russian and English languages. 

The name is a kind of sign, it is well known that this name is a cultural phenomenon in both Russian and Chinese cultures. Names have different meanings in China and other countries. Names can be associated with the historical and cultural past of a country and have deep connotations. The Chinese name can be divided into four parts: surname, family name, clan name and first name. The name is a special cultural language, it reflects some social history, cultural spirit and religious customs of this people. This is an important embodiment of the culture of the nation, which requires study to ensure effective intercultural communication. 

The theory of nomination and the concept of naming

The very concept of naming – Naming Unit (NU) was first used by Wilem Mathesius in 1961, which gave rise to the development of the theory of nomination, which studies the processes associated with describing how words acquire meaning through their relationship to the world and to other words. The naming process itself can be divided into two main parts: conceptualization and linguistic coding. The process of conceptualization is based on the mental processing of extralinguistic reality. The naming process also takes place against the background of knowledge of the speaker's existing mental vocabulary. The naming process begins with the perception of extralinguistic reality. 

Every new phenomenon in human society and in human activity in general, which has any significance for communication, is reflected in vocabulary. A word that conveys a concept in its meaning is a generalized reflection of reality; therefore, it is impossible to understand its development if you do not know about changes in social, political or everyday life, production or science, mores or culture that it serves to reflect. The act of nomination is the speech recognition process of choosing a ready—made name for a thing from the available language units or coming up with a new name for it. The formation of new words occurs by combining linguistic elements based on a determinant/determinant relationship called syntagma.

The very structure of the nomination act can be defined as follows: it includes the speaker's intention and the linguistic means of its implementation. In accordance with his intention, the speaker analyzes the situation and notes some details in it. This affects the choice of the nomination unit ^[1]. The following factors are taken into account here:

1) the source of the nomination: in what form – ready-made or newly created – the unit is taken; 2) the form and length of the nomination unit: a word, phrase or sentence;

3) the internal form of the nomination: the nomination can be either a motivated sign or an unmotivated sign. Examples: phonetic motivation – smash, whip, splash; morphological motivation – friend – unfriendly; semantic motivation – human hand ? tree hand;

4) semantic types of nomination: direct/indirect, primary/secondary, literal/figurative. The primary nomination takes place when the referent is nominated directly and the meaning of the linguistic unit can be understood without the help of context, in isolation. Secondary nomination is the use of existing language units in a new function, with a new meaning.

5) the adequacy of the nomination act and internal control over its correctness and correctness.

Various pragmatic factors are of great importance in the act of nomination: emotional factors; evaluative factors; social factors. The vocabulary of a language and, accordingly, the "lexicon" as a sub-component of grammar, formally representing the lexical competence of a native speaker, are structured according to two organizational principles: semantic and formal morphological.

Semantic structures arise as a result of the existence of various kinds of semantic relations between lexical units, more precisely, the meanings of lexical units, on the basis of which sets of lexemes with a common basic meaning are formed. These sets are usually called lexical fields. Formal morphological structures arise from the ability of already existing lexical units to connect with other lexical units or with related morphemes (prefixes, suffixes), forming morphologically complex new lexical units. These processes, i.e., word composition, prefixation, suffixation, etc., characterize the field of word formation and are usually considered as a means of almost unlimited expansion of vocabulary in order to adapt it to the constantly changing referential requirements of the dictionary. the speech community. This leads to a formal division of vocabulary into primary and secondary lexemes.

Primary tokens, for example. big, mountain, give, in, etc. are simple, arbitrary language signs in the sense of Saussure ^[3]. Secondary tokens, for example. spaceship, steamer, rewrite, atomize, horseman, departure, etc. are lexical syntagmas. As such, they are characterized by a determinant/determinatum relationship; they are relatively motivated in relation to their constituents and parallel formations; and they are based on certain morphological, semantic and syntactic patterns.

Classical naming in Chinese culture

For the Chinese, surnames were an individual symbol of the family. Chinese surnames originated with mankind, the previous primitive tribe in a matriarchal society. Today, in Chinese culture, naming is an important symbolic practice with deep meaning and cultural significance. The theory of the ancient Chinese is based on the belief that man is an integral part of nature. This position most typically represents the Eastern way of thinking and influenced the peculiarities of naming in Eastern culture. Let's look at the examples.

The surname of a person occupies an important position in the concept of thinking of representatives of Chinese linguistic culture. Naturally, it can be assumed that when creating a Chinese name by combining words from the lexicon, the corresponding meanings of the selected words will always be carefully taken into account.

Chinese names often have family, generational, and cultural significance. Names are usually chosen based on the positive qualities or aspirations of parents for their child. Surnames (surnames) are passed down from generation to generation and reflect a sense of origin and heritage.

Traditional Chinese naming practices are often influenced by the theory of the five elements (wood, fire, earth, metal, water). Certain symbols or sounds are considered lucky or auspicious based on their association with these elements, and this can influence the choice of names for people.

In Chinese culture, there are certain taboos on names, for example, to avoid names that sound like negative words or have negative connotations. For example, names that sound like death or misfortune are usually avoided.

The surname always precedes the name when writing in Chinese, sometimes some people may change the order of their name when writing it in Latin letters, for example, Sun Sidong will be used instead of Sidong Sun. Surnames almost always consist of a single character. There are several two-character surnames, such as Sima and Ouyang, but they are very rare.

Recent Chinese censuses show that there are more than 4,000 unique surnames, in practice, the vast majority of Chinese have a relatively limited set of surnames: as of 2007, the three most popular surnames accounted for 21.37% of the Chinese population, and the next 97 most common surnames accounted for another 63%. Moreover, there are significant regional differences in the frequency of surnames (for example, LINAN is the second most common surname in Taiwan and only the 19th most common surname in mainland China). As a result, the surname alone does not matter much to clarify the ambiguity of the personality.

The first name always follows the last name if it is written in Chinese. Although names usually consist of two characters, single-character names are not unusual. Theoretically, any of tens of thousands of Chinese characters can be used in a name, but in practice the vast majority of names consist of a much more limited set of characters with a positive meaning.

Although any particular character does not necessarily indicate the gender of the person in whose name it is used, some characters tend to be used more often by one gender than the other. For example, Li (?, jasmine) is almost never used in male names; Wu (?, martial) is almost never used in female names.

The vast majority of Chinese take their father's surname. Married couples almost never take their spouse's last name, although married women can sometimes be called by their husband's last name followed by their first name (for example, Gu Kailai, Bo Xilai's wife, is sometimes referred to as Bo Kailai). ).

Brothers, sisters, or cousins of the same generation may have the same symbol of their name. Although it is less common today than in the past, it is still common. This common character usually occupies the first character of a given name. For example, businesswoman Ma Xiaohong, who has been sanctioned by OFAC, has siblings named Ma Xiaobo, Ma Xiaojie, and Ma Xiaodong.

While most people in mainland China today romanize their names using the official Chinese romanization system of Hanyu Pinyin, there is a wide range of romanization schemes used in Greater China and among ethnic Chinese communities around the world. Names can be displayed together (for example, Ding Ailan ), separately (for example, Lui Wang Jing ), separated by a hyphen (for example, Wang Shin-sing ?).

Although some ethnic minorities use Chinese characters in their names, many adopt Chinese names, which are simply phonetic transliteration into Chinese of the name of their native language. In some cases, they may be longer than 3 or 4 characters. Among ethnic groups that use Chinese characters in their names, some surnames are more common than most Han Chinese (for example, the most common Korean surname Pak translates in Chinese as Piao ?.

There are also common nouns as surnames. For example, the parents of former senior aide to President Hu Jintao, perhaps inspired by a desire to demonstrate revolutionary zeal, named their children after fashionable political buzzwords:

Lin Jihua - Jihua = plan

Lin Fangzhen - Fangzhen = guidelines/policy

Ling Luxian - Luxian = line (for example, the party line)

Lin Wancheng - Wancheng = completed

It is also worth noting that the Chinese surname system has a greater connotative meaning than in Russian. Chinese names and surnames have a more complex form and a deep connotative meaning, which occupies an extremely important position in the concept of people's thinking.

Classical naming in Russian culture

The long-term historical and cultural heritage has created a unique culture of Russian names. In different historical periods, people followed different rules and customs in naming, reflecting the peculiarities of the time epoch. Traditional Russian naming principles follow a certain pattern of first name, patronymic (derived from the father's name) and last name. For example, Ivan Ivanovich Ivanov.

Russian names often have a deep meaning and connection with religious or historical figures, and many names have Slavic, Christian or Ancient Russian origin. Russian names can also be gender-specific, with different names for men and women. For example, Ivan is for a man and Ivan is for a woman. In Russia, people often have a nickname or a diminutive form of a name that is used by family members and close friends. For example, Sasha for Alexander or Katya for Ekaterina.

Russian naming traditions may vary depending on region, ethnicity, and social class, with some families choosing to abandon traditional naming conventions and choose more modern or unique names.

Naming ceremonies, such as the Orthodox tradition of baptizing a child shortly after birth, are important cultural events in Russian society. Russian naming customs also apply to the names of streets, buildings and landmarks, many of which are dedicated to historical figures, patriotic themes or important events in the history of Russia.

In modern Russian society, there is a tendency to choose international or non-traditional names under the influence of world pop culture and the media. However, traditional Russian names continue to be popular and have cultural significance.

Zinin believes that "before the adoption of Christianity, parents had much greater freedom to choose the child's name, and the choice was characterized by external reasons, sometimes accidental, the desire of parents to put in the name, as in a talisman, the best wishes in the child's future life" ^{[8, p. 51]}. In addition to the ancient names, common Slavic ones were used: Yaroslav, Mstislav, Vsevolod. After the 14th century, such names became unpopular among princes and their entourage and fell out of use. In some families, when choosing these names, naming was also observed: in order to trace the common components in the names of all family members. With the adoption of Christianity, a new type of names appeared in the Russian language – hagionymy – the names of saints.

It was impossible to talk about any free choice of a name in Russia for a long time, since newborns were anointed according to church regulations ^{[5, p. 142]}. In addition, it should be noted that the set of names was influenced by events that occurred after the October Revolution: the church (and indeed any official control) over the anthroponomic situation disappeared. This helped to embody full-fledged views on "fashionable" names in society. In 1920, this name became a special pass for new people to a new life ^[3]. In workers' communes and factories, it was simply impossible to give a child a traditional religious name, especially after the separation of church and state, where atheism was promoted.

There are several directions in which new names were created:

1) Revolution and the revolutionary period – Revd (revolutionary child) Revo, Hero;

2) Plans for the development of the country: Ram (revolution, electrification, mechanization), Martin (in honor of Siemens – Martin furnace);

3) Achievements of science and art: Academician, Polygraph, Genius;

4) Names of flowers and precious stones: Hydrangea, Lily, Diamond;

5) In solidarity with the workers of foreign countries – borrowing Western names: Ernst (in honor of Telman), Clara (in honor of Zetkin), Louise (in honor of Michelle).

Nowadays, the concept of a name has changed again. Although religion has regained its citizenship rights, church calendars do not help identify certain variants of names. The main one is the spelling form of the name, and the civil status authorities consider the variants of the name (Natalia and Natalia, Sofa and Sofia) to be different names, although these are only different pronunciation of the same name. in different social groups ^{[2, p. 12]}. Based on the work of Superanskaya, Nikonov, and Suslova, the following factors can be assumed to influence naming in Russia:

1) According to the saints of the church canonical names ^{[8, p. 179]};

2) In honor of especially revered saints;

3) Unmotivated hatred or love for the name ^{[8, p. 180]};

4) Selection of the first name by patronymic and last name;

5) Euphonious;

6) The influence of the nominal list of the ruling dynasty (for example, the name Catherine was not widely used in the XVIII century);

7) In honor of or in memory of any person or significant event;

8) The effect of drama and literature – Assol, Aelita ^{[7, p. 144]};

9) Increased interest in ancient Russian history – (using the names of the first ancient rulers of the intelligentsia of the 20-30s of the XX century – Oleg, Igor, Vladimir, Vsevolod, Olga and others;

10) Originality – use a common name for the name – Barricade, Globe ^{[5, pp. 5-6]};

11) Social status - Peter, Ivan for boyars and nobles; Petrushka, Ivashka – for the common people ^{[1, p. 105]}; Vasilisa, Fekla – for peasants; Elizabeth, Alexandra – for noblewomen ^{[1, p. 118]}.

In conclusion of the discussions on the peculiarities of naming in Russian culture, it is important to emphasize that the system of naming traditions has changed over time, it has been influenced by cultural and historical events. Events such as the adoption of Christianity and the adoption of the Orthodox traditions of Byzantium had the strongest influence. A separate layer of names are those associated with saints, archangels and martyrs. As before, so now, native speakers of Russian linguistic culture pay great attention to choosing a name for a child. At the same time, the euphony, originality and special connotations of the name are taken into account. It is also worth noting that in some examples it is possible to trace the connection between the name of a person's place of residence, his religious affiliation, ideology and name. Another typical Russian tradition is to name children after family members. 

Comparison of naming principles in Chinese and Russian cultures

The study of the basic principles of naming in Chinese and Russian cultures allowed us to establish that the naming process in these two linguistic cultures has different features and traditions, which are determined by different paths of historical development, different religions and cultural traditions. Let's systematize the similarities and highlight the main differences.

First of all, it is established that in Chinese culture names are chosen carefully to convey certain meanings and connotations. The name in Chinese long culture is endowed with a special meaning and can determine a person's fate. Chinese names often consist of two or three characters, with the surname standing first. Surnames are usually adopted by the father and contain information about the origin of a person. Family traditions are often reflected in the surname. Names are often chosen in such a way as to reflect the virtues or values that parents hope to embody in their child. Names can also be chosen based on elements of Chinese astrology, such as the five elements (metal, wood, water, fire, earth) and 12 animal signs.

In Russian culture, names are also important and are chosen based on many factors. Russian names usually consist of a first name followed by a patronymic (formed on behalf of the father) and a surname, which, as in Chinese linguoculture, is transmitted from the father. Russian names can be chosen based on a person's religious affiliation, family traditions, or popular cultural trends that are currently taking place. As a rule, Russian names often have Slavic or Orthodox Christian origin and may have connotative meanings that are associated with virtues, nature, or historical figures.

A common feature is that in both Chinese and Russian cultures, names are considered an important aspect of identity. The basic principles of naming in each culture reflect the basic values, historical traditions and beliefs of society as a whole.

Conclusions

It has been established that the names themselves are not arbitrary symbols, but have a direct connection with the objects they nominate. In Russian linguistic culture, among personal names, the largest number are religious names, names of apostles and evangelists. A person's name is defined as a special word denoting a unique personality and given to him individually. Traditional Russian naming principles are based on first name, patronymic and last name. Russian names often have a deep meaning and connection with religious or historical figures. Russian names can be gender-specific, with different names for men and women. In Russia, people often have a nickname or a diminutive form of the name. Russian naming traditions may vary depending on the region, ethnicity, and social class. Naming ceremonies, such as the Orthodox tradition of baptizing a child, are important cultural events in Russian society. Russian naming customs also apply to the names of streets, buildings, and landmarks. In modern Russian society, there is a tendency to choose international or non-traditional names. Russian Russian names continue to be popular among native speakers of Russian linguistic culture and have a special cultural significance.

In Chinese culture, naming has a deep meaning and cultural significance. The theory of the ancient Chinese is based on the belief that man is an integral part of nature. Surnames in Chinese culture are an individual symbol of the family and have family, generational and cultural significance. Names in Chinese are formed by combining morphemes from the same set of 3,500 commonly used morphemes. Chinese names have two very distinctive features: meaning due to their origin from significant morphemes and two-syllabic. Names are often chosen based on the positive qualities or aspirations of parents for their child. Traditional Chinese naming practices are often influenced by the theory of the five elements. There are certain taboos on names, for example, to avoid names that sound like negative words or have negative connotations. In Chinese culture, there are certain linguistic features that affect the Chinese name, such as tone and two-syllabic.