STRUCTURAL-SEMANTIC MODELING OF THE LEXICO-SEMANTIC FIELD OF ENVY IN CONTEMPORARY ENGLISH
Keywords:
Lexico-semantic field, emotional vocabulary, envy, corpus linguisticsAbstract
The linguistic representation of emotions constitutes an important area of research in modern linguistics due to its close relationship with cognition, culture, and communication. The present study investigates the structural and semantic organization of the lexico-semantic field of the negative emotion envy in contemporary English. The analysis is based on the field approach combined with corpus-based frequency analysis using data from the Corpus of Global Web-Based English (GloWbE). The results demonstrate that the lexico-semantic field of envy forms a hierarchical structure consisting of a core, a perinuclear zone, and a peripheral zone. The core is represented by the lexeme envy, while the perinuclear zone includes lexical units that directly express or intensify the emotional state. Peripheral elements demonstrate weaker semantic connections and often reflect social, behavioral, or evaluative aspects related to the experience of envy. The findings confirm that the field approach combined with corpus linguistics provides an effective methodological framework for analyzing the internal organization of emotional vocabulary in English.
References
Apresyan, Y.D. (1995). Selected works. Vol. 1: Lexical semantics. Moscow: Languages of Russian Culture.
Cruse, D.A. (1986). Lexical semantics. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Davies, M. (2013). Corpus of Global Web-Based English (GloWbE). Retrieved from https://www.english-corpora.org/glowbe/
Ekman, P. (1992). An argument for basic emotions. Cognition & Emotion, 6(3–4), 169–200. https://doi.org/10.1080/02699939208411068
Geeraerts, D. (2010). Theories of lexical semantics. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
Kövecses, Z. (2000). Metaphor and emotion: Language, culture, and body in human feeling. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English. (2014). Harlow, UK: Pearson Education.
Parrott, W.G. (2001). Emotions in social psychology: Essential readings. Philadelphia, PA: Psychology Press.
Wierzbicka, A. (1999). Emotions across languages and cultures: Diversity and universals. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
