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Poljarnyj Vestnik. Volume 5, 2002
Volume 5, 2002, includes the following articles:
Lennart Lönngren: On the Interrelations Between "Parts of Speech" and "Cases" in Russian. Summary in English
David Pineda: Some Observations on the Plural Instrumental in the Dialect of the Village Varzuga. Summary in English
Margje Post: Advantages and Shortcomings of Different Perspectives in Describing Northern Russian dak. Summary in English
Erik Egeberg: The Poetry of Jakov Polonskij. Summary in English
Olga Komarova: And What Next? On the Prose of V. Narbikova. Summary in English
Tamara Lönngren: Russia in the Mirror of Holidays. Summary in English
Tore Nesset: Dissimilation, Assimilation and Vowel Reduction: Constraint interaction in East Slavic dialects with so-called dissimilative akan'e and jakan'e. (E)
Jan Brodal: Floral Motifs in Garshin and Dagny Juel: A Literary Parallel. (E)
Articles written in English are marked (E).
Summaries in English
Lennart Lönngren: On the Interrelations Between "Parts of Speech" and "Cases" in Russian.
The seemingly simple relations between these two categories turn out to be quite complex in the framework of a dependency grammar in which all kinds of segmental linguistic signs are involved: not only free, explicit words but also morphologically incorporated lexemes and implicit lexemes. To the set of traditional cases are added CAS (general case), AGR (agreement case), PRP (prepositional phrase), CJP (conjunction phrase), and NOC ("no case", not marked for case). The part of speech category is enriched by the introduction of two subword labels, AFF (derivational affixes) and FLEX (desinencies). The possible combinations of the "part of speech" and "case" labels are investigated separately for each type of lexeme.
David Pineda: Some Observations on the Plural Instrumental in the Dialect of the Village of Varzuga
This paper attempts to give an overview of the different case endings found in the Instrumental Plural in the Northern Russian dialect of Varzuga on the Kola Peninsula, and looks at the situation in the neighbouring Russian dialects of Carelia and the Archangel district. Along with the Literary Russian ending [m'i], Varzuga uses the endings [my] (in nouns) and [ma] (in nouns, adjectives and pronouns). While [my] dominates in noun declension, [ma] is dominant in adjectives, and in possessive and demonstrative pronouns. These facts link the Varzuga dialect to Carelia, whereas Northern Archangel dialects do not use [my] at all, and reserve [ma] for adjectival and pronominal declension only.
Margje Post: Advantages and Shortcomings of Different Perspectives in Describing Northern Russian dak
The word dak is one of several highly frequent particles, used in most Northern Russian and some Siberian dialects. It can occur sentence initially, sentence internally and sentence finally to connect two parts of the discourse, such as words, sentences, and presuppositions. This article describes the advantages and shortcomings of six different perspectives which have been used to describe this unspecified, multifunctional word: descriptions in traditional grammatical terms, in syntactic terminology used for spontaneîus speech, research on its role in information structure, its use in discourse, the role of prosody, and finally comparisons with parallel words in neighbouring and other languages. I conclude that a combination of approaches is required for a better understanding of the way dak functions. Studies in prosody combined with research on dak's role in information structure appear to be most fruitful, and modern theories of discourse structure, which are almost completely ignored at present, could be helpful. Much research remains to be done, especially to clarify the restrictions on the use of the word dak and the way it functions in less obvious contexts.
Erik Egeberg: The Poetry of Jakov Polonskij
In this article the poetry of Jakov Polonskij is compared to Afanasij Fet's verse with a special focus on the motif "night". A juxtaposition of parallel passages demonstrates both similarities and profound differences: on the one hand, Polonskij is familiar with the various aspects of verse technique so brilliantly applied by Fet, while on the other hand he avoids the erotically coloured emotional climax which often concludes Fet's poems. In Polonskij a joyful mood is combined with dissonant notes of doubt and disillusion.
Olga Komarova: And What Next? On the Prose of V. Narbikova
Parallel to radical changes in Russian society in the last decades of the 20th century are transformations in literary methods and genres. There is a widespread notion that new tendences in this sphere were born as a reaction to the uniformistic, boring Sovjet literature of the previous period. Valerija Narbikova was one of the new names which manifested the arrival of postmodernist literature (1989), with its neglect of social and political realities and concentration on the egocentric inner life of an individual and, unusually for Russian literature of the time, its acceptance of sex as the most important part of life, an expression of the desperate need for love and understanding and helplessness in the attempt to discover the meaning of human existence. Narbikova's prose is interesting not for its philosophy, which is intentionally very simple, but for its inventive use of language, for its intertextuality and vitality. Narbikova became almost a cult figure in the 1990s. Her latest novel was published in 1996, and since then she has been silent. Russian society has changed, the reader has become mature, and one may ask oneself in what directions this type of prose might possibly develop.
Tamara Lönngren: Russia in the Mirror of Holidays
This article deals with the holiday calendar in contemporary Russia. Up to now, it has been customary among Russian ethnologists to speak of three periods of formation and radical transformation of the Russian calendar: a) during the introduction of Christendom, b) during the rule of Peter the Great, and c) in the years following the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917. It is now appropriate to add one more period of intense change: the present, post-Soviet era. An attempt is made to provide a classification of the numerous Russian holidays. The article also presents the results of an interview with a group of Moscovians; the interview was carried out in order to elucidate their attitudes to certain holidays.
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