CONCEPTSYSTEM OF THE MODERN ENGLISH HUMOROUS DISCOURSE

Abstract

The article investigates the conceptual space of modern English humorous discourse as a system of hierarchically ordered concepts. The term "humorous discourse" means situationally conditioned interpersonal oral and mental activity aimed at the intellectual ability to see fun and cause laughter. The humorous discourse has become the attractive object of interest for discursologists nowadays, so it seems relevant to consider the conceptual space of modern English humorous discourse. A constructive unit of humorous discourse is the situation of witty communication, marked with national peculiarities. The aim of the article is to identify elements of the conceptual space of modern English humorous discourse as relevant discourse-forming concepts. The object of study is modern English humorous discourse, and the subject are elements of its conceptual space. The research material determines the author's humorous statements from modern British talk – shows: «Edinburgh Fringe», «Tommy Cooper`s TV show», «Milton Jone`s show». The isolation of the basic concepts-autochthons is carried out according to their specific weight in the discourse. The applied technique allowed using quantitative calculations to identify 24 significant concepts-autochthons within the 9 domains (human being, family and relatives, leisure, emotions and feelings, household and financial-economic sphere, social-state sphere, physiological needs, medicine, animal world) of modern English humorous discourse.