SEMIOTIC REPRESENTATION OF THE IMAGE OF MOTHER IN THE ENGLISH-LANGUAGE VISUAL SPACE

Abstract

The article analyses the semiotic representation of the image of the mother in the English-language visual space from the perspective of a cognitive-communicative and cultural-semiotic approach. Semiotics, as an interdisciplinary paradigm, allows for a comprehensive study of the interaction of verbal, visual, and multimodal sign systems in the digital and media environment. The interaction of these systems forms a holistic semantic field, where the linguistic sign performs an integrative function, coordinating various semiotic elements and ensuring the cognitive and receptive activity of the addressee.
The mother's image in the English-language media space appears as a multi-layered archetype that combines positive and negative characteristics and symbolic and psychoanalytic constructions. The central verbalisers are the words mother and mom and their derivatives, which ensure the transmission of social, psychological, and cultural meanings. In media narratives, the maternal figure is represented as a bearer of fundamental values, a role model, and an instrument for forming individual identity and social hierarchy.
In the texts of the English-language visual space, the archetypalisation of the mother can be traced through various forms: the Kind Mother, the Terrible Mother, ambivalent and transgenerational modifications. The interaction between mother and child is represented through the media, reflecting early psychological and emotional experiences, cultural archetypes, and the transmission of values. Semiotic analysis reveals a multi-level structure of messages that combines symbolic, cultural, and psychological aspects of motherhood and the mechanisms of their representation in contemporary English-language media.