Author:
O. К. Mzhelskaya,
Candidate of Philology, Associate Professor,
Omsk Humanitarian Academy,
2а 4th Cheluskintsev st., Omsk, 644105, Russian Federation
e-mail: mzhelskaya@yandex.ru
Abstract:
Introduction. The purpose of the article is to identify the features of linguistic means functioning in order to create ambiguity in the headlines of the English and Russian media discourse. The language material analysis has allowed to reveal a number of language receptions for achievement of the communicative. At the same time, the question of the successful use of deliberate ambiguity has been considered.
Research hypothesis: most of the ambiguous headlines do not cause problems in the discourse, be-cause readers can think over the meaning the authors express in the text of the article.
Description of the sample: the study was conducted on the material of Russian-language and English-language newspapers. The study has revealed that headlines with ambiguity are more common in Russian media. 230 headings have been analyzed.
Materials and Methods. Research methods: contextual analysis, comparative and interpretive analy-sis of translation.
Conclusions. Among 230 headlines with ambiguity, 161 fell into the section of the most popular and read articles (such sections include the most reviewed articles), it means that the recipients do not open pri-marily articles with unambiguous headings: creating ambiguous headlines, the media attracts readers to open text, and not read only the heading.
The leading function of headlines containing ambiguity in both English and Russian-language media is advertising-pragmatic one. It is also the only function implemented by absolutely all the means of creating ambiguity we have allocated. Thus, it is the ambiguous headlines that attract the attention of readers and are pragmatically motivated.
Lexical ambiguity in writing is also a kind of lexical ambiguity. In addition, ambiguity differs from vagueness and deixis, as they are capable of presenting an distinct semantic situation, but they can also be associated with ambiguity.
Keywords:
Media discourse, title, semantics change, means of ambiguity creation.
