Концептуализация смерти в русских пословицах

Conceptualization of ‘Death’ in Russian Proverbs

In this paper, we investigated the way how the concept of death is expressed through a certain language form in Russian proverbs. To grasp how Russians cognize death, we applied the method of conceptual metaphor in cognitive linguistics. Humans cognitive system is metaphorical. So we can catch their mind better through metaphor. Thinking and acting in our lives, our daily conceptual system is essentially metaphorical. This means that humans language life remarkably depends on metaphor. Metaphor is widely distributed in daily languages. And it is a means which conceptualizes the abstract world. If we conceptualize the meaning through the conceptual metaphor of death phenomenon, we can understand the death concretely. And it is helpful for understanding the concept of death in Russian. We can conceptualize the meaning of death through analysing the syntagm of Russian proverbs and as follows: (1) Death is a cold. (2) Death is a man. (3) Death is an animal. (4) Death is a bird. (5) Death is liberty.