Polylinguality and Transcultural Practices

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The research is devoted to the analysis of the state of the modern Komi-Permyak literary language. Literary language serves the communicative needs of society in all spheres of its activity. The presence of a literary form of a language indicates the level of its development, its potential, and the cultural level of the people as a whole. The relevance of the research topic stems from the need for an in-depth study of the language situation in the Komi-Permyak Okrug under modern conditions. The aim of this work is to identify and analyze some of the most evident development trends of the modern Komi-Permyak literary language and the problems associated of its functioning. This study utilizes descriptive and analytical research methods. It has been revealed that at present, despite a considerable period of its formation, the literary Komi-Permyak language has many unresolved problems that hinder its full-fledged development. It is noted that under modern conditions, the literary Komi-Permyak language lives and develops in various spheres; it is most in demand in the sphere of education. Today, its functioning as a language of official communication and as a language of science is extremely limited. Despite the presence of certain problems, some trends in the development of the literary Komi-Permyak language can be noted, namely, the creation of Komi-Permyak linguistic and literary terminology, a tendency toward neologization, which can be characterized as a rational, targeted effort to expand the lexical resources of the literary language, and a desire to enrich the vocabulary using its own linguistic resources. A positive trend in the development of the modern Komi-Permyak language is the formation of a religious style associated with the translation of liturgical books into the Komi-Permyak language. The role of the Internet in expanding the boundaries of the language’s functionality and its further development is noted. The study emphasizes the importance of the Komi-Permyak language as a component of cultural heritage capable of preserving national identity and ensuring the continuity of generations.

The modern Komi language is a multi-layered and complexly organized dynamic system, with a standardized literary variant and dialectal forms. The Izhma dialect is one of 10 dialects of the Komi language. Despite a fairly comprehensive scientific description of the Komi literary language and its dialects, the interaction between the literary language and dialects, as well as the acceptance or rejection of the literary language by dialect speakers, has not yet been adequately addressed in the scientific literature. These issues have not only scientific but also practical and social significance for local linguistic communities that use dialects as their primary language of communication. The purpose of this article is to analyze the linguacultural attitudes of Izhma Komi dialect speakers, residents of the Izhemsky district of the Komi Republic, within the broader context of the ethnolinguistic situation in the Komi Republic. The article analyzes the opinions of Izhma respondents on the interaction between the Izhma dialect and the literary Komi language, which were collected during a field study conducted in the summer of 2025, as part of an assignment of the Research Center for the Preservation, Revitalization, and Documentation of the Languages of Russia at the Institute of Linguistics of the Russian Academy of Sciences to clarify the state of languages of Russia. Local projects aimed at the development and intergenerational transmission of the Izhma dialect and culture are also examined. As the study showed, the Izhma dialect is defined by its speakers as a language, either as ас кыы , as kyy , ‘our language’, or изьва кыы , iz'va kyy , ‘Izhma language’. Its opposition to the literary Komi language has existed historically and continues to this day. The state of both the Izhma dialect and the Komi language as a whole is affected by the depopulation of the indigenous population and an intense language shift toward Russian, especially among children and young people. Despite this, recognizing their responsibility for the preservation, development, and transmission of the Izhma dialect and culture, the Izhma Komi people initiate, implement, and actively participate in local linguacultural projects.

In modern linguistics, scientists are very interested in the study of sounding speech and the specifics of its intonation. The paper focuses on one of the components of intonation, namely the pause, which plays an important role both in spontaneous live speech and in the written text. Its special place among other elements of intonation lies in its key role in ensuring the communicative effectiveness of the transmitted message. The paper deals with the study and description of the pause in Komi prose works. The object of our research is the pause as an element of intonation, capable of carrying an important semantic load in speech. The main objectives of the study are to analyze the motivational side of pausal inclusions, identify the means of transmitting pauses in the text of a prose work and classify them in a functional and semantic aspect. The sources of the empirical base of the work were the texts of the original Komi fiction, on the basis of which a rich textual material was collected for the study of intonation features, including pauses characterizing the character’s speech. The text of the artwork reflects the specifics of the use of linguistic means of transmitting pauses in the speech of the interlocutors. The study allowed us to conclude that for the most part they are transmitted through author’s remarks, word breaks, their repetition in the character’s remark, font highlights of lexemes, speech-like placeholders, as well as the use of graphic, including punctuation, features in the text. When classifying pauses, their characteristics, multi-level parameters, such as position in relation to semantic connection, physical nature, and function were taken into account. The analysis allowed us to identify many types of pauses used in the text. A distinctive feature of each of these varieties is their spontaneity and unpredictable nature. The author’s style, the unique sound organization of speech created by writers for their characters, and the author’s attitude to the images formed have a significant impact on the representation of the linguistic characteristics of pauses in the characters’ speech.

The research is devoted to the study of a fragment of Komi verbal etiquette - etiquette expressions and speech etiquette formulas (SEFs) of the Komi language that include the lexeme “bow” (“poklon”). Komi verbal etiquette is a relevant area of contemporary linguistic research, requiring not only preservation but also comprehensive study and systematic investigation that takes into account the poly-ethno-linguocultural specifics of the Northern and Volga-Kama macro-regions of the Russian Federation, shaped by intercultural and interlingual contacts. The aim of the work is to describe significant elements of Komi speech etiquette - SEFs containing the lexeme “bow” (“poklon”), and to identify the peculiarities of their functioning in oral and written communication, as well as their linguistic expression, semantics, and structure (constructions). The material was collected primarily from records of etiquette units in works of Komi literature, in written artistic speech, in lexicographic sources, in dialectal texts, and in the Electronic Corpus of the Komi Language (ECKL, www.komikorpora.ru). The main research methods are descriptive, as well as methods of component and distributional analysis. The study enriches the knowledge about Komi speech culture and Komi verbal etiquette, revealing the sources of new etiquette speech units and the peculiarities of their use and development. It has been established that Komi etiquette was strongly influenced by Russian etiquette traditions; the borrowing of etiquette speech expressions with the lexeme “bow” contributed to the enrichment of Komi speech etiquette and the expansion of means of expressing courtesy and politeness. The main etiquette situations for using SEFs are greetings, farewells, and expressions of gratitude, used when one wishes to show special reverence, respect, or attention to a particular person, or to acknowledge their merits. SEFs with the lexeme "bow" in the Komi language are used as colloquial etiquette formulas, as well as in the opening and final (farewell) formulas of private and business correspondence. The expression of respect, courtesy, and attention through SEFs can be directed both directly to the addressee and indirectly, through the addressee, to a third party (the recipient of the bow).

The study provides a review and analysis of the Komi literary process of the 1920s in order to identify and define general trends and individual characteristics in the development of the national literature during this period. The objectives are to trace the chronology of literary events; to examine the main principles behind the creation and development of Komi poetry, prose, and drama; and to determine the role of writers such as V. Savin, V. Chistalev, V. Lytkin, M. Lebedev, and P. Doronin in the formation of Komi literature. The research is based on comparative, descriptive, and cultural-historical methods which allow for the most comprehensive presentation of the literary life of the Komi region in the first post-revolutionary decade. The 1920s are considered a separate period in the history of Komi literature. The material for the analysis comprised poetic, prose, and dramatic works published in author’s books and periodicals - in the journals Ordym (“the Path”), Komi mu (“the Komi Land”), and in collections and almanacs as Parma Jol (“Forest Stream,” 1922), Voj tӧv shuvgӧm (“the Noise of the North Wind,” 1921), Gӧrd pӧlyan (“the Red Pipe,” 1921), Komi gizhysyas (“Komi writers,” 1926). The analysis demonstrates that the 1920s were one of the most important, albeit complex and ambiguous periods that influenced the formation and subsequent development of Komi literature in the 20th century. An unprecedented surge in the creative activity of both young and experienced writers, and the development of all kinds and genres of literature occurred simultaneously with the tightening of state control over the literary process, by the end of the decade and the intensification of creative unfreedom, culminating in the mass repression of Komi writers in the 1930s.

This article explores the key milestones in the history and the current state of the National Music and Drama Theatre of the Komi Republic. The relevance of this work is determined by the need to introduce historical data about the theatre into academic discourse and to study previously unexplored material. Analyzing this material will expand the scientific understanding of the cultural life of the Komi Republic. The article attempts to comprehend the reasons for the theatre's founding, the formation of its repertoire, and the renewal of its productions. It identifies the theatre's role in the development of national drama and culture, and reveals its uniqueness and distinctive character.

Considerable attention has been paid to the issue of Komi-Russian linguistic and intercultural relations in the works of linguists and sociologists. Recently, more substantial research in folkloristics has also emerged. Komi folklore demonstrates unique examples of the appropriation of foreign (in this case, Russian) folklore texts. This is not a mechanical appropriation, but rather a semantic correlation of Russian texts to the pragmatics of the Komi language. In this aspect, Komi jokes have remained unexamined, although it was in them that the problem of inter-language interaction manifested itself quite clearly. In the contemporary Komi folklore environment, jokes are as widespread as genres like the bylichka (supernatural folk tale) or legends. Their thematic range is not very diverse; in fact, the majority of the jokes reflect the everyday realities of village life: incidents involving people known to the storyteller, jokes about nicknames, cycles of jokes about village “jesters” (local wits/fools), and the like. However, the largest and most popular topic of jokes can rightfully be called the linguistic topic. This theme unites jokes of the Komi itself, jokes about Komi distorting Russian speech, and Russian jokes about Komi. Both series, in one way or another, are built around a speech situation in which a Komi person uses the Russian language.

Due to the fragmentary knowledge about Komi-Zyryan verbal magic, the incantation tradition of hunting and fishing has not yet been the object of special research. The author attempts to present a general picture of the existence of verbal-magical knowledge in the fishing and hunting life. Understanding verbal magic as a wide range of irrational techniques and methods of verbal influence on the surrounding world, the author summarizes the experience of research in the field of the Komi incantation tradition. This tradition is closely connected both with magical knowledge and the regulation of linguistic behavior in fishing and hunting activities. The material for the study was provided by currently available publications, unpublished archival sources, and the results of the author’s own field research over recent decades. When collecting field material, we used the methods of interviewing and participant observation. The methods of structural, semantic and pragmatic analysis were applied in the study of folklore narratives. Methods of comparative and structural-semantic analysis were used to study ritual descriptions. The analysis incorporates not only information on the incantation tradition but also a wide range of folklore and ethnographic data concerning ideas about fishing and hunting, associated rituals, and mythology. The general picture of the existence of verbal and magical knowledge constructed by the author includes a broad spectrum of irrational techniques and methods of verbal influence on the surrounding world - everything connected both with magical knowledge and the regulation of linguistic behavior in fishing and hunting activities. This expanded understanding of verbal magic is presented as a promising approach for the further study of the Komi incantation tradition.

The authors of this article present various Russian perspectives on the implementation of an environmental approach at different levels of education, identify the structural components and types of educational environments, and identify the role of the university educational environment in developing the professional ethnocultural competence of future teachers working at the primary education level. The results of a diagnostic assessment of primary school teachers in the Komi Republic to determine the level of ethnocultural competence are analyzed. The authors have have provided a description of the concept of “ethnocultural educational environment”, the components of the ethnocultural educational environment of the university are identified such as: target, normative-legal, theoretical-methodological, substantive, procedural, diagnostic-resultative blocks, a model of the ethnocultural educational environment of the Department of Primary Education of the Institute of Pedagogy and Psychology of the University, implementing the environmental approach, is designed and described in Pitirim Sorokin Syktyvkar State University and aimed at developing ethnocultural competence in future primary school teachers.

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The article presents an informational review of the scholarly and educational journal Komi Philology of Sytyvkar State University named after Pitirim Sorokin, and examines the publications of the main sections of 14 issues of the journal for 2020-2025: “Linguistics,” “Literary Studies,” “Folklore Studies,” and the “Study of the Komi Language and Literature in Schools.” The study was based on articles in the journal written in the Komi and Komi-Permyak languages. The paper analyzes these works to determine their relevance and role in the development of Komi philology and education.