Names of Characters Associated with Russian Cultural Identity

Precedent names greatly contribute to the national cultural canon. The names of famous persons, as well as names of animals and ethnonyms are signs which symbolize national cultural values and concepts. Precedent names may be borrowed by other cultures. These processes involve changes in the name’s connotations as well as in its extra-linguistic references. This can be illustrated by the epigrams about famous persons where borrowed images undergo the national cultural adaptation. The content of units of the national cultural canon in the language consciousness of native speakers is discovered through surveys and associative experiments which help find out the list of basic precedent names, texts and stereotypes. Diachronic studies show essential changes in the national cultural canon. In the near future famous scientists, athletes, musicians, and actors will dominate in the Russian national cultural canon alongside with political leaders and patriotic wars heroes. A precedent name becomes symbolised and is associated with a certain quality (or qualities). The person’s name is employed to measure the values of the national cultural canon. In this aspect, it acquires an idiomatic character. One of the ways to create idioms that are impossible to literally translate into other languages is metonymy, and particularly synecdoche. The nationally identified metonymy may be defined as ‘frame metonymy’. However, national identity does not always mean the opposition of “native” and “foreign”. National self-identification should not only be aimed at contrasting ourselves with other nations but – to a greater deal – at better understanding of our