THE CONCEPT OF MEMORY IN THE URBANONYMY OF UZHHOROD
THE CONCEPT OF MEMORY IN THE URBANONYMY OF UZHHOROD

Summary/Abstract: The purpose of our article is to delve into the emergence and development of the concept of memory in the Ukrainian urbanonyms of the city of Uzhhorod. We applied the method of associative experiment, which helps to reproduce speakers’ perception of the world. From the urbanonyms of Uzhhorod, we selected those which, according to the authors of these names, are associated with the formation of this concept, the purpose of which is to perpetuate a person or event in the memory of people. We found 310 units of this type. To obtain reliable results, 50 people of different ages (between 18 and 65 years old), gender, and education were interviewed. The analysis of memorial urbanonyms of the city of Uzhhorod showed that most of them form the concept of historical memory based on the key provided by the authors of the names. There are three groups of names according to the degree of their influence on the cultural mentality of speakers: the first group includes the names that are associated with the specific activities of persons whose names are immortalized in these names. The associative experiment showed that the number of such names is about 18%. The second group consists of urbanonyms, which reflect the general idea of the speakers about the person whose name is the basis of the name, but without a specific understanding of what the person did (67% of the names). The third group contains names for which speakers do not have a connection with a particular person in whose honour the urban name was given (15%). The analysis indicates that the clearest understanding of motivation is evoked in the imagination of Uzhhorod residents by names of foreigners and personalities of national importance, especially the names of artists. The reason for this is twofold: first, the fame of the persons immortalized in these names, and secondly, the relative stability of this layer of urbanonyms. The perception of names in honour of local personalities is lower, which is due to the constant transformation of this subgroup of units.

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