The occasional transformations of anthroponyms such as invective lexis

Abstract

In modern media, proper names and their derivatives are characterized by a high occurrence. The occasional transformations of anthroponyms registered in the Bulgarian media and social networks have a distinctive emotionally-expressive evaluation. The newlyformed units retain the nominative character of the proper name, which designates a real person, but add to it a variety of evaluative components related to expressing personal assessment with concrete manifestations of friendliness or antipathy towards a given person and their behavior, activities, qualities, etc. Their creation is situationally or contextually determined, which is why their understanding requires knowledge about an actual extralinguistic situation, against which it would be possible to assess their emotional-expressive impact. Anthroponyms are transformed on the basis of homonymic and paronymic relations with other lexical units, as a result of which they receive a new internal form. The underlining of offensive or obscene words allows us to regard them as invective lexis. The most offensive are occasionalisms, in which obscene lexis is found as a structural component, as well as other units with a pejorative or otherwise negative connotation, including zoo and phytometaphors. These offensive qualifications are indirect in character since they are expressed by people, often anonymously. Every transformation is motivated by particular events in which a given person is an active side (an active participant). The most common ways of transforming anthroponyms are shown, among which are contamination and graphic word formation. Also, certain characteristics of lexis are revealed, with which they have close relations. The observation of occasional anthroponyms, which, to a different extent, lower someone’s reputation, provides important information about public attitudes and opinions reflected in them.