“A ja, mal’chik, nachuzhbinepozabytotl’udej”: Self-nominations in Non-Ritual Songs

Abstract

Modern field recordings of folk songs allow to compare information about a singer of folk songs with the basic characteristics of a speaker which is explicated in the lyrics. These characteristics are quantity, gender, and age category. The field data shows that the singer and the subject of the speech explicated in the lyrics may be different. The difference becomes apparent in the songs with self-nominations, i.e. nominations that a singer refers to himself. The fact that self-nominations refer to the speaker draws special attention in the study of the pragmatics of folk songs performance. Refs 9.