Perception Stereotypes of Basic Monomodal Tastes in Russian Linguaculture

The connection of taste sensations with cultural contexts leads to significant dissimilarities in the verbalization of such experience in different languages. People often face difficulties in conveying their sensations, but the task is facilitated by predetermined ideas about the stereotypical perception of tastes which are stored in the language in the form of comparisons. The aim of the work is to study the perception stereotypes of the basic monomodal tastes in order to identify the images with which they are associated in Russian linguistic culture. Basic monomodal tastes (bitter, sour, salty, sweet and umami) are perceived by human receptors and serve as the basis for more complex combinations. Forty-one phrases selected from the Large Dictionary of Russian Comparisons, the Russian national corpus and the Google Books Corpus are used for the research. According to the analysis, the stereotypical ideas about only four basic tastes are represented in Russian linguaculture. Sweet and bitter are considered antonymous and have identical spheres of image sources for describing these tastes. They are: food products, liquids, plants, biological fluids and abstract concepts. Salty and sour are not always clearly differentiated since the same objects (liquid) serve as images for the stereotypical perception of these tastes. The peculiarity of sour is its comparison with food products and salty with biological fluids. The study of the stereotypical perception of tastes through the analysis of comparisons allows us to understand cultural features, as well as to consider the relationship between language and consciousness.