Semantic changes of adverbs in Russian: the lexeme akkuratno / English neatly (a corpus-based study)

The article describes the semantic evolution, functional variation, and stylistic changes of Russian adverbs in the 17th–21st centuries using the example of the adverb akkuratno (English accurately/neatly/carefully). The relevance of the study is determined by the scientific significance and insufficient knowledge of many aspects of the semantics and functioning of Russian adverbs. It primarily concerns the diachronic changes that have occurred over the past three centuries. The study aims to describe the semantic changes of the Russian adverb akkuratno over the course of the 18th – early 21st centuries and to verify the obtained results through micro-diachronic analysis of corpus data. The research methods are based on the scientific tools of micro-diachronic corpus data analysis. The research material is lexicographic interpretations of the adverb akkuratno presented in Russian explanatory dictionaries. In addition, the study employed the contexts of its use obtained from two subcorpora of different chronological periods (the 18th–19th and 20th–21st centuries) created on the Russian National Corpus basis. The study shows that the core semantics of the adverb akkuratno common to the periods of the 18th–19th and 20th–21st centuries, includes five meanings: 1) ‘ispravno, soblyudaya poryadok, tochnostʼ (English ‘promptly, properly, observing order, accuracy’); 2) ‘regulyarno, ne narushaya grafika’ (English ‘regularly, without interrupting the schedule’); 3) ‘opryatno, chisto’ (English ‘neatly, tidily, cleanly’); 4) ‘tshchatel’no, v detalyakh’ (English ‘thoroughly, carefully, in detail’); 5) ‘ostorozhno’ (English ‘carefully, gingerly’), which is confirmed by the data of both chronological subcorpora. The research also demonstrates that six more meanings not recorded in the 20th–21st century subcorpus were regularly realised in Russian speech in the period from the 17th to the 19th centuries. These are as follows: 1) ‘berezhlivo’ (English ‘parsimoniously, economically’); 2) ‘vovremya, v srok’ (English ‘punctually, on time’); 3) ‘tochno’ (English ‘precisely, exactly’); 4) ‘horosho’ (English ‘well’); 5) ‘pravil’no, v sootvetstvii s normami’ (English ‘correctly, in accordance with norms’); 6) ‘prilichno, kak podobaet’ (English ‘decently, as befits’). Functional variation, i. e., the transition from an adverb to a determinative-specifying particle, is also recorded for uses in the meaning of tochno (English precisely, exactly). The article concludes that the research procedure proposed in the study is scientifically valid. It can be utilized for identifying, recording, and verifying the facts of the semantic, stylistic, and functional evolution of Russian adverbs over the course of the 17th–21st centuries. 

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