The Concept of "Truth" in the Context of the Russian and Anglophone Mental Representations

The present paper attempts to investigate the correlation between the Russian culture-specific concepts of ‘pravda’ and ‘istina’ and the Anglophone concept of ‘truth’. The main objective of the current research is to detect the commonalities and distinctions between the above mentioned culture-specific concepts in relation to their scope, content and the sphere of their application. The semantic analysis enables us to identify the salient components of the given culture-specific concepts at the contemporary layer. At the same time, the etymological analysis was employed, which assisted us in the scrutiny of the culture-specific concepts under consideration at the historical level and their transformation in the diachronic perspective. Moreover, the evaluative layer of the given concepts was studied, including its emotional and ethical components. The evaluative layer of the concepts was examined in the course of analysis of collocations, idioms and proverbs. The combination of the synchronic and diachronic types of analysis and the examination of the evaluative layer of the given culture-specific concepts contributes to the achievement of a more profound comprehension of the roles of the concepts under consideration in the corresponding mental representations and to the identification of the influence of mentality on the formation of the culture-specific concepts and the organization of mental representations, which facilitates a deeper understanding of the peculiarities of the process of categorization and conceptualization of the world and the distinctions in mentalities, which are specific to the representatives of different cultures.