Defining what a proverb is

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

Proverbs can be called without exaggeration the treasury of any nation. They develop historically, generalize worldly experience and folk wisdom. Regardless of the level of education and place of residence, each person regularly uses about 200-300 different jokes and popular expressions in colloquial speech. Definition "What is a proverb?" interpreted in different ways, and many philologists, historians are trying to find the right answer. These well-aimed sayings, which have intelligible content, often consist of two rhyming parts. Sometimes we don’t even notice how often we use various proverbs in everyday life. After all, they are able to revive dry speech, add national color to it and briefly characterize this or that situation.

As a rule, good proverbs have two meanings: literal and figurative. With their help, any thought or life observation is conveyed in a metaphorical form. These short sayings are a real national treasure and have not lost their relevance to this day.

How to define what a proverb is?

In order to understand the success of this morphological construction, you need to know what it is. The definition of "what is a proverb?" you can give it. This is a certain genre of folklore, a logically complete, figurative and capacious saying in rhythmic form, which has a great semantic load. This term is of Russian origin and implies that the proverb is used in live colloquial speech. The following signs of folk sayings are most clearly manifested in it:

1. Collectivity of creativity (as a rule, sayings do not have an author, they were created over a certain period of time and supplemented by different people).

2. Tradition, that is, sustainability. As a rule, the text of the proverb practically does not change.

3. Orality. These sayings are much more than others related to direct and direct speech.

In order to explain a proverb, you need to know the language in which it is pronounced well in order to catch the figurative meaning. Such sayings necessarily carry some conclusions about what is good and what is bad, how to act correctly and how not to.

Proverbs in other countries

Of course, this folklore genre arose and developed not only in Russia. Such popular expressions exist in almost every country, because they are an indispensable companion of the historical progress of mankind. Remarkably, almost every proverb has its own analogues.and among other peoples. Of course, it is adapted to the conditions of life and the level of civilization of each ethnic group, but the very fact of such a general idea makes scientists puzzle over it. Most likely, this can be explained by the fact that the basic moral principles and ideas of social life are the same in all countries. This is a kind of set of rules, historical heritage and philosophical memory.

The most common proverb themes

If we consider this folklore genre in more detail, you can see that there are areas of life, about which there are a lot of sayings and sayings. Most often they talk about the need to work in order to ensure a decent life, about how negative laziness and lack of goals are in a person. All of them aim to motivate people to a useful and functional way of being. For example, how to understand the proverb:

"Lazy hands are not related to a smart head" or "Work feeds a person, but laziness spoils"? The answer is obvious: people who do not want to do anything are doomed to a boring and useless life. Work, on the contrary, gives people joy and understanding of their own need for society and loved ones.

Wolf is a popular image for proverbs

American philologists conducted interesting research and found out that images of animals are very often used in Russian sayings. One of them is undoubtedly the wolf. In order to reveal the nature of this feature, one must remember that the Russian people have been inextricably linked with the environment for centuries. About wolvesthey knew firsthand and thoroughly studied their habits and way of life.

No wonder there are so many tales, riddles and proverbs associated with this beast. He has no compassion, trusts no one, and has no friends. It was these qualities of a forest animal that served as an impetus for playing with the image of a wolf in Russian folklore.

Proverbs of the Soviet people

When the USSR emerged, the government had to create a completely new ideology. So there were such sayings as "The Soviet people are harder than rocks." They carried a motivating meaning. These short and capacious sayings were supposed to make it clear to the citizens of the USSR and the whole world how true the path of socialism chosen by this country was.

But folklore cannot be subordinated to political goals. The proverbs that were created by professional writers and poets never took root in everyday life and remained to sound like slogans printed in newspapers and on banners. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, they instantly lost their significance and are of interest only to historians and philologists.

How to use sayings in everyday speech?

Like any phraseological units, proverbs need to be able to be added to the lexicon in a timely and appropriate way. If the speech is oversaturated with them, then the interlocutor will get the impression that the person does not have his own ideas, and he is able to think only in clichés. Everything should be in moderation.

Thus, having studied the features of this genre,you can define "what is a proverb" and understand its historical essence.