PROTOTYPICAL STRUCTURE FOR DOUBT EXPLICATION IN THE CONTEMPORARY ENGLISH LANGUAGE

The importance of the current research is determined by the interest of contemporary linguistics in human’s inner world, and by researchers’ attention to correlation between language forms and structures of knowledge. These factors define the significance of doubt situation study within cognitive-discursive paradigm of linguistic knowledge that allows studying language as a unique source of information about the process of world perception and its results. This research paper analyzes doubt categorization on the level of prototypical structure that combines all possible ways of doubt explication. This research considers the prototypical structure as a structure that nominates prototypical situation in the best way and exists in speaker’s mind as a complete form for its expression. The author has analyzed theoretical researches in the sphere of cognitive grammar, prototype theory and conception of modus-dictum sentence division. Besides, in order to reveal prototypical structure for doubt explication we have applied the research results of cognitive model of uncertainty lexico-semantic field in the English language, and the identified features of doubt prototypical situation. The results of the research enable us to confirm that the structure I doubt (that) + Indefinite Tenses / Perfect Tenses is prototypical and represents doubt prototypical situation. In this structure some components of doubt are expressed explicitly (subject of doubt, epistemic state of doubt, mental object), the others – implicitly (cause of doubt, mental alternative). The results of this research are valuable because they allow us to explain the doubt explication variety in speech (lexical, grammatical and syntactical means) in consequence of deviation from prototypical construction by particular components.