Image characteristics of the russian language in the aspect of “soft power” politics1

Abstract

The article examines the possible ways to promote the Russian language within the framework of the Russian state policy of “soft power”, which forms a positive image not only of the Russian world, but also of the Russian language itself. The relevance of the research area is determined by the need to adjust this policy to the current conditions, complicated by the information war. The authors proceed from the fact that, acting in two different qualities – as a tool and as the owner of “soft power” – the Russian language forms its image and reputation. Endowing the Russian language with the properties of a “soft po-wer” actor, the goal of analyzing the mechanisms of forming the attractiveness of the Russian language in professional and “naive” advertising, comparing the models of its presentation and determining the specific indicators of attractiveness, is set. The examples of social advertising (both domestic and foreign), emphasizing the power and strength, spirituality and purity of the Russian language, the examples of advertising slogans invented by native speakers, to which methods of text and discourse analysis are applied, are given. The research is carried out on the corpus of slogans taken from advertising campaigns of the Russkiy Mir Founda-tion, advertisements of university educational projects, school contests for advertising the Russian language, polls initiated by the media. The “professional” and “naive” models of the Russian language social promoting are compared, and the latter assessed as the most creative and promising. “Naïve” advertising seems to be a more effective tool of “soft power” policy, since it turns out to be more multidimensional, more meaningful and more human than professional advertising, and forms a more attractive image of the language.