Regional onomastic “chronicle”: basis for impartial description of national onomastic space

The relevancy of this article, analyzing the national onomasticon through preliminary large-scale onomastic work conducted on the regional level, is especially obvious in present conditions of globalization, which equalizes historical and cultural distinctions of various nations. The assertion that a proper noun is the main source of information about the nation’s life is axiomatic for the present-day onomastics; consequently, national onomasticon represents by itself the center of national and cultural values. At the regional level, the ability of any proper noun to accumulate diversified information on the past and present culture, on the history of any nation has acquired especial significance. A great part of such information is coded in local names, which often exist only in verbal domains. Disappearing villages serve as a habitat for existing regional proper nouns. The fact of their disappearance poses an urgent challenge for researchers, i.e. collection and preservation of regional onomastic material. To solve this problem we offer a project developed on the example of Smolensk region. The project is aimed at full linguistic and lexicographic description of Smolensk regional onomasticon. For this purpose the following research procedures should be accomplished: collection of onomastic material, its systematization, and lexicographic representation. During the process of project implementation we performed multiple field surveys. The main research methods were interviews and questionnaires of the informants. Carrying out our research, we employed computer-aided methods to process the obtained onomastic array. Analytical and descriptive methods were chosen to accomplish the final stage of this work. As a result, we issued a catalogue containing over 8,000 onomastic units; created a form of electronic database helping to process material in the optimal manner; developed a set of basic structural principles for regional onomastic dictionary structure. The principles are based on the anthropocentric approach towards modern lexicography. It is worth mentioning that this approach can be useful for scientists from other regions of Russia in their onomastic studies. It may subsequently lead to the development of the solid foundation instrumental in the impartial description of national onomasticon.