The Category of Authority as an Identifier of Egocentrism

Abstract

The article is devoted to the analysis of the communicative categories of authority and egocentrism. The relevance of the study is determined by the insufficient knowledge of communicative categories, the lack of a unified approach to their interpretation in Russian linguistics. The main goal is to demonstrate that the communicative category of authority can serve as a means of identifying egocentrism in communicative interaction. The article defines the concept of "communicative category" based on Russian scientists’ researches, offers a brief review of researches devoted to the study of the category of authority, analyzes the means of its expression, which can be considered as markers of authority and egocentrism both. The research is based on the material of scientific discourse. Fragments of speeches at scientific conferences, contexts of scientific publications, excerpts from reviews of opponents, contexts from the National Corpus of the Russian language are used as examples. The main markers (identifiers) of authority and egocentrism, which are highlighted and described in the article, include a reference to one's own self, a reference to authority, special expressiveness, a pretentious style of speech, and its excessive emotional coloring. The conclusion about the complexity and versatility of the interrelationships between egocentrism and authority in the communicative space of scientific discourse is made.