Trends in the use of patronyms in Ukrainian literary language of the 21st century — Europeanization vs. tradition

Abstract

The article analyzes the changes that have occurred in the ways of the official naming of persons in Ukrainian literary language of the 21st century. The reasons for these changes have been established and substantiated, as well as evaluated from the point of view of practical expediency. In particular, the factors that led to the shift of the official naming of Ukrainians include the socio-political processes that began in Ukraine in 1991, the desire of speakers to distance themselves from anything in common with Russia, the practical inconvenience of using three-component structures due to their cumbersomeness etc. An attempt has been made to predict the further development of the trend of the use of patronyms in the modern language. It has been suggested that in the future, in connection with Ukraine’s accession to the European Union, the analysed trend will become even more powerful, as a result of which patronyms will acquire the status of intralingual anthroponyms, functioning in a limited communicative space.
The material of the study were two- and three-component anthroponymous models of the formal names of persons selected during the period 2015–2022 from two functional styles of Ukrainian lan
guage  — journalistic and scientific. With the help of general scientific methods (induction, deduction, observation, analysis, synthesis, comparison, systematization) and linguistic methods (descriptive, comparative, pragmatic), the typical manifestations of trends in the use of patronyms in the Ukrainian literary language of the 21st century are comprehensively characterized.