Athena: Journal of Social, Culture and Society

The Codification of National-Cultural Stereotypes Through Etalons of Comparisons: A Contrastive Study of English and Karakalpak Languages

2026-07-12T02:57:46+00:00

This article examines the codification of national-cultural stereotypes through the etalons of comparison in English and Karakalpak linguocultures from a contrastive linguocultural perspective. Stable comparisons are regarded as one of the principal means of verbalizing culturally significant knowledge, since their figurative standards preserve and transmit the values, stereotypes, and worldview of a linguistic community. The study aims to identify the national-cultural specificity of comparison etalons and to determine their thematic distribution in both languages. The research is based on a corpus of 600 English and 1,000 Karakalpak stable comparisons extracted by continuous sampling from authoritative phraseological and explanatory dictionaries. The analysis employs descriptive, comparative, linguocultural, semantic, and quantitative-statistical methods. Following the thematic classification proposed by F. Usmanov, the comparisons were grouped into five categories: Fauna, Realities of Everyday Life, Phenomena and Elements of Nature, Flora, and Folklore Characters. The quantitative analysis demonstrates that fauna constitutes the most productive thematic source in both languages (35% in English and 32% in Karakalpak), confirming the universal cognitive role of animal imagery in conceptualizing human qualities. At the same time, Karakalpak comparisons show a higher frequency of ethnoculturally marked everyday realities and natural phenomena, reflecting the influence of nomadic traditions, the natural environment, and material culture. English comparisons reveal a greater tendency toward pragmatic and object-oriented conceptualization, emphasizing everyday experience and observable reality. Although both languages display similar cognitive models in the distribution of thematic groups, the internal semantic content of comparison etalons reflects distinct national-cultural values, historical experience, and cultural codes. The findings contribute to the development of contrastive phraseology, linguoculturology, cognitive linguistics, and intercultural communication by demonstrating how stable comparisons encode culturally specific stereotypes while simultaneously revealing universal mechanisms of figurative conceptualization.

Teacher–Student Conflicts: Conflict Proneness, Perceived Causes, and An Empirical Analysis of Interpersonal Relationships

2026-08-04T09:13:02+00:00

Teacher–student relationships constitute one of the most influential determinants of students’ academic achievement, psychological well-being, and social adjustment. Conflicts emerging within these relationships may either hinder educational outcomes or serve as constructive opportunities for personal and academic development, depending on how they are managed. This study investigates the socio-psychological characteristics of teacher–student conflicts by integrating theoretical analysis with empirical evidence. Specifically, it examines students’ conflict proneness, perceived causes of teacher–student conflicts, and the relationship between conflict proneness and the quality of teacher–student relationships. Data were collected from 410 secondary school students (Grades 8–11) using N. V. Grishina’s Conflict Situation Diagnostics methodology. Descriptive statistics and Pearson correlation analysis were employed to analyze the data. The findings revealed that most participants demonstrated a moderate level of conflict proneness (56.8%), whereas 22.2% exhibited high conflict proneness. Communication barriers and mutual misunderstanding (34.9%), perceived unfairness in assessment (23.9%), and disagreements concerning disciplinary requirements (18.5%) emerged as the most frequently reported sources of conflict. Furthermore, a statistically significant negative correlation was identified between conflict proneness and the quality of teacher–student relationships (r = –0.52, p < .01). The findings emphasize the importance of strengthening teachers’ conflict management competence, empathic communication skills, and psychologically safe learning environments to foster constructive educational relationships.

From Patrimonial Recognition to Hybrid State Decoration: A Phase Model of the Transformation of the Bukhara Emirate’s Award System, 1868–1920

2026-08-11T05:16:20+00:00

his article reconstructs the transformation of the award system of the Bukhara Emirate between the treaty settlement of 1868 and the abolition of the Emirate in 1920. Existing scholarship has established the inventory of Bukharan orders and medals but has treated the shift from traditional courtly recognition to European-style decorations largely as a descriptive sequence. The present study addresses three problems left open by that literature. First, it supplies an operational definition of “modernization” for award institutions, specifying seven testable criteria, and evaluates the Bukharan case against them; the system satisfies three criteria fully, two partially, and two not at all, which supports the narrower characterization of a form-led modernization without full institutional rationalization. Second, it distinguishes five mechanisms through which Russian influence could have operated and grades each against the surviving evidence; consultative reference to St Petersburg, dependence on Russian-mediated manufacture, and reciprocal diplomatic conferment are documented, whereas morphological resemblance and elite socialization remain inferential. The Emir’s enquiry of 16 June 1894 concerning decorations for women, and the negative response of the Russian ministries, is identified as the clearest documentary instance of imperial gatekeeping over Bukharan award policy. Third, the article proposes an explicit four-phase transformation model patrimonial recognition, post-treaty adjustment, institutional layering, and bureaucratic expansion and specifies the political mechanism driving each transition. A typology separating insignia of office, honorific investiture, diplomatic gifts, material remuneration, and formal decorations is introduced to replace the undifferentiated notion of a single “reward system,” and a twelve-dimension comparison with the Russian imperial order system is presented. The evidence indicates a recipient gradient in which the highest classes were directed outward toward the Russian imperial house and administration while the lower classes served internal functional constituencies, although the surviving corpus is itself biased toward Russian-held material and this asymmetry is stated as a pattern in the record rather than as a complete account of conferment practice.