The article is concerned with the results of the comparative study of Russian and British encyclopaedias of the 19th century. The aim of the study is to reveal the peculiarities of the historical development of Russian and British encyclopaedias in relation to each other and to specify the features of similarities and differences in the structure of encyclopaedic articles in these editions. If the main task for the Russian encyclopaedia of that period was to create a predominantly national edition, the British encyclopaedists were primarily concerned with providing the reader with information on current events, the latest achievements of science and technology in the world. It was found that at the beginning of this century British encyclopaedias developed more actively than Russian encyclopaedias and that the development of British encyclopaedias, unlike the Russian ones, was significantly influenced by the commercialisation of book publishing and serious competition between publishers. In general, more encyclopaedias were published in Britain (especially in the first quarter of the century) than in Russia, and at the same time, unlike Russia, not only alphabetical but also systematic (thematic) encyclopaedias were published in Britain. The comparison of encyclopaedic articles in Russian and British editions showed that the encyclopaedias of both countries used similar types of articles (review article, reference article, explanatory article, crossreference article), and the indication/non-indication of the authorship of the article is not nationally conditioned. Unlike British encyclopaedias, Russian encyclopaedias usually indicate that the material, or part of it, is translated or borrowed. A comparison of the articles in Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopaedic Dictionary and the ninth edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica shows that by the end of the century had been developed a model of a personalia-article that was used by both Russian and British editors: the headword is an individual or group anthroponym, the choice of which is nationally specific; the information is presented in a referential way; the article oft en has an evaluative modality. The headwords of the articles on mythonyms, which are somewhat fewer in the Encyclopaedia Britannica than in the Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopaedic Dictionary, represent in both encyclopaedias the names of several spheres of onomastic space. The similarity of Russian and British encyclopaedias of the 19th century is due to the fact that their Russian and British compilers followed the already established rules of selection and compilation of encyclopaedic articles. The differences found can be explained by the cultural and national traditions of Russia and Great Britain.

The article deals with examples of humour creation and their verbal and non-verbal peculiarities in English popular scientific discourse. These examples are known as TED lectures or TED talks. Humour is oft en used by speakers to attract the audience’s attention. It happens while establishing a contact or focusing attention on some concrete aspects in the lecture’s content. The information in the lecture is used for transmitting complex ideas, which in the process of perception may become not so sophisticated in English popular scientific discourse. 

The text of the speech is shaping the analysis of verbal mechanisms of humour representing orally popular scientific discourse, sometimes mingled with non-verbal features. The understanding of cognitive mechanisms of humour creation in the orator’s speech and the perception of it by the listeners is expressed by a verbal form and it is combined with the nonverbal and multimodal characteristics. It may help language learners improving their language skills and understanding of English as well as providing the better perception and comprehension of the professional speech in the English language. Besides that, humour studies in lectures aimed at the audience in English in TED lectures may reveal the way speakers use humour, and pointing which particular features depend upon the situational-pragmatic characteristics of communication. The authors of the article represent the difference between a special text and special discourse to perform a much deeper analysis of the discussed problems. The material of this research is based on the text of the lecture by the well-known American neurophysiologist Stuart Firestein (Firestein, 2013).

This article presents an overview of contemporary approaches to multimodal discourse analysis. In multimodal discourse studies, different definitions of mode and different foci are noted. The multimodal analysis theory of different types of discourse is considered from functionalist, cognitive and interactionist sociological perspectives and multimodal corpus analysis and multimodal empirical studies of advertising discourse are presented.

The article deals with the phenomenon of motivation as a key factor determining the professional activity of translators. The author focuses on the significance of internal and external stimuli that infl uence the choice of translation strategies and methods, as well as the final result of translation. Special attention is paid to the role of personal and creative aspects that characterise translation activity as a form of professional self-expression. Various forms of translation motivation are analysed in detail, including the translator’s comments, prefaces, notes and other metatextual elements that contribute to the elimination of semantic losses and cultural asymmetries. The study is based on an interdisciplinary approach combining linguistics, psychology and translation studies, which allows for a deeper understanding of the mechanisms underlying translators’ professional choices.