Categorization of phraseological units: Russian/Italian expressions

The study on phraseology is wide and complex, since it examines different aspects of an entire linguistic branch. The current article takes into consideration the typology proposed by the Italian linguist Federica Casadei, which will serve as a basis for the authors’ categorization of specific Russian expressions. The purpose of this paper is to illustrate the full and partial correspondence of Italian and Russian phraseological units through a new schematization, and, at the same time, to propose a new categorization of the phraseological units applied to Russian expressions. Italian and Russian theories on phraseology are examined and compared. Italian theory is more focused on the classification of the phraseological units: idioms, sayings, transparent locutions, opaque locutions and higher lexical units. Russian studies are more oriented to cognitive aspects related to the metaphorization of phraseological units. However, linguists agree that stability and reproducibility are the two main criteria that combine all phraseological units. The main issue when translating from one language into another is that of conveying the source meaning through processes of paraphrase. The result is that some Russian denominations of specific entities can be classified as monomorphemes and some do not constitute part of non-autonomous group as they do in Italian. On the basis of the differences among categories, a hypothesis about the categorization of some Russian phraseological units is proposed. Furthermore, we underline the importance of metaphorization as a key element for understanding phraseological units. Through metaphors, native speakers can express figurative meanings and innate mental representations.


Purpose of the Paper
RESEARCH RESULT THEORETICAL AND APPLIED LINGUISTICS her examination, idiomatic expressions are viewed as syntactically free structures with one or more invariable components.The variable components instead are subject to two distributional and grammatical variations.The distributional one, composed by synonyms, adjectives or relative clauses, deprives the original idiomatic expression of its idiomaticity.On the other side, the grammatical variation in tense, mode, adverbs or modifiers does not affect the idiomatic meaning.Her conclusion is that a continuum between free and idiomatic sentences exists, and that variations are accepted only when the idiomatic meaning remains intact (Vietri, 1985: 18).
Nowadays in Russian linguistics the current approach appears to be cognitive and examines phraseological units in terms of mental nature.Within phraseological studies, only the components that have figurative and metaphorical meaning should be considered.The cognitive and psycholinguistic patterns assume that a basic concept exists within phraseological units, which is highlighted with the help of a word identifier that links a determined unit to the sphere of these concepts.The Russian cognitive approach is thus based on the study of those internal phraseological correlations.Furthermore, metaphors play a significant role in the formation of phraseological units.The process of metaphorization is the "verbalization by an individual of the knowledge he acquires about the world and himself' (Zubkova, 2008: 128).

Results
Casadei sketched a typology of idioms in the Italian language and proposed a definition of "idiomatic expressions" (Casadei, 1995: 335-358).The current analysis takes this categorization into consideration and assumes it as a basis for a classification hypothesis applied to Russian phraseological units.The author excludes monomorphematic forms, since it is not possible to predict their semantics.However, some monomorphematic forms which own morphologically complex characteristics are taken into account (ciaoprivet -because it is a greeting formula, leone -lev -because, apart from the literal meaning, it has a figurative meaning, that of "courageous person', also bustarellavzjatka, and rompiscatole -zanuda).
Furthermore, the author excludes all those forms that are subject to mechanisms of metaphorization, irony and indirectness, when they occur occasionally and creatively.The reference is here to those expressions like "essere una matita" used in sentences like "quella ragazza e una matita" where matita (karandash) alludes to a person's figure.However, the expressions of the type "essere un/una x', "fare il/lo x' are conventional metaphors and they can be included in the classification, also for the reason that they represent predictable metaphors (fare il burattino, legkomyslennyj chelovek / vetrenik).
As a result, the lexically saturated and the partially saturated are, thereafter, in accordance with the paradigm of conventionality.Conventionality concerns the degree of non-newness of an expression and the link of a given expression with a communicative function, a pragmatic purpose or a context of use.Thus, the fully or partially lexically saturated expressions include institutionalized expressions, stereotypes (cliches, quoted corpus) and formularies.
Therefore, Casadei (Casadei, 1995: 335 358) introduces a new lexical-syntactic criterion, that of fixity.Different types of fixity exist: fixity in the order of constituents, transformational fixity for a certain structure, and fixity in the inventory of components due to the impossibility of insertion, suppression and substitution.However, fixity does not hinder semantic variation: commutation in idiomatic expressions is possible only if the original idiomatic meaning is maintained intact.As a consequence of this, it is the idiomatic character of an expression that indicates whether that expression is idiomatic or not, and not the commutability.The idiomatic feature is the element that usually obstructs possible lexical and syntactic modifications.
The conflict between the diagrammatic and the holistic comes into focus, when considered from the perspective of semantics.Diagrammaticity indicates the relation between the signified and signifier, the transparency of which is gradual and increases when the relation is one to one.The author refers to increased transparency with reference to a denominated entity like pesce palla -ryba-ezh, a kind of fish, in contrast to the less transparent form pellerossakrasnokozhij, which is not a kind of skin.The zanuda.In all these terms it is necessary to reinterpret the relation between the form in its entirety and its overall meaning and it is possible to talk about a greater or lesser transparency of the metaphorical motivation of the expression.The diagrammatic / holistic distinction is very significant when categorizing the idiomatic and non-idiomatic expressions within institutionalized forms.The maximum degree of idiomaticity is represented by metaphorical and metonymic expressions.The lower level is represented by expressions with metaphoric and metonymic features that instead have a diagrammatic aspect: (donna cannone -zhenshchina -pushechnoe jadro).Below this class, there are some holistic expressions, represented by non-autonomous lexemes that occur only in certain locutions (andare a zonzo -brodit', andare a ruba -b^t' narashvat).The grammatical holistic locutions (per lo piu -chashche vsego) are positioned at a lower level still: their nondiagrammaticity does not allow full meaning to be given to its components.
Non idiomatic expressions are those expressions in which conventional meaning might not be predictable or might not be uniquely predictable.Examples of such verbal locutions include, essere alla disperazionebyt' dovedennym do otchajanija, prendere quota -nabrat' vysotu, prendere il solezagorat ' and prendere tempo -ne toropit 'sja.
In Casadei's categorization (Casadei, 1995: 335-358) the diagrammatic / holistic distinction cannot be applied to stereotypes, cliches, proverbs, quotes and formularies since their understanding implies a reference to cultural beliefs and conventions.They present a cultural-pragmatic character and for this reason they can be included in the wide domain of idiomatic expressions, but only in a broader sense, as lexical saturated expressions.On the contrary, if the semantic variable is privileged, the idiomatic expressions are of the holistic institutionalized type, while the others are labelled as cliches, proverbs, quotes, formulas and have distinctive aspects from the idiomaticity.However, for the purposes of the present paper, we agree with the broader conception and we examine all those classes in the following paragraph.

Findings and discussion
The analysis we conducted leads to consideration of comparative and typological types.When transferring the meaning from Italian to Russian, equivalence is not always univocal.It is therefore necessary to emphasize the grammatical syntactic structure of the expressions and the type of connection between the constituents, since the idiomaticity can be full or partial.Full means that from the meaning of the components it is not possible to predict the meaning of the phraseological unit.Partial means that the meaning of the phraseologism becomes clear on the basis of some rethinking processes.The following scheme presents the abovementioned forms and clarifies the differences existing between the locutions of the two languages, Italian (the source language) and Russian (the target one):

Tirare le cuoia Kondartij khvatil
The meaning of these expressions is "to die'.There are a wide range of expressions corresponding to the event of dying; however, we chose Kondartij

Italian
Russian Description khvatil because of the analogy to body rigidity after the death.

Patata bollente Zhguchij / zlobodnevnij vopros
The Russian language uses the term vopros (question) instead of patata (potato) and the second alternative zlobodnevnij vopros would rather sound as questione scottante (delicate issue), which is also used in the Italian language.

Testa di cuoio Specnaz
The source language expression refers to police officers, whose uniform is characterized by a leather hat; the target language expression is an abbreviation of "voinskie podrazdelenie naznachenija' (special purpose troops).Therefore, the two expressions allude to the same military unit, but the second one does not keep the specific feature of the hat.All'acqua di rose Poverkhnostnyj (adjective) In this case the equivalence is null.Poverkhnostnyj is a paraphrase of the Italian idiomatic expression, which conserves the source meaning of " superficial'.

Alla bell'e meglio Koe-kak
The source expression refers to "something that is done in a rush and without too much attention'.There is no grammatical correspondence; however, both are adverbial locutions.

Bustarella Vzjatka
Here, there is a full correspondence between Italian and Russian and both terms belong to the class of nouns and are characterized by diminutive suffixes.Moreover, the Russian term can be considered a noun derived from the verb vzjat' without the addition of any suffix.The meaning is "bribe'.

Rompiscatole
Zanuda Also in this case, the two expressions are nouns and there is full correspondence; however, it should be noticed that the first term has euphemistic sense and is a compound, formed by two parts, rompi (from the verb rompere -to break) and scatole (boxes) that refer to "someone who is annoying'.

Fare il burattino Legkomyslennyj chelovek, vetrenik
On a grammatical level, the Italian expression prefers the use of the construction with the verb fare (to do), whereas the Russian one uses the verb "to be+noun' (on -legkomyslennyj chelovek).Moreover, legkomyslennyj is a compound of the adverb legko (light) and the adjective myslennyj (minded), so that legkomyslennyj chelovek is an empty-headed or frivolous person.This appears to be a different variation from the Italian one, where burattino is a marionette, thus it is the metaphor of a person who lacks personality or who is unreliable or manipulated by others.The metaphorical meaning hence falls apart in the Russian language.
научный результат вопросы теоретической и прикладной лингвистики The meaning of those expressions is 'business is business' and 'children are children'.The mentioned scheme 'definite article + noun + verb essere + (definite article) + noun', typical of the Italian language, is fully provided in Russian, except for the determinative article, which Russian lacks.Those structures are similar to another type of phraseological syntactic fixed constructions, called 'patterns with empty spaces' (Baranov, Dobrovol'skij, 2013: 86), which provide some fixed and free positions, saturated by lexical material used in a referential sense and generally subject to grammatical or semantic restrictions.An example of these phraseologisms-construction is "X -on i v Afrike X" (literally: "X-anche in Africa e A'), where X has constant traits, independently on the situation, like in "krizis -on i v Afrike krizis''" (la crisi e crisi ovunque), ""rabota -ona i v Afrike rabota'" (il lavoro e lavoro ovunque) (Baranov, Dobrovol'skij, 2013: 86).The idiomatic value in these cases is in the structure itself as a whole, regardless of the lexicon that completes it, and its meaning is unitary, as if it was a lexeme (Ramusino, 2018: 107).__________________Disco fisso / rigido Zhestkij disk Those are calques of the English IT term (hard disk).They present equivalence of adjectives and nouns.

Giacca a vento Vetrovka
It is interesting to notice that the Italian language prefers a locution constituted by 'noun + preposition + noun' where the Russian language adapts the noun from the word veter (wind).The meaning is 'wind breaker'.__________________________

Uborshchica
The same as above can be asserted about this expression.The Italian language has a 'noun + article + noun' form, and the Russian adjusts the term from the verb ubirat' (tidy up).The meaning is 'house cleaner'.

Pishushchaja mashina
While the Italian preposition 'da+infinitive' expresses the meaning of purpose, the Russian language adopts the adjective-participle form.

Essere bello come una rosa Byt' krasivym kak roza
The equivalence is full in this case (to be beautiful like a rose).

In bocca al lupo Ni pukha ni pera
There is no correspondence between these two expressions that wish one "good luck'.

Vi dichiaro marito e moglie Ob"javljaju vas muzhem i zhenoj
The correspondence is full and the meaning is "I pronounce you husband and wife'.
Per concludere V zakljuchenie In English it is called a "Puffer Fish'.

Pellerossa Krasnokozhij
The equivalence is full and both pellerossa and krasnokozhij (redskin) are substantivized adjectives.

Donna cannone Zhenshchinapushechnoejadro
In Russian jadro is a cannon ball, but still the two forms m atch.The phrase in English translates to "a [fem ale] human cannonball'.

Andare a zonzo Brodit '
As was already mentioned, the term zonzo exists exclusively in this expression; its meaning is that of wandering, that is the way it is transferred into the Russian language.English is "to go for a stroll'.The source language uses an expression that might not be predictable, since the verb used is "to take'.The correspondence is null.However, in Italian language, another verb exists, that of abbronzarsi (to sunbathe), but it does not constitute a verbal locution.

Prendere tempo Ne toropit'sja
The m eaning of this expression is "take your

RESEARCH RESULT THEORETICAL AND APPLIED LINGUISTICS
On the basis of this analysis, it is possible to deduce that some Russian translations and adaptations do not belong to the same categories as Italian expressions.Some of them are just adjectives like poverkhnostnyj (superficial) which does not have any metaphorical meaning in contrast to the Italian expression all'acqua di rose.As far as the saturated expressions are concerned, in our opinion, the categorization is appropriate for Russian expressions, but more for the partially saturated ones than the lexically saturated, since the lexical variable element can be inserted and it changes according to the meaning that the speaker wants to give (po-moemu, po-tvoemu).However, it is worth keeping in mind that in Russian, the lexical variable element can be a possessive or a quantifier, but not a determiner.Indirect speech acts, cliches and proverbs also closely match the Italian equivalent.Some of the Russian expressions categorized as denominations of specific entities are actually part of this class (zhestkij disk and pishushchaja mashina), but others, being derivative forms of nouns or verbs, can rather be categorized as monomorphemes (vetrovka and uborshchica are, in this sense, closer to the examples of vzjatka and zanuda).On the other hand, the grammatical locutions (dopo di che -posle togo kak, per lo piuchashche vsego) present similarities, although they are irregular idiomatic expressions.The same cannot be asserted of the non autonomous lexemes, which in Italian occur exclusively in certain kinds of locutions (andare a zonzo, andare a ruba).In Russian the correspondent forms (brodit', byt' naraskhvat) are also used in other locutions and contexts.

Conclusion
In short, this examination has shown that the equivalence among the Italian and Russian phraseologisms can be full or partial, that translation and paraphrase processes can be applied to the target language in order to preserve the source metaphorical meaning, and, most of all, it underlined that the idiomatic meaning manifests itself through phraseological units.The Italian and Russian theories presented above claim that Russian literature on phraseologisms is nowadays more focused on the cognitive aspects issued by metaphorical expressions.Casadei's study also arrives at the conclusion that transparency of the metaphorical motivation of the expression is the key to reinterpreting the relation between the form in its entirety and its overall meaning.Behind the stable vocabulary, there are physical, psychical and social situations that reflect cultural aspects.Therefore, expressions such as tirare le cuoia and vuotare il sacco are related to figurative perception and to mental representations that are innate in native speakers and they constitute part of the metaphorization process.Similarities, affinities and analogies are mental mechanisms that native speakers activate at a cognitive level.Through speech and experience, mental representations are issued and metaphors and phraseologisms are expressed.

Gramm ar, the basic feature of which is represented by the constructions stored in the native speakers' memory as single blocks, rather than assembled according to the rules of syntax and connotation. Current theory aims at finding theoretical m odels adequate
(Dobrovol'skij, 2016: 9).

, an expression or idiom that generally indicates the combination of a fixed signifier (little or not at all modifiable) with a
multiword forms with structural

Table 1 :
Comparison offorms and meanings of Russian and Italian expressions

Both languages use the verb 'to be'; the Russian phraseologism uses a past passive participle with the meaning of 'to be driven to despair', the Italian uses a preposition and the m eaning is 'to be in despair'.
(Tragic

prepositions, but in Italian a verb is used, while Russian uses a noun.
As conversational and epistolary messages (by the way and best wishes),

to go at a good price', is in the verb form s (in Italian
"andarVto go, in Russian "byt'' -to be).