Stylistic means of expressiveness in the publications of Russian war correspondents

Abstract

The subject of the study is expressive means and their pragmatic functions considered at three levels of text organization: the trope level (metaphorical models and similes), the syntactic level (expressive syntactic constructions), and the lexical-stylistic level (military terminology, military jargon, precedent names, de-euphemisms). The object of the study is author-driven military journalism in the Telegram messenger. The aim is to identify the leading expressive means, determine their functions, establish how the levels of text organization interrelate and how the set of means correlates with the genre type of a publication. The material consists of 16 original posts published in 2023–2026 in the Telegram channels Ko-tsnews, “Sladkov +”, WarGonzo, “Rybar”, “Starshe Eddy” and the channel of E. Poddubny, selected by purposive sampling and divided into three genre types: operational report, commentary on video footage, and opinion column. The methodo-logical basis comprises media-linguistic and cognitive-discursive approaches. The study uses the method of metaphorical modelling, the methods of structural-functional analysis of syntax and contextual stylistic analysis of vocabulary, co-occurrence analysis, discourse analysis and the comparative method (comparison of genre types of publications, and of war correspondents’ reports with the reports of the Russian Ministry of Defence). The scientific novelty lies in describing the stylistics of war correspondents’ Telegram channels as a three-level system and in revealing the link between the set of means and the genre type of a publication. It is established that a zoomorphic model and a model of mechanical processing are used to conceptualize combat means and fire strikes. In the examples analysed, par-cellation performs an actualizing function, nominative sentences a depictive one, segmentation of the narrative into short sentences a dynamizing one, and asyndetic series a characterizing one. Military terminology forms the background register, while military jargon prevails among expressively marked vocabulary. The combination of expressive means of different levels is found mainly in commentaries on video footage. Reports gravitate towards standardized language, while opinion col-umns tend towards evaluativeness. The data obtained suggest the existence of a subdiscourse of “trench media journalism”, realized primarily in reportage-type posts. The results are applicable in medialinguistic research and in teaching media stylistics.