The subjective modal realization of the lexeme "truth" with a concessive-restrictive meaning

Based on the materials of columns written by Russian sports journalists V. V. Utkin and I. Ya. Rabiner in the newspapers "Sovetsky Sport," "Izvestia," and "Sport-Express," an analysis of the word "pravda" (truth) with a concessive-restrictive meaning as a subjective modal unit has been conducted. In lexicographic sources and works of Russian linguists, the phenomenon under analysis has received various interpretations: it is viewed as a conjunction, a modal word, and a unit that is intermediate between conjunctions and modal words. The relevance of the study is determined by the necessity of distinguishing between the subjective modal and conjunctive functions of the word "pravda," as well as the persistent interest of linguists in newspaper discourse and the insufficient study of the speech practices of contemporary sports journalists. The subject of the research is functioning of the word "pravda" as an indicator of logical modality and an activator of the rheme center in the communicative structure of the sentence. During the research, methods such as targeted sampling, structural-semantic analysis, analysis of the communicative organization of the sentence, descriptive method, and inductive method were applied. In the texts of sports journalists, the analyzed unit functions within constructions with coordinating conjunctions under the subordination of word forms, as well as in parcellated constructions with adjunctive-concessive relationships. Furthermore, when shifted to the middle of the sentence, that is, in interposition, the introductory word "pravda" becomes an important element of the communicative structure of the sentence. This unit marks the rheme center of the statement and contributes to its semantic emphasis. The scientific novelty of the research lies in the fact that for the first time, based on the texts of sports journalists, the features of the functioning of the word "pravda" with a subjectively-modal meaning have been examined. The results obtained contribute to the theory of means of expressing subjective modality and may be applied in teaching the syntax of the Russian language to journalism students.