ABSTRACT

The relevance of the work is due to the interest in cognitive and discursive research and linguosynergetic aspects implemented in contemporary artistic discourse, including literary, the importance of conducting research on the category of futurality, modality, and the concept of temporality in literary works. The purpose of this article is to examine in detail all aspects that influence the formation of the mentality of English-speaking countries and Kazakhstan: social, cultural, psychological, and linguistic, through a study of the category of futurality and modality in the example of postmodernist prose. The methodological basis was theoretical and comparative, with elements of conceptual, frame, functional-semantic, structural, and synergetic analysis. This article deals with communicative conditions of implementation, semantic and cognitive mechanisms of forming a conceptual picture of the world in the aspect of futurality, and the interaction of temporal categories with other text parameters by using linguosynergetics. It talks about the postmodern perception of temporality and the worldview of English and Kazakh people. A comparative analysis of the works in terms of general mood, themes, ideological concepts, and aesthetic characteristics has been carried out. Methods, ways, and forms (lexico-grammatical, structural, and semantic) of activating cognitive and conceptual understanding of key futural situations and modal meanings have been comprehended.

KEYWORDS:
Cognitive; Semantic; Inclination; Verb; Temporality

RESUMO

A relevância do trabalho deve-se ao interesse pela investigação cognitiva e discursiva e pelos aspectos linguístico-sinergéticos implementados no discurso artístico contemporâneo, incluindo o literário, à importância da realização de investigação sobre a categoria de futuralidade, a modalidade e o conceito de temporalidade em obras literárias. O objetivo deste artigo é examinar em pormenor todos os aspectos que influenciam a formação da mentalidade dos países anglófonos e do Cazaquistão: sociais, culturais, psicológicos e linguísticos, através de um estudo da categoria de futuralidade e modalidade no exemplo da prosa pós-modernista. A base metodológica foi teórica e comparativa, com elementos de análise conceitual, de enquadramento, funcional-semântico, estrutural e sinergética. Este artigo aborda as condições comunicativas de implementação, os mecanismos semânticos e cognitivos de formação de uma imagem conceitual do mundo no aspeto da futuralidade e a interação das categorias temporais com outros parâmetros do texto, recorrendo à linguosinergética. Fala-se da perceção pós-moderna da temporalidade e da visão do mundo dos povos inglês e cazaque. Foi efetuada uma análise comparativa das obras em termos de estado de espírito geral, temas, conceitos ideológicos e características estéticas. Foram compreendidos os métodos, os modos e as formas (léxico-gramaticais, estruturais e semânticas) de ativar a compreensão cognitiva e concetual de situações-chave do futuro e de significados modais.

PALAVRAS-CHAVE:
Cognitivo; Semântico; Inclinação; Verbo; Temporalidade

Introduction

The relevance of this article is due to the importance of studying the category of futurality in the linguistic and synergetic aspects in order to understand the mechanisms through which the ideological and conceptual fields of the text are formed, how artistic elements are built, and how they contribute to the aesthetic aspects of the reader’s perception. It also piques interest in the method of cognitive research in the modern literary space. Only by examining this problem comprehensively and in detail can the connections between the category of futurity and postmodern discourse be traced and the specifics of the cognitive perception of time through modality and implicit forms of time expression revealed. Linguist Inga Kirkovska (2019KIRKOVSKA, Inga. Category of Futurality within the System of Modus Categories. Problems of General and Slavic Linguistics, vol. 3, pp. 38-44, 2019. DOI: https://doi.org/10.15421/251906.
https://doi.org/10.15421/251906... ) considers the category of futurality as a modus operandi, as it denotes an action or event evaluated at the moment of speaking as real in the future, bringing it as close as possible to modality and predicativity, emphasising neutral prospectivity. The concept of futurity in English frequently appears through modal words that are shaped by cognitive processes. Among the main options are warning, request, recommendation, wish, expectation, assurance, promise, and others (Baghirova, 2020BAGHIROVA, Nigar. The Future Meanings in Modern English. Current Issues in the Humanities, vol. 30, no. 2, 2020, pp. 29-35. DOI: https://doi.org/10.24919/2308-4863.2/30.212267.
https://doi.org/10.24919/2308-4863.2/30.... ).

According to M. Koval (2020KOVAL, M. Linguistic Synergistic Aspect of Linguistic Variability. Khmelnytskyi: Khmelnytskyi National University, 2020.), linguosynergetics is one of the most important areas of interdisciplinary knowledge. It studies the linguistic system in terms of how different parts of language interact with different types of social, cultural, or ethnic factors. The study identifies key aspects relating to linguosynergetics in contemporary scholarship. The paper by Raikhan Kaldybaeva et al. (2020KALDYBAEVA, Raikhan; SHAKIR, Zharas; OMARKULOVA, Bibigul. The Character of Postmodernism in Kazakh Stories. In: KRASNOVA, Natalya; KANAEVA, Yulia (eds). International Conference on Modern Researches in Science and Technology. Morrisville: Lulu, Inc., pp. 59-62, 2020.) explains the main reasons and prerequisites for the formation of postmodernism as a desire to find new forms to express modern meanings. Peter Holtz (2020) compares postmodernism and modernism, highlights the key differences between these two ways of reflecting reality, and considers the distinguishing feature of postmodernism to be courage and the struggle for freedom of choice, as opposed to modernist arrogance. The author focuses on the desire of postmodernism to challenge dogmas and established worldviews and the limitations of this method in time and culture. Postmodernists appreciate many different voices, use different ways to implement their own strategies, try new ways, and consider divergent opinions as options. Their work is based on polysemanticism.

The researcher Nigar Baghirova (2020BAGHIROVA, Nigar. The Future Meanings in Modern English. Current Issues in the Humanities, vol. 30, no. 2, 2020, pp. 29-35. DOI: https://doi.org/10.24919/2308-4863.2/30.212267.
https://doi.org/10.24919/2308-4863.2/30.... ) considers the future-modal and modal-futural levels: the former involves explicitly defining time frames in explicit ways (e.g., through grammatical and lexico-grammatical means); the latter focuses on conveying the cognitive perception of time through implicit (hidden) meanings. The grammatical means of expressing the future tense include all linguistic means deictically linking events to the moment after the end of speech. Due to modifications made to the cognitive model of time as a result of specific historical events, the category of the future emerged in English. This study focuses on Life of Pi by Yann Martel (2022MARTEL, Yann. Life of Pi (indigo 25th Anniversary Edition). Toronto: Knopf Canada, 2022.) and Zhah-ryk doo-nee-ye [Bright World] by Rayhan Mukanova (1994MUKANOVA, Rayhan. Zhah-ryk doo-nee-ye [Bright world]. Almaty: Zalyn, 1994.). In the example of these works, the different aspects of futurality and modality in the linguosynergetic plan are investigated. The description of the linguistic means involved in the artistic plan is the main task of the article.

Literary and Cultural Exploration: Postmodern Narratives in Life of Pi by Martel and Zhah-ryk doo-nee-ye by Mukanova

Martel’s (2003) novel Life of Pi is the story of a young Indian boy named Pi who leaves his home country in the late 1970s with his family and the remaining animals from their zoo and moves to Canada. Pi’s journey across the Pacific Ocean on a lifeboat with an adult Bengal tiger named Richard Parker for 227 days becomes the basis of a narrative of trial, self-discovery, and spiritual development. This story demonstrates a rewriting of the survival narrative Robinson Crusoe in postmodern discourse, departing from traditional forms. The spatial locus of the ocean becomes a sign of liminal transformation, in which the worlds of humans and animals are intertwined through a metaphorical level of representationalism. The temporal setting of the work transcends linear constructions and objective ethological categories, characterised by an oversimplification of reality and the avoidance of the most contentious social issues that have shaped the extra-literary world of the reader and the linguosynergetic field of fiction (Dodeman, 2014DODEMAN, André. Crossing Oceans and Stories: Yann Martel’s Life of Pi and the Survival Narrative. Commonwealth Essays and Studies, vol. 37, no. 1, 2014, pp. 35-44. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4000/ces.5122.
https://doi.org/10.4000/ces.5122... ). The overlapping of fictional and non-fictional frames in Life of Pi (Martel, 2022) intertwines the narrative’s perception of time and space in a captivating manner. Within the fictional frame, time becomes fluid and subjective as Pi Patel recounts his harrowing journey at sea, while the vastness of the ocean blurs the boundaries of space, contributing to a sense of isolation and disorientation. In contrast, the non-fictional frame presents a more linear and objective timeline as Martel (2022) interacts with Pi, grounding the story in reality. This interplay challenges readers to grapple with the authenticity of Pi’s account, questioning the nature of storytelling and the power of imagination in shaping our understanding of truth and fiction within the narrative.

In Life of Pi (Martel, 2022MARTEL, Yann. Life of Pi (indigo 25th Anniversary Edition). Toronto: Knopf Canada, 2022.), the metaprose is self-reflexive: the formal aspects of the fiction move into the fictional part of the book in order to earn the credibility of the story. This narratological strategy is carried out through manipulations of the language, temporal, and spatial aspects of the novel. Historical events take up a small part of the novel to explain the reasons for the family’s departure: a reference to Mr. Gandhi’s rule in India, her declaration of a state of emergency in 1975, and related details. The postmodern narrative draws the reader’s attention to a structure organised in terms of frames, which causes confusion as to where the frame begins and where it ends, where the boundary between fantasy and reality, the real and the fictional, the true and the false (Martel, 2003; Kuriakose, 2018).

The works of Mukanova (1994MUKANOVA, Rayhan. Zhah-ryk doo-nee-ye [Bright world]. Almaty: Zalyn, 1994.) describe the reality of difficult historical periods experienced by the Kazakh people and the damage inflicted by the totalitarian system. Each story is filled with sadness, regret, and hatred; one of the main features of the works is the ability to convey the inner feelings of the characters. The fixation of such manifestations is semantic and artistic-aesthetic, dominant in the linguosynergetic aspect. The plots of R. Mukanova (1994) are taken from life; the literary work itself is born from life (Rakhimbaeva and Asemkhan, 2021RAKHIMBAEVA, Gauhar; ASEMKHAN, Murat. The Reality of Life in the Work of Roza Mukanova. In: Abstracts of XIII International Scientific and Practical Conference “Development of Modern Science: Theory, Methodology, Practice.” Madrid: International Science Group, pp. 177-179, 2021.). The Zhah-ryk doo-nee-ye (Mukanova, 1994) collection of stories is based on the concept of a “bright world,” reflecting the philosophical views of the Kazakh people on life in a traditional way and envisaging a careful attitude to every moment of everyday life (zhahn ah-zah-bih [Pain of soul], keshir meni [Forgive me], shuhk-pai-tuhn yeh-seek [A dead door], doo-nye keh-zek [The world is a turn]). One of the most interesting works written in the fiction genre is Myngilik bala beyne [Eternal Child Video], which tells about the difficulties of life for a 16- to 17-year-old girl named Leila, who suffered from an explosion at a nuclear test site in Semey City and remained disabled after the tragedy. All the personal events and experiences unfold against the backdrop of historical events and a broad description of the everyday lives of the people and the problems of the country. Leila is in the image of an eternal child whose fate has been permanently crippled; she lives with memories and dreams, suffers the humiliation of her sister Katira, and the story ends with another tragic event: the girl’s death (Mukanova, 1994).

On the basis of postmodernist works, parallels can be drawn between the linguistic picture of the world in English-speaking countries and Kazakhstan (Doszhan, 2023DOSZHAN, Raikhan. Multi-Vector Cultural Connection in the Conditions of Modern Globalisation. Interdisciplinary Cultural and Humanities Review, vol. 2, 2023, pp. 27-32. DOI: https://doi.org/10.59214/2786-7110-2023-2-1-27-32.
https://doi.org/10.59214/2786-7110-2023-... ). It should be noted that postmodernism in these territories was formed in different ways: Kazakh culture began to actively develop in this artistic direction only at the end of the twentieth century, after the declaration of independence. For a long period of time, literature existed within the framework of social realism and could not go beyond it, while English literature was constantly developing and was not limited in its forms of understanding reality, so from the second half of the twentieth century on, a variety of postmodernist trends began to appear. It is crucial to consider the geographical factor of influence in understanding how European and American values impact the conceptualization of futurality (Berehova, 2022BEREHOVA, Olena. Comparative Poetics of Composers’ Creativity in the Formation of the European Cultural Paradigm. Interdisciplinary Cultural and Humanities Review, vol. 1, 2022, pp. 13-19.). Kazakhstan’s unique position at the crossroads of European and Asian cultural traditions exposes it to a diverse range of cultural influences. Meanwhile, English-speaking culture demonstrates a clear orientation towards European and American values, which often include concepts such as individualism, democracy, freedom, and capitalism. These values act as extralinguistic factors that significantly shape how people in these regions perceive and conceptualise the future. This influence can impact their expectations, aspirations, and attitudes towards the future, effectively adding a distinct “colour” to their outlook. While European and American values play a central role in shaping their perspectives on futurality, the Asian context, though present, is primarily used to infuse additional nuances into this conceptualization.

Cognitive features, including mental ones, are expressed in different ways of reflecting reality: in Life of Pi (Martel, 2022MARTEL, Yann. Life of Pi (indigo 25th Anniversary Edition). Toronto: Knopf Canada, 2022.), the author describes fantasy worlds; historical events are practically excluded from the literary context and presented episodically; the collection of works Zhah-ryk doo-nee-y (Mukanova, 1994MUKANOVA, Rayhan. Zhah-ryk doo-nee-ye [Bright world]. Almaty: Zalyn, 1994.), despite its postmodernist techniques and means of expression, is in terms of problems and themes close to the realist tradition, since it describes the social and domestic aspects of life of specific people in specific conditions. Postmodernism in Life of Pi (Martel, 2022) demonstrates enthusiasm for life, full of energy through joyful adventures; the information is presented in an optimistic way; in Zhah-ryk doo-nee-ye (Mukanova, 1994), the motives of sadness, loss, bitterness, uncertainty, and lack of understanding of their purpose are brought forward; the general mood and artistic means of representation reflect despair, which is manifested in the linguistic synergetic mechanisms of construction of the work.

Expressing Futurality in English and Kazakh: Linguistic Means and Narrative Functions

The structure of English demonstrates the ranking of different categories and constructions by the grammatical means used to express futurality. The future-modal level of the functional-notional field uses the linguistic means of the future tense in an explicit way. The periphery of this level includes lexical-semantic and lexical-grammatical means (adverbs, adverbial constructions, participative sentences) that have an additional or clarifying function. The modal-futural level of functional sentence perspective (FSP) is caused by the existence of a level of cognitive perception, formed by means of linguistic means with modal meanings with implicit expression of time, performing the function of artistic expression of the narrative meanings of the author in order to mediate influence on the reader (Baghirova, 2020BAGHIROVA, Nigar. The Future Meanings in Modern English. Current Issues in the Humanities, vol. 30, no. 2, 2020, pp. 29-35. DOI: https://doi.org/10.24919/2308-4863.2/30.212267.
https://doi.org/10.24919/2308-4863.2/30.... ; Lebid, 2023LEBID, Tetiana. Electronic Culture: Achievements and Growth Vectors. Library Science. Record Studies. Informology, vol. 4, 2023, pp. 22-32.).

In modern English, the functional-semantic core of futurality is a monocentric structure, the centre of which is formed by the auxiliary verb “will” (used 152 times in Life of Pi (Martel, 2022MARTEL, Yann. Life of Pi (indigo 25th Anniversary Edition). Toronto: Knopf Canada, 2022.)). To express the future tense in the novel, linguistic means are used, linking the moment of the event with the moment of ending speech: future-modal constructions (to be likely, to be about, to be surely, to be to), deictic adjectives (coming, expected), modal verbs (can, to be able, must), and verbs expressing expression (wish, intend, plan, promise, threat, expect). The infinitive and infinitive constructions actively act as auxiliaries to fix the future tense. Futurality in Life of Pi (Martel, 2022) is most often expressed using the following forms: modal verb + infinitive (can escape, to be able to sniff, need to go), verb with futural component + infinitive (wish to see, intend to feed), Subjunctive II forms (might have lifted, would fill, should suffice) (Selivanova, 2003SELIVANOVA, Elena. Means of Expressing the Category of Futurality in English Discourse. Moscow: Moscow State Linguistic University, 2003.). Thus, in addition to the Future Indefinite, the Future Indefinite in the Past is also actively used. This tense reveals the gap between the moment of speech, when the narrator recounts the events, and the moment when the action is completed. In linguosynergetic terms, temporal turns contribute to the active unfolding of the event component and provide the rhythm of the fiction text: “But fate decided that my parents and I and the three wise men, as I shall call them, should meet one day on the Goubert Salai seaside esplanade and that my secret should be outed,” “The day before our departure, she pointed at a cigarette wallah and earnestly asked: Should we get a pack or two?” (Martel, 2003; Sukhomlina, 2007SUKHOMLINA, Tatyana. The Category of Futurality and the Means of Its Language Manifestation: Based on the Material of the English Language. Samara: Samara State Pedagogical University, 2007.).

Most often, futurality in English is closely related to modal lexemes that are used to denote orders, requests, decisions, recommendations, promises, threats, warnings, forecasts, predictions, premonitions, suggestions, opportunities, expectations, hopes, aspirations, wishes, intentions, tasks, goals, imminence, and guarantees; the tradition of their use is formed at the cognitive level (Baghirova, 2020BAGHIROVA, Nigar. The Future Meanings in Modern English. Current Issues in the Humanities, vol. 30, no. 2, 2020, pp. 29-35. DOI: https://doi.org/10.24919/2308-4863.2/30.212267.
https://doi.org/10.24919/2308-4863.2/30.... ). The most frequent frames in Life of Pi (Martel, 2022MARTEL, Yann. Life of Pi (indigo 25th Anniversary Edition). Toronto: Knopf Canada, 2022.) are desire (wish, want, hope, long for), agreement (coincidence, acknowledge, admit, allow), assessment of the degree of probability of action (maybe, perhaps, possibly), uncertainty in action (uncertainty, doubt), prediction (unpredictable), and persuasion to action (force, compel, press).

In Kazakh, modal meanings (hypotheticality, permission, necessity, problematicity, prohibition, probability, uncertainty, and doubt) are represented only by modal words. The key role is played by lexemes cognitively correlated with the semantics of desire (-са/-се) ye-ken (-sa/-se it is), -са/-се dey-min (-sa/-se I say)), probabilities (suh-KEEL-dee (kind of), tuh-reez-dee (kind of), se-kil-di (like), mum-kin (maybe), sha-ma-si (apparently), bel-kim (probably), bo-lar (maybe), shy-ghar (maybe)), owings (ke-rek (must), qa-zhet (necessary), la-zym (need)), fixating on other people’s thoughts (de (as well), dep (that)), confirmations (әрине (certainly), er-ee-neh (of course), shy-ghar (in fact), shy-ghin-dy-ghin-da (in fact), ah-nuh-ghin-da (actually)). The inflection is used to express the relation of an action to reality and is expressed with the help of the speaker. The Conditional Inclination is used to indicate an action desired under certain circumstances (adding suffixes -са, -се (-sa, -se) + personal endings), the desirable inflection expresses an action that the speaker thinks is desirable or possible (adding suffixes -gy, -ky, -gi, -ki), the imperative is used to induce action (adding suffixes -aiyn, -eiin, -gyn, -gin, -kyn, -kin, -sai, -sei) (Mukanova, 1994MUKANOVA, Rayhan. Zhah-ryk doo-nee-ye [Bright world]. Almaty: Zalyn, 1994.; Kurmanova and Dalbergenova, 2020DALBERGENOVA, Lyazzat; ZHARKYNBEKOVA, Sholpan. Evidentialität als argumentative Funktion am Beispiel des Deutschen, Russischen und Kasachischen. Zeitschrift für Slawistik, vol. 65, no. 1, 2020, pp. 134-144. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/slaw-2020-0006.
https://doi.org/10.1515/slaw-2020-0006... ).

Within a fiction text, the temporal vocabulary contributes to creating a certain atmosphere of the work; the Future tenses inform the reader of the change of thematic plane, functionally linking different text fragments together, giving the recipients room for interpretation, and creating narrative space (in the example of Life of Pi):

In Kazakh, different inflections are used in order to capture direct speech, which allows for the function of organising the flow of speech (using Zhah-ryk doo-nee-ye as an example):

Exploring the Linguosynergetic Perspective on Futurality, Modality, and Cultural Influence in Language and Literature

The author of the work uses the category of futurality from a linguosynergetics perspective to clearly define the spatial and temporal framework separating reality from the virtual world she has created. The implicit expression of subjective modality is often used in a fiction text to provide and build associative-semantic links between the intratextual and extra-textual categories and is used in the author’s individual design of monologues and dialogues, direct and non-personalized direct speech (Sukhomlina, 2007SUKHOMLINA, Tatyana. The Category of Futurality and the Means of Its Language Manifestation: Based on the Material of the English Language. Samara: Samara State Pedagogical University, 2007.). In Zhah-ryk doo-nee-ye (Mukanova, 1994MUKANOVA, Rayhan. Zhah-ryk doo-nee-ye [Bright world]. Almaty: Zalyn, 1994.), the contrast between the real world and the fictional world is more prominent, especially in the use of the desirable, imperative, or conditional declension in direct speech; in Life of Pi (Martel, 2022MARTEL, Yann. Life of Pi (indigo 25th Anniversary Edition). Toronto: Knopf Canada, 2022.), the modality frames act as dividers between the fantasy world of the here-and-now and the dreams deployed in the adventure discourse.

To cognitively express the future tense, English primarily uses a wide range of verbs, including modal verbs. The basis of the sentence is constructed as follows: will/shall +infinitive be going to + Infinitive, Present Progressive, Simple Present, be to + Infinitive etc. (Malgaazhdar, 2020MALGAAZHDAR, Madina. Translation Techniques of Rendering Future Tense Forms from Kazakh into English (based on the novels Koshpendiler and Abaizholy). Bulletin of KazNU. Series Philology, vol. 2, no. 178, 2020, pp. 230-242.). In Life of Pi by Y. Martel (2022MARTEL, Yann. Life of Pi (indigo 25th Anniversary Edition). Toronto: Knopf Canada, 2022.), it can be traced to the frequent use of adverbs, adjectives, and personal possessive pronouns on the periphery of the category of futurality; most of the verbal instantiators are stylistically neutral and provide the linguistic synergy of the fiction. The Kazakh language actively uses the category of inclination (imperative, conditional, desirable) for futural and modal meanings, through which hypotheticality, probability, agreement, or anticipation of events are expressed in Zhah-ryk doo-nee-ye (Mukanova, 1994MUKANOVA, Rayhan. Zhah-ryk doo-nee-ye [Bright world]. Almaty: Zalyn, 1994.); other means of futurality are rarely used.

The cognitive perception of reality, in particular temporal relations and the categories of futurality and modality, is conditioned, apart from extra-linguistic influencing factors, by intralinguistic ones as well. English belongs to the Germanic group of languages, and Kazakh belongs to the Turkic group of the Altai family, which is reflected in the syntactic structure of the phrase, in the morphological and word-formation ways of expressing time, and in the lexical and semantic richness of modal means for conveying different shades of meaning. English is inflective and analytical, i.e., the main means of expressing grammatical meanings are word order and the use of function words (grammatical inflections, function words, intonation pattern); Kazakh is an agglutinative language; it often uses grammatical inflections; other ways of expressing futurality are less productive. When translated, one Kazakh sentence corresponds to several English sentences, which are interchangeable.

Exploring the Complexities of Postmodernism, Cognitive Linguistics, and Futurality in Contemporary Discourse

Postmodernism is a movement that emerged as a reaction to the current of modernism and the outcome of the era of modernism. There are different points of view: postmodernism as a continuation of modernism; postmodernist culture in isolation from classical modernism. In this era, the following problems are comprehended: violation of human rights, meaninglessness of human life during World War II, atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and consequences of the Cold War (Kaldybaeva et al., 2020KALDYBAEVA, Raikhan; SHAKIR, Zharas; OMARKULOVA, Bibigul. The Character of Postmodernism in Kazakh Stories. In: KRASNOVA, Natalya; KANAEVA, Yulia (eds). International Conference on Modern Researches in Science and Technology. Morrisville: Lulu, Inc., pp. 59-62, 2020.). The term “postmodernism” emerged in the early twentieth century in fields such as philosophy, architecture, and literary theory, the precondition for its emergence being the emergence of a new era and the desire to meet the demands of a new age, at first associated with an extreme expression of modernism. An interesting approach to postmodernism is demonstrated by Peter Holtz (2020), noting its aversion to modernist arrogance, its emphasis on courage and innovation, its symbolic struggle against totalitarian attempts to suppress individual expression, and its understanding that all knowledge is limited in time and culture. The article by Ivana Dragoş (2020DRAGOŞ, Ivana. Narrative, Temporality, and the Modernist City. Lublin Studies in Modern Languages and Literature, vol. 40, no. 2, 2020, pp. 123-131. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.17951/lsmll.2020.44.2.123-131.
http://dx.doi.org/10.17951/lsmll.2020.44... ) comprehensively explores the idea of temporality in the literary representation of London, actively using fragmentation, quotation, myth, allegory, intertextual references, or allusions, deconstructing traditional temporal sequences, and highlighting the relationship between past and present.

A foundational study for cognitive linguistics is that of George Lakoff (1988LAKOFF, George. Cognitive Semantics. In: ECO, Umberto (ed.). Meaning and Mental Representation. Bloomington: Indiana University Bloomington, 1988. pp. 119-154.), which demonstrates that metaphorical language has systematicity, so the conceptuality embedded in it cannot be arbitrary. A conceptual metaphor is motivated and constructed as a result of real human interaction (physical or social) with the world around us. In describing the conceptosphere, the principle of unidirectionality is used, involving the transference of the structure of the source sphere to the target sphere with no transference in the opposite direction. A cognitive-discursive scenario is a chain of cause-and-effect relationships that consists of future actions with localization in a particular time and place and can be realised as a “bright future” and a “dystopian future” (Solopova, 2012SOLOPOVA, Olga. Comparative Analysis of an Analytical Article and a Predictive Search Scenario: Methods and Structure (Study of Future Models). Vestnik Voronezh State University, vol. 2, 2012, pp. 42-48.). Recently, given the active study of synergetic interdisciplinary branches in different scientific fields, a new field of cognitive knowledge is taking shape: linguosynergetics, which considers the language system and language personality as complex open, non-linear structures that ensure interaction of their own subsystems with external socio-cultural and ethnic manifestations. It is the science of linguistic system self-organisation. Koval (2020KOVAL, M. Linguistic Synergistic Aspect of Linguistic Variability. Khmelnytskyi: Khmelnytskyi National University, 2020.) provides a lengthy list of the main linguosynergetic aspects: (i) self-organisation of conceptual systems; (ii) synergetics of poetics, idiolect, media discourse, and journalism (Ukrainian literary texts); (iii) word-formation synergy of the English language; (iv) the linguosynergetic aspect of the syntactic organisation of the novel; (v) translation synergy; (vi) fractality; (vii) linguosynergetics in the study of social communication; (viii) English, German, and French style synergy; (ix) synergy of the detective genre.

The concept of time is the result of long experience of human interaction with the environment and is closely connected with creative and thinking activity, so at this stage there are already subjective shades of meaning correlated with conscious assimilation of information. On a deeper level, the idea of time is shown through the functional-semantic category of temporality, which is linked to the grammatical system of speech construction (three-member grammatical structure and grammatical classes). Thus, the linguistic flow is segmented into present, past, and future tenses. The global vision of the future includes the following elements: desire; agreement; probability assessment; compulsory action; pattern of action; and neutral prospectivity.

According to Elena Selivanova (2003SELIVANOVA, Elena. Means of Expressing the Category of Futurality in English Discourse. Moscow: Moscow State Linguistic University, 2003.), these “conceptual primitives” in conditions of futural situations are realised in various frames defining the boundaries of the cognitive domain of the future and its semantic structure. The existence of multiple frames is due to the multifaceted nature of the concept of the future and the difficulty in identifying all of its features. Some frames are activated, coming to the fore; the “active” zones of the futural situation frames focus on the communicative nature of the future. The author thus draws important linguistic conclusions: frames fulfil a function of conceptualization and representation of the external world, as well as a programming function, involving the determination of a person’s activity strategy in relation to his or her speech behaviour. The category of futurality, characterised by hypotheticality and subjectivity, as the very nature of the future is represented by unrealized events, provides only for the subject to put forward a certain potentially possible format of developments, bearing the imprint of subjectivity. This character of time is also expressed at the level of internal modality, with a variety of modal meanings and their connotations (epistemic and deontic). Since there is a constant interaction between the nuclear and peripheral components of futurality and modality, there is an overlap of semantic domains. An important outcome of Selivanova (2003) is the development of three temporal categories: future actions that depend on the subject of the utterance, future actions that depend only on external factors, and the neutral future.

The peculiarity of futurality as a modus category is that it is a modus category denoting an action or event that is real in the future, according to the speaker. In the context of studying futurality, Inga Kirkovska (2019KIRKOVSKA, Inga. Category of Futurality within the System of Modus Categories. Problems of General and Slavic Linguistics, vol. 3, pp. 38-44, 2019. DOI: https://doi.org/10.15421/251906.
https://doi.org/10.15421/251906... ), this category approaches the categories of modality and predicativity in meaning, differing only in the semantics of temporality, reflecting the relation of consequence to the moment of speech. Futurality is also related to other modal categories: the category of assertion with the semantics of neutral prospectivity, the category of persuasion with the semantics of certainty in relation to the future, and the category of modality with the semantics of reality in relation to the future. Martin Mikuláš (2016MIKULÁŠ, Martin. Functions of Expressions of Futurality in Professional Economic Texts. Prague Journal of English Studies, vol. 5, no. 1, 2016, pp. 185-207. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/pjes-2016-0010.
https://doi.org/10.1515/pjes-2016-0010... ) uses corpus research to identify the functions of words expressing the category of futurality and modality in professional economic texts. The paper analyses lexical and grammatical means related to the future and investigates their functions in English. The modulal principle, according to Magulsim Zhanabekova et al. (2015ZHANABEKOVA, Magulsim, ZHANABEKOVA, Aiman; KOLESNIKOVA, Tatyana. The Principles of Differentiation of Temporary Forms of Kazakh Verb (In Comparison with English Past). Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, vol. 177, 2015, pp. 17-22. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2015.02.323.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2015.02... ), is used to express the period of specific action between the past and future, is closely related to the speaker’s point of view, and is of great importance in the history of time conjugation. It expresses the subjectivity of the speaker regarding the reality of information about actions that took place in the past. The main types of modal meanings that make up the modus futurus category are as follows: (i) the speaker’s assessment of the subject of the statement in terms of future reality or irreality; (ii) the assessment of the environment of the statement in terms of likelihood, necessity, or desirability in the future; (iii) the speaker’s assessment of the speaker’s level of confidence in the content of the statement from a future perspective; (iv) the communicative function of the utterance, which is determined by the speaker’s purpose in terms of the future (desire, intention, preference); (v) confirmation or denial of objective relations between objects, phenomena, or events of the future (Kirkovska, 2019).

The theory of Gulgul Iskakova et al. (2021ISKAKOVA, Gulgul; KOSTA, Peter; BERDIBAY, Shalabay; SHAPAUOV, Alibi; KIYAKOVA, Raushan. Ways to Express the Author’s Modality in Kazakh, Kyrgyz and English Fiction Works. Homeros, vol. 4, no. 2, pp. 97-117, 2021. DOI: https://doi.org/10.33390/homeros.4.2.05.
https://doi.org/10.33390/homeros.4.2.05... ), who consider various linguistic means and techniques for expressing modality at the text level not separately but in a complex with other elements and contexts, in a combination or combination of the above-mentioned linguistic components, is holistic. The researcher singles out interrogative and exclamatory sentences and non-personal direct speech as means of modality, which, in her opinion, are the expression of the author's voice in the text. But it is hard to agree with the author’s opinion that Kazakh and English writers use the same stylistic devices. Lyazzat Dalbergenova and Sholpan Zharkynbekova (2020DALBERGENOVA, Lyazzat; ZHARKYNBEKOVA, Sholpan. Evidentialität als argumentative Funktion am Beispiel des Deutschen, Russischen und Kasachischen. Zeitschrift für Slawistik, vol. 65, no. 1, 2020, pp. 134-144. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/slaw-2020-0006.
https://doi.org/10.1515/slaw-2020-0006... ) consider the concept of evidentiality, which reflects the subjective opinion of the speaker, the degree of knowledge of the objective situation, the level and nature of his beliefs, assumptions, and relations to objective reality. Systemic functional grammar considers modality as a semantic domain operating within several grammatical categories, a trend developed by S.-K. Сhen (2017СHEN, Shu-Kun. From Explicit to Implicit Orientation: Mapping Rank Scale to Modality in English and Chinese. Functional Linguistics, vol. 4, 2017, ar. 15. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/s40554-017-0049-1.
https://doi.org/10.1186/s40554-017-0049-... ) that is promising in terms of explicit and implicit meanings in the text. Explicit modality is expressed by explicit linguistic means (verbs, adverbs, and adjectives with certain semantics); implicit modality is understood as a modal complement, part of a process or predictor, or an element of mood. In English, the choice of explicit and implicit modality is similar to the choice of subjective and objective modality. Explicit modality is realised at the sentence level, while implicit modality is realised at the phraseological or textual level.

According to Ronald Fong (2020), the category of modality is semantically based because the modal auxiliary denotes some meaning and is consistent with the principle of semantic composition. This study is promising in terms of further building a verb-oriented approach to English modal verbs. Promising is the direction of Alebachew Fentaw et al. (2021FENTAW, Alebachew; DAGNEW, Tesfaye; GUADU, Ayenew. Time in Literary Translation: Anticipation of Retrospection, Temporality of Reading and Living. Journal of Language and Cultural Education, vol. 9, no. 3, 2021, pp. 90-103. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/jolace-2021-0021.
https://doi.org/10.2478/jolace-2021-0021... ) research on time in fiction translation: anticipation of retrospective, correlation of text temporality, and perception of time in life. The work of Ton Nu My Nhat and Nguyen Thi Dieu Minh (2020NHAT, Ton Nu My; MINH, Nguyen Thi Dieu. A Study on Modality in English-Medium Research Articles. VNU Journal of Foreign Studies, vol. 36, no. 6, 2020, pp. 74-92. DOI: https://doi.org/10.25073/2525-2445/vnufs.4630.
https://doi.org/10.25073/2525-2445/vnufs... ) may theoretically contribute to a better understanding of modality when analysing research papers from an applied linguistics perspective. Thus, in modern works, the category of futurality is always considered in connection with other textual and non-textual categories. The category of modality plays a special role in understanding and analysing the implementation of cognitive meanings at the lexico-semantic and linguosynthetic levels. Modal meanings are diverse and are used primarily to implement the author’s narratological strategy at the level of explicit and implicit meanings.

Conclusions

The study presents a comprehensive analysis of the concept of futurality and its implementation in postmodern literary works, particularly focusing on English and Kazakh literature. The research highlights how futurality, encompassing temporal aspects and modal expressions, significantly contributes to the formation of a conceptual worldview in postmodern literature. It emphasises the importance of understanding futurality not just as a linguistic feature but as a pivotal element in the cognitive perception of time and reality, particularly in the context of English and Kazakh postmodern narratives. The study delves into the representation of futurality in works such as Life of Pi by Martel and Zhah-ryk doo-nee-ye by Mukanova, providing insights into the different approaches to time and reality in these cultural contexts.

In English literature, futurality is often portrayed through a complex interplay of modal verbs, temporal lexemes, and narrative techniques that reflect a multifaceted, often nonlinear, perception of time. This is exemplified in Life of Pi, where temporal shifts and modal expressions contribute to a narrative that transcends traditional linear storytelling, offering a more fluid, subjective interpretation of time and reality. In contrast, Kazakh literature, as seen in Zhah-ryk doo-nee-ye, demonstrates a different approach to futurality. The use of specific linguistic structures, such as the conditional inclination and the desirable inflection, reflects a more direct, yet nuanced, expression of time and modality. The study suggests that Kazakh literature’s portrayal of futurality is deeply rooted in the cultural and historical context of Kazakhstan, blending European and Asian influences.

The study underscores the role of linguosynergetics in understanding the cognitive and discursive aspects of futurality. It argues that this interdisciplinary approach offers a more holistic understanding of how temporal and modal categories interact with other textual parameters, shaping the reader's perception and interpretation of a narrative. The study provides valuable insights into the complex nature of futurality as a linguosynergetic category in postmodern discourse. It highlights the diverse ways in which English and Kazakh postmodern literature employ futurality, reflecting their respective cultural, social, and historical backgrounds. The research emphasises the significance of understanding futurality not just as a linguistic phenomenon but as a crucial element in the cognitive and cultural construction of narratives, offering a richer, more nuanced understanding of postmodern literature and its engagement with concepts of time and reality.

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