Obscenities as Part of Socio-Cultural Identity of University Students

The paper examines the current changes in the speech culture of young Russians. The case study involved 285 students of the Department of Humanities, St. Petersburg State University of Economics, St. Petersburg. The survey tested their attitude to obscenities in various media to outline the boundaries of speech norms in everyday vs. professional communication, as well as to identify the place of obscene language in the socio-cultural identity of university students. Obscene vocabulary proved to be a means of expressing cultural and linguistic values. As a factor of transmitting linguistic culture within the student community, it demonstrated a profound impact on the development of the modern Russian language as a whole. The participants appreciated censorship in business literature, documentary and feature films, plays, and fiction but found it unnecessary in heavy-rock lyrics, blogs, and comedy shows. The university students considered obscene vocabulary as a variant of everyday speech norm typical of a certain class of linguistic personality with a particular socio-cultural identity.