A Mental Map of Regions in the Czech Republic (Based on the Czech National Corpus)

This article presents the results of an analysis of the semantic scope of the concept “region” in Czech and its functioning in non-scientific, colloquial communication. The analysis, conducted on the material of journalistic texts obtained from the Czech National Corpus, confirmed the existence in the colloquial consciousness of a rich system of territorial units which are given the status of a region. These units form a mental map that allows residents to navigate the cultural, historical and other spaces. It only partially overlaps with the administrative and/or historical divisions. It is dynamic in nature and often goes beyond these frameworks, documenting the creation of ad hoc regions, from the name of some urban centre. The separation of a region on the mental map is important from the social and cultural perspective, and increasingly also from the economic perspective. The region and its name constitute an important, comprehensive value – cultural, economic, etc., and, over time, also historical.