Tekueva A.A. Axiological core of everyday life: reconstruction of conceptual sphere of modern Balkars based on associative experiment data

The article presents a study, as well as a detailed analysis and the results of a free associative experiment aimed at reconstructing a fragment of the everyday linguistic consciousness of the Balkar population permanently residing throughout the Kabardino-Balkarian Republic. The main stimuli for this research were several key lexical units of the ethnic cultural code: kitab (book), kun (sun/day), tau/taulu (mountain/mountainous/highlander), ana (mother), adam/adamlıq (man/people/humanity), igi/igilik (good/goodness/benefit), and ariu/ariuluq (beautiful/beauty). A high proportion of single responses is interpreted as an indicator of dynamic processes — namely, the preservation of a stable value core alongside the simultaneous individualization and contextualization of its periphery. The data obtained provide insight into the specific linguistic and cognitive characteristics of the Balkar people, while also shedding light on culturally determined features of the processes of categorization and conceptualization in thinking as a whole.