THE IMPACT OF THE POLYSEMY OF LOAN WORDS ON THEIR GRAMMATICAL CHARACTERISTICS (A CASE STUDY OF THE CONTEMPORARY RUSSIAN LANGUAGE)

The article examines the impact of polysemy on grammatical categories (of gender, number, animacy) on the material of loan nouns. The author analyses a new phenomenon in the sphere of Russian indeclinable nouns: attributing gender characteristics to each lexico-semantic variant (LSV) of a polysemantic word individually (фрисби, барбекю, etc.). Formerly such phenomena were registered only if different LSVs of the same word denoted animate and inanimate objects. Attributing different gender meanings to different LSVs of one and the same word signifies gradual weakening of neuter gender position as well as domination of analogy principle. Using the example of “ing”-nouns the author describes regular semantic shifts supported by plural form semantics and makes an assumption that in lexicographical practice it is important to trace relation of English loan words to number, since plural forms can reveal development of polysemy. The study examines the change in relation to the category of animacy of polysemantic words. There are irregular cases of “aban- doning” animacy in nouns which in their indirect meanings correlate with inanimate object (comp. мастер подсказок). If polysemy develops according to a different scenario (from inanimate to animate LSV), grammatical characteristics of animacy reveal themselves more regularly.