The term “captivity” in Ukrainian encyclopedic discourse

The article examines the semantic and cognitive features of the term polon [captivity] in Ukrainian ency­clopedic discourse. The analysis is based on scientific and reference sources in Ukrainian, including uni­versal and specialized encyclopedias, online encyclopedias, encyclopedic dictionaries and reference dic­tionaries. The results of the study showed that the semantic specificity and functional features of the term captivity, which belongs to the conceptual fields of freedom/slavery and war, define it as a complex inter­disciplinary unit, the nature of which cannot be interpreted solely based on the information contained in modern encyclopedias. The need to use both direct dictionary entries and indirect encyclopedic material (prisoners of war/captives) to clarify the semantic structure of the lexeme captivity is emphasized. The core, basic and peripheral semes of the concept of captivity are identified and adapted to modern realities. It has been found that the term captivity functions in articles of various types, styles and topics, and is most often found in articles about personalities, which allow for a deeper and more specific understanding of the se­mantic structure of the unit under analysis. A lack of information about captivity that corresponds to the realities of the Russian-Ukrainian war has been identified; therefore, to actualize the modern semes cov­ered by the term captivity, an attempt has been made to draw on material from scientific discourse. It has been determined that encyclopedic discourse contains sufficient multifaceted material on captivity, but this information requires careful searching and recording, so emphasis has been placed on the need to cre­ate quick access to such an important term as captivity within a single dictionary entry.