IMPLICIT CONTRAST IN CONTEMPORARY UKRAINIAN WAR POETRY: A COGNITIVE-PRAGMATIC ANALYSIS

Abstract

The article examines implicit contrast as one of the key cognitive-pragmatic strategies in contemporary Ukrainian war poetry. Unlike explicit contrast, which relies on overtly marked oppositions (antithesis, oxymoron, contrastive connectors), implicit contrast is interpreted as a conflict of meanings that is not verbalized directly but emerges through the interaction of underlying semantic fields, intonational distortions, disrupted frame expectations, and the inversion of cultural scripts. The aim of the article is to theoretically define the notion of implicit contrast in contemporary Ukrainian war poetry, determine its place within the system of contrastive devices, and describe the cognitive, semantic, pragmatic, and intonational mechanisms underlying the formation of covert oppositions. The theoretical framework is grounded in works on pragmatics (H. Grice, R. Carston, L. Horn, S. Repp), cognitive linguistics (C. Fillmore, G. Lakoff, R. Langacker, G. Fauconnier, M. Turner), cognitive poetics and discourse theory (P. Stockwell, M. Gavins, R. Giora). Methodologically, the study integrates frame analysis, the theory of implicatures and explicatures, the concept of domains and cultural scripts, as well as a cognitive-poetic approach that accounts for the reader’s interpretative role as a bearer of cultural memory. Based on contemporary Ukrainian war poetry, the article demonstrates how implicit contrast arises from mismatches between denotational and contextual meaning (e.g., to liberate as a euphemism for destruction); from collisions between opposing domains (“summer without summer”, “home as war”, the “great” state as a “foul stain”); from intonational falsetto (ceremonial rhythm vs. criminal content); from scale disruption (stars vs. the taste of cigarettes); and from intertextual effects (“to burn hearts with the prophetic word”). The analysis shows that implicit contrast in war poetry unfolds within cognitive domains, background knowledge, and emotional memory, modelling the semantic truth of traumatic experience–experience that resists direct naming.