The research represented in the article focuses on the modelling of the process of ironic meaning construction. The modelling is realized in the form of hierarchically organized mental spaces. These are cognitive contexts that provide comprehension of irony.
The paper considers the cognitive-communicative nature of blending (contamination), as a word-formation process. Blending is characterized by the combination of mental spaces in one-word motivated signs, accompanied by their semantic laconic brevity, fullness and a great potential of expressiveness.
The article proposes a generalization of theoretical discourse studies as a product or result of social relations, as well as a mechanism or instrument of their construction and regulation. The author structures the ideas of discourse, most thoroughly developed in the national philological science, and focuses on the controversial issues related to the research of various types and forms of discourse.
