Semantics of verbs ‘laugh’ and ‘smile’ in Russian in comparison with Chinese

Ma Mengfei

This article is devoted to the description of semantic peculiarities of modern Russian verbs ‘laugh’ and ‘smile’ and their comparison with Chinese equivalents ‘xiào’ and ‘wēi xiào’. The purpose of this article is to analyze the distinctive features of two verbs. The analysis revealed the main distinctive features as an indication of facial expressions and sounds, an indication of the loss of self-control of the subject; an indication of the presence of complex emotions. The brief comparison with the material in Chinese allows us to better consider the similarities and differences of their representation in the Chinese and Russian language picture of the world

Keywords:semantics, laugh, smile, distinctive features, verb