Nominative Units for Denoting Forced Internal Migrants: The Media Context of Creating a Verbal Image of a Person

Media texts use the names “internally displaced person”, “IDP” (without decoding), “migrant” to refer to people who were forced to change their place of residence within Ukraine due to the war, there are individual cases of using the names “refugee”, “new resident”, “evacuee”, “new arrival”. Each nominative unit has some differences in meaning, confirmed by the media context of their use. The abbreviation “IDP” most often reflects depersonalization, passivity, inability to take active actions. The deciphered abbreviation “internally displaced person” reveals the person to a greater extent, but the passive participle in its composition also encourages us to perceive the person primarily as a recipient of assistance. The nominative unit “migrant” contains the semantic meaning of the result of active independent action, the combination with the adjective “forced” makes the text more emotionally charged; texts with the word “migrant” most often provide information about active action, effectiveness and success, they are used for the presentation and self-presentation of internally displaced persons. Journalists should take into account that the connotations of words and the linguistic image of the person named by these words are largely shaped by the media. In view of this, it is worth expanding the compatibility of the official term “internally displaced person (IDP)”, increasing the number of text fragments where this nominative unit does not refer to a passive recipient of assistance, but to an active person who takes responsibility for his or her life. Also, if possible, it is worth avoiding unjustified economy of linguistic means and using the full phrase, not an abbreviation, because it is very difficult to see the person behind the abbreviation.