Did Lesia Ukrainka use feminitives? (on the example of short prose in 1888-1890)

The category of femininity is a manifestation of a linguistic phenomenon, as well as a sociolinguistic, linguistic and cultural phenomenon, the study of which should be carried out on texts that are representatives of a certain historical period, area and, accordingly, a community (social group). Taking into account these factors in the research gives indicative results regarding the functioning of language units, reveals the historical perspective of the language in general. Considering this, the article clarifies how, why and in what contexts Lesya Ukrainka, a representative of the late 19th and early 20th centuries and one of the most famous women of Ukraine, used femininity. The proposed study demonstrates the peculiarity of the manifestation of the category of femininity as opposed to masculinity on the example of Lesya Ukrainka's short prose of 1888–1890. The choice of the study period is determined by the historical and ideological context of the day. Lesya Ukrainka is the daughter of Olena Pchilka, one of the first feminists in Ukraine. The circle and circumstances of Lesya's growth – the intellectuals of that time (the Kosachiv and Drahomanov families), access to European fiction, to philosophy, to the plays of Maurice Maeterlinck and Gerhart Hauptmann, where the type of "new woman" appears – all this motivated the writer to a "new" understanding of a woman, freed from patriarchal conventions, which could not but be reflected in the language of that time, in particular, in the language of Lesya Ukrainka. The short prose of the writer of the late 19th century is demonstrative about building a personality, and in those days Lesya Ukrainka was a representative of the youth, she was only 17–20 years old. According to sociolinguistic studies, it is the youth who are most sensitive to language innovations. From this point of view, the works of Lesya Ukrainka have not yet been studied in detail, which indicates the relevance of the research. How and in what context Larisa Petrivna Kosach – one of the feminists of Ukraine – used female forms to indicate a certain type of activity or belonging to a certain social status is revealed in this investigation.