Variability and conditions of abstract genre destruction in publishing discourse

The article deals with the problem of variation of speech genres and blurring of their boundaries. The aim of the study is to determine the change of what parameters leads to the destruction of the annotation genre functioning in publishing discourse and what changes are acceptable and are a manifestation of intra-genre variation within one discourse. The study was based on 100 Russian publisherʼs abstracts of literary fiction and childrenʼs editions published in 2000–2024, collected by random sampling. The results of the study prove that the publisher's abstract in the conditions of marketing communication expands its functional capabilities and becomes polyintentional: in addition to the informative function prescribed by regulations, it has an impact function. The strengthening of the advertising component leads to the violation of the requirements set by normative documents to the structure and linguistic embodiment of publisherʼs abstracts. The manifestation of the additional influencing function and flexibility of the structure demonstrate the variant realization of the abstract genre in the publishing discourse, as the leading informative function and the status of a secondary text are preserved. In the case when the text placed on the back of the title page is a quotation from the work to be annotated or its structural element, the abstract loses its informative function and its secondary status, which indicates the destruction of the genre form.

abstract, speech genre, secondary text, variation, publishing discourse, persuasiveness, attractiveness