| Sumario: | The paper presents a multidisciplinary perspective on stereotypes, language, and culture, thus intersecting social, linguistic, and culture studies through the lens of modern art, which becomes a precise illustration for the way we create, perpetuate, and transform them while at the same time behave under their influence. The notion of a stereotype originates from journalism and social studies and dates back to the beginning of the twentieth century. Having been altered for different needs and adjusted to specific fields of study, the core matter of stereotype has remained stable and comprises three basic components: mental imagery, social phenomena, and cultural identity. The two basic functions of stereotypes focus on the acceleration of understanding and sharing patterns of perception and reaction to reality. In contemporary linguistics discourse studies most frequently appeal to this notion especially considering the nature of media texts, manipulations, and strategies. The given study uses a multimodal text of a film for illustrations in view of its unique versatility and simultaneous appeal to different semiotic codes. Consequently, the approach to text allows to extend the boundaries of this notion and to identify its supra-syntactic features while remaining in one methodological paradigm. Ultimately, the study promotes the view of stereotype as a specific text form uniting language and culture. Using functional, communicative, and cognitive approaches to text structure allows identifying the permanent and dynamic features of stereotypes. The former features will inevitably root in presupposition, lead to particular inferences, reflect a specific referent, and become explicit through the abovementioned indicators, thus allowing for code-switching and other speech adjustments. The latter features of stereotypes emphasize their unstable nature and correlate with individual perception, explicitness of presentation, general and/or specific knowledge as well as communicative salience of the text itself and the semantic correlation between activated concepts. Ultimately, the study of stereotypes demonstrates the mechanism of their verbalization thus making language the instrument of their preservation and promotion. It leads to identifying the process of stereotyping and explains the potential for polysemy, implications, and ability to extend or elevate those language units that closely correlate with a particular stereotype.
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