Abstract
Zdravý rozum (lit. healthy reason) is the closest Czech equivalent of English common sense and is sometimes treated as its unproblematic counterpart with identical meaning. However, even a brief look at the semantic structure of both concepts shows that they do not mean the same.
In my presentation, based on data from the Czech language corpora, Anna Wierzbicka's analytical work on common sense (2010), and the broader tradition of European ethnolinguistics (Bartmiński 2016; Vaňková et al. 2005), I will use the Natural Semantic Metalanguage to show and highlight how zdravý rozum differs from common sense and what these differences tell us about the two respective conceptual and cultural universes of Czech and Anglo English. Where common sense reveals a rather optimistic attitude about our capacity to know the world and act accordingly, zdravý rozum tells a different and more sombre story: a story of a small European country, often at the mercy of others, where people use their "healthy reason" to protect themselves and keep sane under unfavourable circumstances.