The paper focuses on development of linguoculturological competence in philology students. Linguoculturology is regarded as an interdisciplinary or 'interdiscipline' science with its focus on study of language through cultural and anthropological interpretation of linguistic facts. Linguoculturological competence is understood as a cultural values' body of knowledge acquired by a linguistic persona. The importance of conceptual approach for development of a value-based linguocultural identity in students is emphasized. The distinctive feature of the proposed approach is that it is based on the main trends in higher education, namely: expansion of language scope: not only an essential means of communication, but also a phenomenon of spiritual culture. The conceptual approach actualizes the notion of concept as a didactic unit of learning. Works of Russian researchers include a variety of definitions with regard to the following notions explaining a deeper layer of noosphere called concept: "notion", "genotype", "logoepistema", "linguocultureme", "sapientema", etc. Taking into account experience of operating with linguistic units reflecting ethnocultural values, we define a concept as a meaningful unit of consciousness functioning in a text, this unit being expressed in a language and having a stable network of associations relevant for bearers of the culture. Familiarization of a linguistic (cultural and linguistic) individual with spiritual values is done via a system of linguocultural concepts. Concept is regarded as interpreter of meaning, 'archiver of cultural meanings'. Interpretive analysis of concepts actualizes educational environment used to search for meaning. It is noted that cultural meanings represent the value content of culture. Accordingly, theory of cultural memory is actualized, which is effective in studying of the process of language conceptualization. A model of verbal and cogitative activity of students is presented, which includes a set of techniques allowing them to assimilate the meaning volume of the concept of patriotism taking into account contexts of different epochs. The conceptual approach integrates not only linguocultural knowledge, but also meaning-making, axiological components. Individual receives cultural experience, in which the aspect of meaning plays an important role. The paper defines criteria of linguoculturological competence of future professionals.

linguoculturological competence, conceptual approach, interpretation analysis, concept, cultural memory, cultural meaning