Kształty polskiej tożsamości : potoczny dyskurs narodowy w perspektywie etnolingwistycznej (XVI–XX w.)

Abstract

The aim of the book is to present and discuss Polish discourse on the subject of Polish identity in common and individual dimension. The author is in favour of the sociologists and psychologists’ thesis who claim that group identity is formed within the reference to common or even the same elements as the individual identity. These are: isolating oneself from the others, locating oneself in certain place being considered as own, noticing one’s lasting in time that concerns notions about past, present and future times, and finally, conducting autocharacteristic process i.e. describing oneself in account of one’s attributes. The basis of analysis and conclusion is the material collected from the text of private and autobiographical character: journals, diaries, memories that have all been considered as sources illustrating the condition of popular identity and allowing to reconstruct the category of popular discourse. The corpus of the texts consists of the same number of sources from 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th and 20th century. Each chapter is devoted to the analysis of the national discourse categories in the enumerated five time sections: identification, place, time, autostereotype. When analyzing the listed issues the author uses the ethnolinguistic and cognitive linguistics’ findings that she tries to use in culture description. First chapter: Who are you? Identification consisting the analysis of the statements on the subject of the distinguish of the group of Poles, its range, the individuals’ will to identify with it and problems concerning the necessity to contrast Polish conceptions with foreign interpretations. In 16th and 17th century identifying with “Polish Nobility” was connected with sharing by the individuals the democratic values of Polish society. In 18th, 19th and 20th century problems connected with the necessity to overcome the influence of the hegemonic leaders – colonizers (invaders, partitioners) have been noticed. Second chapter: Where do you live? Mental maps transformations concerning the images of Poland and Polish people location in the world. When reconstruction three variants of the map in each period (long-term and immediate plans) the author shows the influence of one’s locating in the centre or in the suburbs of the world or the consciousness of being noticed by the others towards the development of Polish identity and the feeling of “being a Pole”. Problems resulting from worse self-assessment and unsatisfying shape of the long-term plan have been solved by means of the more intensive and on a large scale map drawing up where Polish presence can be emphasized. Third chapter: What about your time? Conceptualizations of common time is devoted to the reconstruction of the transformations of ideas concerning Polish time. It can be conceptualized as linear or cyclical, as constant, teleological or as disrupted continuum. The past seems to be interpreted in different ways: in mythological or historical categories. The length of Polish times sections is changing (the past, future and present) and the attention drawn to each of them. Polish time from the genealogical, human perspective is also noticed differently. Source continuity between the generations and the role of the individuals in shaping the national fate is as well analyzed variously. Fourth chapter: What are you like? Autostereotype is a reconstruction of the attribitive characteristics whose description has been organized according to the Polish ethnolinguistic method of the aspect description: psychological and psychosocial, physical, cultural, living, economical, religious and ideological. In comparison with the remaining categories, there has been noticed fewer transformations of the autostereotype in the subsequent periods. The Polish unwaveringly enumerate the same features characteristic to them. Its judgement, however, changes that remains in close relation with the category of place, time and identification. Transformations of the stressed categories in separate periods have occurred simultaneously and they have motivated one another. Their development is caused by the necessity of adjusting the community ideas about oneself towards the changing historical circumstances and the main aim that is retaining of the elementary feeling of the importance of one’s existence.