| Abstract: | The main aim of this thesis is to expose not only acts of discrimination and tolerance which are present in polish public but also attitudes, values and ideologies that are connected. Discourse analysis is methodological context of author’s consideration. Because of ambiguous definition of the discourse the first part of the thesis is concentrated on determination of the author’s self-conception of the crucial term. It is based on research traditions of current humanities so the author uses discourse conceptions developed in sociology and linguistics. A linguistic perspective accommodates French and English attitude, it also appeals to native researches. The theoretical and methodological part of the thesis applies to understanding the text category because of the fact that understanding the discourse category of different attitudes is in conflict with polish text conception. The author inspired by Michael Foucault’s writings determines her own discourse conception which treats the discourse as an abstract, paramount unit of language organization. It also distinguishes this category from the text which is an individual and material entity. Identification and description of exclusion and tolerance gestures needs implementation of The Other category who is treated by the author as the one who does not belong to the community and is different because of the world view, value system, lifestyle or creed. On the grounds of the analysis of feminist, nationalist, conservative, ecclesial and “Tygodnik Powszechny” discourse the author reconstructs The Other’s images, ways of profiling them and presents communities’ discursive attitudes toward The Otherness. In the thesis there are also presented values and beliefs connected with the discursive world’s conceptualization. The author avoids arbitrary classification of analysed discourses as tolerance or exclusion discourses but shows that in each of them there are not only rules of exclusion, but also rules of tolerance. |