Middle Europa: A Hard Sell
The Poles, like the Hungarians before them, are trying to figure out how to improve their image abroad. It won’t be easy.
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The Poles, like the Hungarians before them, are trying to figure out how to improve their image abroad. It won’t be easy.
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In this research work; the author focuses on the analysis of the liberalisation of foreign trade policy of emerging China in the world economy. What indicates the importance and innovativeness of the research is the presentation of the technical progress in P.R.China and the benefits resulting from the liberalised Chinese foreign trade policy. In accordance with the foreign trade policy theory further trade liberalisation and improved framework policies would increase trade and promote growth. It must be emphasized that openess to trade is associated with higher incomes and growth and there is a need for new approaches to trade cooperation in the light of the forces that are currently re-shaping international business. The key of trade developments within the broader socio-economic context is especially the rise of global supply chains; the general shift of trade power away from the West towards Asia. The main aim of the article is the presentation the liberalisation of foreign trade policy of emerging China in the world economy.
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The article discusses the project of East Asia Summit – EAS; a manifestation of Asian diplomatic regionalism; launched in 2005 as a political forum of countries located in the region of East Asia; consistently evolving toward an Asia-Pacific platform of dialogue due to formal membership of Russia and the United States since 2011. A year before there was a discussion about the possibility of the constitution of the ASEAN Plus Eight formula. The author attempts to study the genesis of the EAS project; indicating an issue of membership in the regional diplomatic framework; while addressing Japan’s optics.
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Japan as one of highly developed countries of the world; for many years; plays a significant role in the Asia-Pacific region. Countries of the region are the target market for Japanese products and Japanese capital. Through the foreign trade and foreign direct investment; Japan affects the shape of the relationship in the region and the process of Asian regionalism. Constantly around 50% of Japanese exports go to Asian countries and a similar percentage of Japanese imports come from the examined region. Japan is also a major exporter of capital in the form of foreign investment to countries in the region; which makes up a considerable part of it. Trade and foreign investment are the only part of the indicators of the role of Japan in the Asia-Pacific regionalism; but these are factors clearly indicating the strong commitment of Japan in the region. The aim of the article is to present the role played by Japan in the Asian regionalism; by showing the Japanese foreign trade and inflows and outflows of foreign direct investment.
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The purpose of this article is to present the impact of Washington Consensus principles for selected Southeast Asian countries – Malaysia and Indonesia and their struggle during Asian Financial Crisis in 1997. Government’s universal issue; particularly in developing countries; is the ability to find a range of government market regulations to ensure fast economic development and social wealth. The author presents that an idea of the government participation is contained between two opposite concepts. The first idea claims that the government should be completely eliminated. The second; one that the government intervention is necessary to revise the market failures. Initially; the Washington Consensus principles were based on laissez-faire and neoliberal solutions. According to postulates prepared by J. Williamson; the Washington Consensus principles originally anticipated e.g. financial discipline; economy and trade liberalization; privatization; open for FDIs or deregulation. Proposed laissez-faire reforms were supposed to to constrict the role of government and build the functioning of economy upon a market mechanism.. Representatives of Bretton Woods organisations e.g. International Monetary Fund or The World Bank; followed this way to achieve the goals of the Washington Consensus. Due to the consensus political effectiveness; the postulates were implemented in many countries in Latin America or East Asia; for instance in Indonesia. To this analysis the author selected two countries from the region; both before the 1997 crisis; recording the impressive economic growth. During the crisis the governments of both countries decided to choose a completely different weapon to fight against the economic chaos. Jakarta; surprised by the economic collapse scale; which during its first phase had “hurt” the country; adopted the IMF recommendations almost indiscriminately. By contrast; Malaysian government adopted alternative strategy and implement own crisis management tools. They were based on e.g. capital control or an intensive role of the government in the reduction of socio-economic loses; which were aftermath of the crisis. The author based on works of many independent economists. It supposed to form the objective opinion about decisions made by particular governments. Additionally; to compare outlined thesis; author’s conclusions were based on economic data and indicators. The data illustrate the long term effects which were being caused by the crisis and reforms implemented by the particular countries governments. Conclusions that can be extrapolated from the presented paper; argue that Malaysia decision of taking own alternative way to fight against the economic breakdown was right. This can be clearly seen by comparing the 1997 crisis effects in Malaysia and Indonesia. Government in Jakarta; despite the financial and advisory support from IMF; was dealing worse during the economic collapse and after it. The results of the research indicate defeat of neoliberal ideas in the developing countries economy and the significant role of the government and effective institution in market mechanism optimization.
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The study constitutes an attempt to join the discussion about the importance of assessing convergence in the process of enlargement of European monetary union and it focuses on the comparative aspect of the degree of similarity of Polish economy in relation to the euro area and of countries that are already part of the single currency area. The aim of the article is to present the results of the indicator analysis of real convergence; which unlike the nominal one; gives a fuller picture of the desirability of state’s participation in the monetary union. These results; on the one hand; allow to draw certain conclusions regarding Poland and supporting the process of choosing the date of adoption of the euro; and on the other hand; help to determine if during the post-crisis period there occurred tendencies indicating an increase of the degree of similarity of economies already using the common currency. The research related; apart from Poland; to selected euro zone member states: France; Greece; Spain; the Netherlands; Ireland; Lithuania; Germany; Slovakia and Italy. For the purpose of the study; it was accepted that an appropriately broad selection of indicators; allowing to achieve the necessary objectivity degree of assessment of countries’ real convergence in relation to the entire euro area; would consist of: growth rate of real GDP and correlation coefficients relating to this measure; GDP per capita as a determinant of income; GDP per hour worked as an indicator of labour productivity; hourly labour costs; level of long-term unemployment; structure of gross value added; changes in the real exchange rate; long-term real interest rate and real money market rate (which; at the same level of the nominal short-term interest rate in the euro zone; is determined in each member state by the prices’ level growth rate). As the research period the years of 2004-2014 were adopted. The conducted indicator analysis of real convergence allowed to formulate a number of observations: the degree of similarity of the analysed economies to the whole monetary union is different in most cases; depending on which sphere is related to a measure; the scale of convergence of individual economies in relation to the euro zone also varies; in respect of the analysed countries; it is difficult to notice a trend towards deepening the scale of convergence in the post-crisis period; in the case of Poland; one should not rather talk about the similarity; but about far-reaching real divergences in relation to the euro zone; which result in postponing a reasonable moment to adopt the common currency.
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Genetically modified food is one of the most problematic areas of cooperation among countries. The numerous controversies associated with its cultivation and introduction on different markets prompted the author to reflect on this issue. The aim of the publication is to identify the essence of genetically modified food and to indicate the extent of its use in today’s world economy. Therefore; legal regulations on genetically modified organisms in individual countries were analysed; with particular emphasis on Poland. In addition; the reasons of the use of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in food production were indicated; as well as the risks associated with it. The descriptive method and the analysis of the literature were used during the preparation of the study. As one can notice; the widespread reluctance of many societies; including Polish one; towards consuming genetically modified food is fuelled by world anti-globalisation movements; which background is primarily constituted by the criticism of decisions taken by transnational corporations (TNC). It can be assumed that potential benefits for human activity which can be brought by modern; GMOs-using technology and growing problems of global nature – in recent years especially the problem of maintaining food security – are factors determining the necessity of deepening knowledge on the utilisation of GMOs in various spheres of life; in food production particularly. The strategic significance of GMOs seems to be indicated by the growing interest in agricultural biotechnology of China and of the European Union itself (although the share of the latter in the whole world crops is marginal). They gradually move in the direction of creating bioeconomy based on spreading innovations; also in the agri-food sector.
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It should be presumed that if any conditions laid down in the article happen; the expansion of the e-book market will follow. However; problematic issues will act as a limiter; which does not allow for the complete removal of traditional books.
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The paper raises the question of whether the linguistic relativity proposal, also known as the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis, should be used as a frame of reference for modern research into the relationship of language to cognition. The question is discussed in the context of Whorf’s (1956) writings, with emphasis on factors that are crucial to the proposal, i.e. language, thought, and behavior. The second issue addressed by the paper is whether linguistic categories provide an accurate window on cognition, as was suggested by Whorf and in some of the more recent debates. The analysis takes the form of a correlational study which examines the categorization criteria applied in tests that require language-based and language-neutral judgments.
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This article reports the results of a study of self-perception of their language identity by advanced FL students. The aim of the study is to observe what students’ language choices are and what guides them in these choices. The concepts related to bi/multilingualism are taken into consideration, following Cook’s opinion (1992, p. 558) that L2 users should be compared to bilinguals rather that monolinguals. The perception of the language self is related to language competence acquired in formal education. The findings will be referred to recent research on language and identity in a foreign language context conducted elsewhere, and suggestions for further study in the field will be provided.
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The semantically fine-grained ditransitive constructions in Mandarin Chinese show complex interaction between lexical semantics, constructional semantics, and syntactic frames. This study examines the acquisition process of the syntax as well as the semantics of these constructions by launching two experiments with French learners of Chinese. The experiment results reveal a ‘syntax-before-semantics’ learning process and the important role of input in implicit learning.
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In 2012, a number of events were held to mark both the centenary of the birth and the 70th anniversary of the death of the Drohobych-born writer Bruno Schulz, including memorial, public awareness and academic projects which resulted in numerous publications that helped ensure the continued vigorous growth of Schulzology in the 21st century. The year 2013 likewise provided a major impetus for the popularization of Schulz’s achievements, since in this year the copyrights to Schulz’s works expired, allowing them to be freely reproduced. A review of the most recent published works in Schulzology serves as an opportunity to ask questions of a more general nature about trends in research on Schulz’s work, which is dominated by W. Panas’ cabbalistic interpretation. This includes other readings of the author of „The Street of Crocodiles” from within a Jewish context, efforts at a radical reorientation in research and philosophical hermeneutics (M.P. Markowski), attempts to read Schulz’s work in terms of political problematics, and the phenomena of the “celebritisation” of literary criticism.
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This study is concerned with L2 Japanese learners’ interpretation of scopally ambiguous sentences containing negation and universal quantifier using prosodic cues. It has been argued, in previous literature, that native adult speakers of English as well as Japanese interpret such sentences both on their surface (total negation) and inverse scope (partial negation) readings in the presence of prosodic cues. The present study shows, however, that L2 Japanese speakers predominantly favor the total negation reading even in situations where the prosodic cues point them to the partial reading. These outcomes indicate that L2 learners of Japanese do not attach “optimal relevance” to prosodic cues when disambiguating scopally ambiguous sentences. The results also imply that for L2 Japanese learners, clues other than prosody may be required to carry out disambiguation.
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Classroom language in EFL classrooms comprises the core of communication between teachers and learners. Teacher talk plays a central role in understanding the nature of classroom language in this respect. According to Krashen’s input hypothesis, teacher talk also constitutes an important source of comprehensible input for the language acquisition of the learner (Krashen, 1981). To make the input comprehensible, teachers may make modifications in their vocabulary, syntax, rate of speech or discourse. Accordingly, the aim of this study is to discover whether native speakers of English and non-native speakers of English make any syntactical modifications in their teacher talk at elementary and pre-intermediate levels and to try to find out what kind of syntactical modifications they make if they modify their syntax during their speech. The study was carried out with eight EFL instructors (both NSs and NNSs) at Çağ University in Turkey, using their audio-recordings, a questionnaire, and interviews. Antconc 3.2.1 Program and SPSS 17.0 Program were used to analyze the quantitative data. The findings of the data were incorporated with the results of interviews forming the qualitative part of the study. The results of the data revealed that native speakers of English and nonnative speakers of English made syntactical modifications in their teacher talk at elementary and pre-intermediate levels. They ranged from subordinate clauses to the types of sentences. The findings of the study also demonstrated that syntactical modifications in the teacher talk of native speakers and non-native speakers at both levels depended on the proficiency level of the learners although not all of these modifications formed a statistically meaningful difference.
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The article discusses some key issues related to worldview in the work of Bruno Schulz, analyzing it through the lens of posthumanist philosophy. In the article, issues such as Schulzian anthropology, the notion of principium individuationis, and the position of the author of "The Street of Crocodiles" in relation to civilizational change are presented in discourse with critical readings of Schulz’s writing. Aspects hardly noticed in previous interpretations are brought to the fore, such as, the laboratory featured in the stories, and the depiction of Egga van Haardt and the convalescent in the essay “A Skeptic’s Wanderings”. The demiurgic acts of the Father in Schulz’s stories are considered in light of artistic activities within mainstream bio art. The author explores Schulz’s characteristic prosthetic principle of creation, relating it to both the construction of bodies and a philosophy of Schulz’s language.
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This study explores the dynamic, interactive relationship between teacher identity and authenticity. Through an examination of several socio-cultural (social identity, situated learning, and image text) and psycholinguistic (individual differences) second language acquisition theories, a conceptualization of identity is provided. Subsequently, language teacher authenticity is characterized from both a philosophical and pedagogical perspective and connected to the notion of teacher identity. The final section of the paper presents research-based applications that include reflecting critically, redefining personal credibility, discovering one’s personal style, displaying emotion and recognizing diversity to facilitate the positive-broadening quest of aligning one’s identity (i.e., who I am) with authenticity (i.e., what I do).
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The article analyzes the plants cultivated by Sophie, the heroine of the poem PanTadeusz by Adam Mickiewicz, on the windowsill in Soplicowo mansion.
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The article brings up the issues of nineteenth-century mesmerism in the works of Bolesław Prus. It describes the coming out of the phenomenon, views of its rationalization and démocratisation both from global and Polish perspective. Moreover, it draws attention to those components of the author's biography, such as the acquaintance and cooperation with Julian Ochorowicz, which influenced the shape of his outlook on the spiritualism enthusiasts movement, quite popular at that times. The writer's attitude towards the new phenomenon was ambiguous and traces of his internal dilemmas are easily found in the language of "The New Woman". The analysed language which creates spiritualistic discourse is represented by general names i.e. names of the doctrine created by Allan Kardec or the reality it concerned; names of the rituals—meetings of people and spirits as well as the names of people and beings, directly or indirectly engaged in those rituals.
More...gra światła i barw w opowiadaniu Detale zachodu słońca
The paper aims at presenting the way in which Vladimir Nabokov uses coloursand light while creating different layers of reality in his literary works on the exampleof the short story entitled Details of a Sunset. As it is shown in the article, colours in thetext convey not only the information about the visual effects but also some informationreferred to the protagonists and the plot. For instance, in Details of a Sunset the colours ofgreen and ginger used with their symbolic meaning for Clare describe her personality andattitude toward her fiance. What is, however, more important colours in the text make itpossible for the reader to recognise two different realities that determine understanding ofthe title as well as the whole text.
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