Retoryczne strategie i taktyki wywierania wpływu na wyborców w programach rosyjskich partii politycznych

Author(s): Robert Szymula / Language(s): Polish Issue: XXII/2020

The main aim of politicians’ actions (a struggle for power and retaining it) is connected with forming voters’ convictions, achieved, inter alia, with particular rhetorical strategies. Research demonstrated that in the analyzed material (programs of 11 Russian parties) three rhetorical strategies are employed: the lowering strategy, the elevation strategy and the theatricality strategy, implemented with the help of various tactics. The most frequently used strategy is undoubtedly the theatricality strategy, verbalized through the following tactics: encouraging, cooperating, separating, promising, anticipating and warning.

Bierwiaczonek, Bogusław. 2013. Metonymy in Language, Thought and Brain

Author(s): Mario Brdar / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2020

Review of: Bierwiaczonek, Bogusław. 2013. Metonymy in Language, Thought and Brain. Sheffield: Equinox, pp. iv + 291. ISBN 9781908049346.

Linguistic Image of Non-Christian Jews in Early Christian Narratives as a Function of Inter-Group Conflict (Theoretical Background)

Author(s): Amadeusz Citlak / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2019

This article is an attempt to apply a modern social psychology thesis to reproduce a linguistic image of non-Christian Jews in chosen narratives taken from the Greek canonical Gospels of the New Testament. In the first century AD, non-Christian Jews and primitive Christians found themselves in a state of growing ideological conflict resulting in marked changes in their social relations and mutual perceptions. While remaining in close connection with the usage of language and discourse creation, these changes led to the adoption of new linguistic strategies among primitive Christians, thanks to which the image of non-Christian Jews took on over the course of the following years characteristics of negative stereotypes. A structural model has been used to analyse Christian texts, allowing for consistent and uniform comparisons of available sources. The aim of this paper therefore is an attempt to recreate linguistic characteristics of Jews in primitive Christian documents. There is also an alternative proposal for the analysis of stereotypes against that which has been used for many years in the study of anti-Judaism in historical documents. I will present the theoretical context (a short historical outline) and accepted psychological theories.

О истакнутим асоцијативним истраживањима на Западу у 21. веку и могућностима њихове примене у (домаћој) лингвистици

Author(s): Ana Lj. Petrović Dakić / Language(s): Serbian Issue: 21/2020

Since local associative research has, so far, been oriented towards the East and Russia, the aim of this paper is to give an overview of lesser-known, but interesting Western research, which could be of use to our linguists in the future. The associative method is used in different branches of the social sciences, but here we will focus on achievements in areas closest to our researchers: the use of this method with corpora, in order to facilitate vocabulary search; the construction of mental lexicon models based on verbal associations; and the use of these associations in the field of applied linguistics, in regard to second language acquisition.

Konsiliencja, czyli o porozumieniu między naukami w trzecim tysiącleciu

Author(s): Elżbieta Chrzanowska-Kluczewska / Language(s): Polish Issue: 1&2/2016

Konsiliencja (termin wywodzący się z logiki indukcyjnej a „zmodernizowany” w latach 1990-tych przez E. O. Wilsona, twórcę socjobiologii) odnosi się do odwiecznego marzenialudzkości o unifikacji wiedzy z wszelkich dziedzin – od nauk ścisłych, poprzez naukispołeczno-ekonomiczne, aż do humanistyki a nawet sztuk wizualnych. Jest to poszukiwaniewspólnego systemu dla całokształtu wiedzy ludzkiej, oparte na wierze w jedność natury iuporządkowanie świata. We współczesnej nauce znalazło odzwierciedlenie w Ogólnej TeoriiSystemów, naukach hybrydycznych i studiach interdyscyplinarnych. Autorka dowodzi, żemetodologiczne poszukiwania współczesnego językoznawstwa, które zajmuje miejscecentralne w stosunku do wielu nauk, mogą wskazać nam drogę ku konsiliencji poprzezposzukiwanie kategorii o wielkiej ogólności (konieczność kontra przypadkowość, modelmatematyczny kontra model niematematyczny, struktura gry, itp.). Ostatecznie konsiliencjajest pytaniem o możliwość wypracowania wspólnego języka i wspólnej problematyki dlanaukowców w obliczu postępującej wąskiej specjalizacji i szczegółowości w badaniach. // Consilience (the term originating in inductive logic and “modernized” in the 1990s by E. O.Wilson, the creator of sociobiology) refers to the age-long dream of humanity that one day all branches of learning will see their unification – from the sciences, through social and economic studies, to humanities and even visual arts. Thus, consilience is a search for a common system that would underlie the totality of human knowledge, rooted in the belief in the unity of nature and orderliness of our universe. It has found its reflection in the General Systems Theory, hybrid disciplines and interdisciplinary studies. The author argues that the methodological quests of modern linguistics, which occupies a central position in relation to several disciplines, can direct us towards reaching consilience by focusing on categories and concepts of great generality (necessity vs. contingency, mathematical vs. non-mathematical modelling, the structure of game, etc.). Ultimately, consilience raises a question as to the feasibility of working out a common language and a common set of problems for all scholars and scientists despite the progressing narrowness of specialization and minuteness of research.

Morfološke pogreške u diskursu djece s PJT

Author(s): Diana Arapović,Maja Anđel / Language(s): Croatian Issue: 1/2003

The notion of Specific Language Impairment (SLI) refers to children whose language skills are in disproportion with their chronological age and their non-verbal skills, for unknown reasons and in any (one or more) part of their linguistic development (Bishop, Adams I99I ). SLI children may have phonological and pragmatic language difficulties, but the most affected part of grammar in SLI children seems to be morphosyntactic. Morphology is the part of the language in which the grammar of a language system becomes clearly perceptible, therefore it is especially important when we try to assess the level of language skills. In this paper we have tried to present the level of morphology acquisition in children with SLI, taking into consideration the morphological complexity of the Croatian language. We have examined morphological errors in 5 I children with SLI, age from 4,2 to 8. Our results show that most errors appear, in categories of inflexion and congruency, i.e. inappropriate case endings for nouns, auxiliary omissions for verbs and morphological incompatibility of noun+adjective combinations. These results suggest that children with SLI are not able to communicate the contents of information and accomplish its correct grammatical form at the same time.

Concept “humour” in the linguistic consciousness of the Russian-speaking population of Ukraine

Author(s): Iuliia Kobzieva,Iia Gordiienko-Mytrofanova,Maryna Udovenko,Serhii Sauta / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2020

The purpose of this study was to define and to describe the semantic components of the stimulus word humour in the linguistic consciousness of young Russian-speaking people from Eastern Ukraine. The main method of the research was a psycholinguistic experiment. The sample comprised 400 young people (aged 20-31), males and females being equally represented. The experiment proved that the concept humour in the linguistic consciousness of the Russian-speaking population of Ukraine is represented by four core semantic clusters: “laughter,” “joke,” “merry-making/joy” and “show.” Analysis of female and male associative fields shows that the semantic core of the word humour does not depend on the respondents’ gender identification. The results of frequency and cluster analysis have implied a number of the following conclusions. Firstly, humour and laughter form an inseparable unity of stimulus and reaction in the linguistic consciousness of respondents, although the psychological paradigm considers humour and laughter as two independent phenomena. Secondly, the cognitive component of humour was only reflected in the peripheral cluster “mind” of respondents’ associations. Thirdly, young Russian-speaking people from Ukraine do not have an ideal image of humour represented by a certain comedy show or relevant to any specific comedians. The generalised visualisation of humour is represented by reactions of the extreme periphery. Finally, comparative analysis of the verbalised concept humour in the linguistic consciousness of Russian-speaking population of Ukraine and people who live in Russia did not reveal any national-specific features in the perception of stimulus humour.

“I get it, but it’s just not funny”:

Author(s): Adrian Hale / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2018

Failed humour can be explained by communicative gaps, at either the semantic or pragmatic levels, but sometimes, after all is ‘said and done’, people resist humour for purely discursive reasons. Some may recognise the divisive nature of a humorous text, and experience conflicting feelings. Others may welcome humour purely because of its appeal to ideology, while the text itself may not be considered as being very funny. Then there are people who ‘go along with the joke’ purely to avoid losing face. Political humour is a site of great power, where the stakes are high. For example, Donald Trump rejected Baldwin’s SNL parody, finding his ‘alter ego’ “unwatchable” and “not funny”. Other politicians, and members of the public, however, choose to respond to political humour in diverse ways. The reception of humour, therefore, is more complex than it appears. We might resist humour because of a deficiency in linguistic competence, but we might also resist humour because of literacy competence. This paper will theorise that there exists a ‘default setting’ in a person’s discourse, such that when encountering an instance of humour, we all employ a Discursive Defence Mechanism (DDM), and that there are ‘triggers’ which provoke this DDM.

From the Action-Packed Film to the Stealth Strategy: A Controlled Revolt against the Tradition of the Western in Desperados III

Author(s): Dagmara Kottke / Language(s): English Issue: 11/2020

Desperados III is a stealth-strategy developed by Mimimi Games in 2020. The game tells the story of five outlaws who undertake hazardous activities in the Wild West. As regards its plot, setting and types of characters, Desperados III seems to follow the principles of formulaic western fiction and films. Yet the process of the western’s adjustment to the genre of tactical stealth has serious implications for the formula. The aim of the article is to discuss the game’s rebellion against the tradition of the genre. The paper is divided into four sections. They examine the game’s mechanics, its temporality, perspective and the construction of the virtual world in the context of the western’s adaptation to the stealth-based tactical strategy.

Editorial: laughter and humour in communication

Author(s): Sergey Troitskiy,Aleksandr Lavrentev,Alyona Ivanova,Liisi Laineste / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2021

The editorial article for the special issue of EJHR “Laughter and Humour in Communication” provides an overview of all the presented articles and highlightsthe general idea of the issue.

Laughter in the context of urban soundscapes

Author(s): Daria Vasileva / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2021

Fifty people compiled diaries in which they described the sounds of their daily life in cities around the world. Of the 940 hours of observation there were 200 entries that referred to sounds of laughter, both live and recorded. The participants of the research always identified laughter sounds explicitly, unlike other urban sounds. The sound of laughter has a powerful cultural-symbolic superstructure. Learning how we use laughter, what we hear and how we react when someone laughs can help us to understand the key processes taking place in the urban space today. Laughter can at once attract and repel, signal danger and relieve social tension. It can lead equally to social agents’ inclusion and exclusion in the situation of interaction, and can largely determine the form and extent of their inclusion. A citizen’s interpretation of the sound of laughter depends directly on the media technologies which predominate in the urban environment and channel their cultural experience and sonic imagination.

Book review

Author(s): Stanca Măda / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2017

КОМУНІКАТИВНО-ПРАГМАТИЧНІ ОСОБЛИВОСТІ ДРАМАТИЧНОГО ТЕКСТУ ЯК РІЗНОВИДУ ХУДОЖНЬОГО МОВЛЕННЯ

Author(s): Ivanna Struk / Language(s): Ukrainian Issue: 1/2021

The article formulates the theoretical foundations of the study of dramatic text, distinguishes between the concepts of “dramatic text” (affects the reader) and “dramatic work” (verbalizes the theatrical action for the viewer), because these linguistic realities are in the relationship of inclusion. A dramatic text is a unity organized according to certain laws, which has a clear structure: a certain number of lines, designed with the help of the author's remark, forms a dialogical unity; the combination of dialogic units forms a scene; the set of scenes constitute an act; several acts create a complete work. Obligatory factors of expressiveness of the dramatic text that influence the development of dialogic parts of the characters are pragmatic components of speech which are considered as certain rules of successful communication. In the communicative-pragmatic paradigm dramatic text is defined as a specific type of artistic text that has its own structural and speech features due to a combination of informational, pragmatic, stylistic and cognitive aspects, where the pragmatic aspect is found in speech acts, syntactic organization of cues. The scientific novelty of the research is DT of Bukovinian’s writers of the late nineteenth – early twentieth century that have not yet been the subject of analysis. The relevance of scientific research requires a holistic analysis of the dramatic text and difference between the concepts of “dramatic text” and “dramatic composition”, the study of mandatory factors of expressiveness of dramatic text, influencing the development of dialogic parts. The following methods and techniques of linguistic analysis are used in the article: system-functional analysis, method of discussion analysis, contextual-interpretive method. Conclusions. Dramatic text is a complex phenomenon with its own peculiarities of functioning. It is possible to penetrate into the structure of a dramatic text, to reveal the meaning of the author's intentions due to the volume-pragmatic division of the text. The communicative-pragmatic organization of DT influences the processes of active aesthetic influence of a work of art on the consciousness of the addressee. We see the prospect of the represented research in the further deepening of knowledge about the categorical features of the text in the communicative-pragmatic aspect.

Diverse nature of literacy: The sociocultural perspective

Author(s): Izabela Dąbrowska / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2019

Considering the pace of the contemporary changes in the world, largely due to global trends and rapid development of media technology, it is commonly accepted that literacy cannot connote reading and writing any more as it did until several years ago. Much broader conceptualisations of what literary practices stand for are needed as people actually use literacy in diverse contexts and for different purposes. These are offered by sociocultural theories and approaches, which, despite being dissimilar with one another, do not undermine the traditional views on literacy and its practices but forward new complex and inclusive ways of understanding the phenomenon.

Ядерные компоненты концептосферы ‘Medicine’ в современном английском языке

Author(s): Anastasia Alexandrovna Golubykh / Language(s): Russian Issue: 1/2021

The conceptual framework ‘medicine’ within the English lexicographic, scientific, educational, and mass-media discourse was considered in this paper. The research was motivated by current medical innovations accompanied by word-coining contributing to the renewal of nuclear concepts and their semantic content within the conceptual framework ‘medicine’. The nuclear concepts of the abovementioned conceptual framework focusing upon semantic, synonymic, and hyper-hyponymic features of medical nouns in English were studied and systematized. For this purpose, the methods of data collection, description, and classification of the empirical materials with elements of semantic and conceptual analysis were used. The key aspects of the modern conceptual framework ‘medicine’ were identified. It was discovered that the conceptual framework ‘medicine’ in the modern English lexicographic, scientific, educational, and mass-media types of discourse is basically actualized through the following nuclear concepts: ‘diseases’, ‘diagnostics and treatment methods’, and ‘drugs’. Interestingly, the nuclear concepts in all types of the English professional discourse enrich and develop the conceptual framework ‘medicine’ with medical terms related to the corresponding professional markers, synonyms, hyponyms, and hyperonyms. The results obtained provide both a valid background for better explanation, translation, and application of medical vocabulary in terms of modern lexicographic, scientific, educational, and mass-media communication strategies.

Osmanlı Türkçesinde Arapça ve Farsça Kökenli Duygu Sözcükleri

Author(s): Ahmet Ferhat Özkan / Language(s): Turkish Issue: 71/2021

Emotion researches has gained momentum in many fields of social sciences with the rise of social constructivist perspective which claims emotions are not only biological impulses but also socio-cultural constructs. One of these disciplines, “the history of emotions”, focuses on changes of emotions over time, and their differences in various cultures, with reference to historical texts and literary works to list emotional vocabulary of the language it focuses. In this regard, detecting emotional vocabulary of Turkish language would yield useful results not only for Turkish literature researches but also to track histories of emotions in Turkish. In this respect, it is important to detect the emotion words belonging to another cultural sphere, of which Turkish language in Western field starts to interact from 13th century. This lexicon search tries to identify Arabic and Persian originated “emotion nouns” of Ottoman Turkish from 13th to 19th centuries. For this purpose, Ottoman Turkish – Modern Turkish Dictionary of Ferit Devellioğlu, which is the most extended dictionary of Ottoman Turkish from 13th to 19th centuries, has been looked up item by item, and three hundred and ninety five words which express an emotion or an affect have been found. Afterwords, the vocabulary found in Devellioğlu Sözlük, searched in Kamus-ı Türkî, the most reliable dictionary of Ottoman Turkish for 19th century, to understand whether they still exit or is there any semantic changes. In this process it is aimed to determine the emotional lexicon which is borrowed from Arabic and Persian of Ottoman Turkish from 13th centuries to 19th centuries, and their situations especially in 19th century in which new genres of Turkish literatures emerged.

Izotopii generatoare de clișee jurnalistice în contextul pandemiei de Covid-19: „patologii la mod㔆 sau „cuvinte-oglindă” ale realității psihosociale?

Author(s): Armanda Ramona Stroia / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 12/2020

The present paper examines the dominant isotopies under which linguistic clichés emerge in the context of the intense media coverage of the current COVID19 pandemic. The analysis of the linguistic automatisms excerpted from the online journalistic discourse proved to be prolific in identifying additional features of the linguistic “behaviour” of clichés. Furthermore, the investigation facilitated our understanding of the underlying motivations, implications, and potential effects triggered by the use of specific prefabricated structures. As a general remark, the analysis of these dominant overused schemes revealed how media institutions overuse, under the pressure of the international model, specific lexico-semantic isotopies which exploit prefabricated structures from distinct fields: war, particularly the area of pyrotechnic elements(“explosion of new cases”, “huge explosion of Covid cases”), the semantic area of natural disasters subsumed to liquidity (“a new wave of COVID”, “anti-Covid control wave”, “death wave”, “a wave of hateful comments”, “wave of infections/confirmations/illnesses”, “flood of accusations/fines”, “tsunami of COVID-19 patients/displacements”). We have also identified journalistic automatisms circumscribed to the isotopy of the economy(“epidemiological balance”), ranking and sports competition (statistical clichés: “top of infections”, “Covid top”, “top Covid infections”, “European top of Covid evolution”, “vaccine race”, among others), disaster (clichés of melodramatic excess, salient to tabloid journalism: “disaster”, “chaos”, “nightmare”, “COVID-19 drama”). For the present article, we channeled our investigative effort only towards the first two dominant isotopies. To achieve these objectives, we proposed a two-dimensional research model. Specifically, we correlated the data obtained through conjugating linguistic micro-parameters (semantic, stylistic features, lexical and morpho-syntactic patterns) and macrolevel variables (pragmatic, psycholinguistic aspects, perspectives derived from the sociology of media communication, critical analysis of discourse, among others). The investigation results revealed that these linguistic patterns, analyzed under the conceptual “umbrella” of isotopy, can function as rhetorical and lexicosemantic strategies through which journalists activate the receptors’ affective responses. Consequently, media discourse can trigger and maintain artificial states of anxiety, panic, and restlessness. Over time, this journalistic operation leads, through the impact of obsessive repetition, to the passive consumption of media representations and cultural stereotypes, of preconceived ideas.

Journalistic clichés under the conceptual “umbrella” of isotopies: “linguistic pathologies in vogue”† or “mirror-words” of psychosocial reality?

Author(s): Armanda Ramona Stroia / Language(s): English Issue: 12/2020

The present paper examines the dominant isotopies under which linguistic clichés emerge in the context of the intense media coverage of the current COVID19 pandemic. The analysis of the linguistic automatisms excerpted from the online journalistic discourse proved to be prolific in identifying additional features of the linguistic “behaviour” of clichés. Furthermore, the investigation facilitated our understanding of the underlying motivations, implications, and potential effects triggered by the use of specific prefabricated structures. As a general remark, the analysis of these dominant overused schemes revealed how media institutions overuse, under the pressure of the international model, specific lexico-semantic isotopies which exploit prefabricated structures from distinct fields: war, particularly the area of pyrotechnic elements(“explosion of new cases”, “huge explosion of Covid cases”), the semantic area of natural disasters subsumed to liquidity (“a new wave of COVID”, “anti-Covid control wave”, “death wave”, “a wave of hateful comments”, “wave of infections/confirmations/illnesses”, “flood of accusations/fines”, “tsunami of COVID-19 patients/displacements”). We have also identified journalistic automatisms circumscribed to the isotopy of the economy(“epidemiological balance”), ranking and sports competition (statistical clichés: “top of infections”, “Covid top”, “top Covid infections”, “European top of Covid evolution”, “vaccine race”, among others), disaster (clichés of melodramatic excess, salient to tabloid journalism: “disaster”, “chaos”, “nightmare”, “COVID-19 drama”). For the present article, we channeled our investigative effort only towards the first two dominant isotopies. To achieve these objectives, we proposed a two-dimensional research model. Specifically, we correlated the data obtained through conjugating linguistic micro-parameters (semantic, stylistic features, lexical and morpho-syntactic patterns) and macrolevel variables (pragmatic, psycholinguistic aspects, perspectives derived from the sociology of media communication, critical analysis of discourse, among others). The investigation results revealed that these linguistic patterns, analyzed under the conceptual “umbrella” of isotopy, can function as rhetorical and lexicosemantic strategies through which journalists activate the receptors’ affective responses. Consequently, media discourse can trigger and maintain artificial states of anxiety, panic, and restlessness. Over time, this journalistic operation leads, through the impact of obsessive repetition, to the passive consumption of media representations and cultural stereotypes, of preconceived ideas.

CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF DONALD TRUMP’S POLITICAL SPEECH VIA TWITTER

Author(s): Shaalan Najem Abdullah Shammari / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2021

Although social media was used in the 2008 presidential campaign, it became increasingly important in the 2016 election. Presidents have had to adopt and adapt to new technology in the past as well, and this has had a long-term effect on political discourse. Politicians now have new tools for communicating with the public, thanks to the internet and social media. An important goal of this paper is to examine how political speech has evolved over time, particularly in light of social media's role in political campaigning, and how Donald Trump used social media as a means of political communications. A discourse-historical approach of critical discourse analysis (CDA), has been applied in this study to carry out the analysis that would determine Trump's speech techniques. The results of this study demonstrate how President Trump's used language to influence his audience. Overall, this research paper will focus on Trump’s discourse strategies and how he employed them to create positive self-presentation and negative other-presentation.

Socjodialektologia ilościowa. Zróżnicowanie regionalne i społeczne regiolektu śląskiego na przykładzie żywotności niemieckich zapożyczeń

Author(s): Gerd Hentschel / Language(s): Polish Issue: 1/2022

Traditional dialectology is developing more and more into historical dialectology, not only in Poland, for the reason that in many parts of the country vernaculars are disappearing more and more. Traditional dialectology describes the situation from several decades ago. Today’s speakers of vernaculars are very frequently “multi-codal”: they are also fluent in the general language. This means that, on the one hand, the usage of vernaculars and general language depends on social criteria, including situational factors, and on the other hand that spoken vernacular, if it persists at all, changes under the influence of the general language: usually, vernacular and general language are mixed, which is also influenced by social conditions. Younger representatives of Polish dialectology today express the view that (contemporary) dialectology functions de facto as a sub-discipline of sociolinguistics. The study argues that dialectology, which in its earlier phase was concerned with the search for ancient tribes or historical principalities, must partly move away from its old focus on vernaculars in the village, similarly to how the much younger sociolinguistics has moved away from its original focus on the linguistic behaviour of social classes. What unites both disciplines is that they study variations “within a language”, with sociolinguistics foregrounding social conditioning and dialectology territorial conditioning. If the current linguistic situation in modern, dynamic societies is to be captured, then one cannot do without the other. Since the methods and theories in sociolinguistics have developed enormously over recent decades, dialectology can profit more from sociolinguistics than vice versa. Using the vitality of German loan words in the current regiolect of Silesian as an example, quantitative procedures are used to show how such a dialectology could look, even in a largely urban and therefore dynamic society. The focus is on speakers’ multicodality in different social contexts. If, for example, synonymous lexical pairs exist in typical Silesian speech (here a Silesian Germanism and a general Polish “Polishism”), the isogloss becomes worthless as a central instrument for territorial distinction. The question is no longer where people say “a” or “b”, but with which frequency each element of such pairs is used in various positions in the material collected. Such differences in the frequency of usage can then be mapped for individual phenomena and larger territorial divisions of linguistic structural affinities can be abstracted from the individual maps, taking the place of conventional dialects.