Политическая/национальная/конфессиональная/ языковая карта Восточной Европы: история и современность

Author(s): N. N. Zapolskaja,Arina Mihaylenko / Language(s): Russian Issue: -/2012

5–9 ноября 2012 года в Вильнюсе и в Супрасле прошел международный научно-образовательный семинар Политическая/национальная/конфессиональная/языковая карта Восточной Европы: история и современность. Проведение семинара стало возможным в результате совместной работы славистов Института славяноведения РАН, Вильнюсского университета, Супрасльской aкадемии, фонда “Российско-польский центр диалога и согласия” и научно-издательского центра “Индрик”; поддержку семинару оказало Посольство Российской Федерации в Литовской республике.

INTERNATIONAL ONOMASTIC CONFERENCE “ANTHROPONYMS AND ANTHROPONYMIC RESEARCHES IN THE BEGINNING OF THE 21ST CENTURY”, DEDICATED TO PROF. DR. SC. YORDAN ZAIMOV.

Author(s): Maya Vlahova-Angelova,Gergana Petkova / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2021

Trailblazer or a One-off?

Author(s): Małgorzata NICIEJA / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2021

The paper attempts to analyse the international success of the Danish televisual series Rita (TV2 Denmark - Netflix, 2012–2020). It places the production in a wider cultural and historical context and treats it as an exemplification of, what the author deems, a recent shift in representations of teachers in visual media narratives. The author’s argumentation is premised on three principal assumptions. First, Rita demonstrates that after the genre’s decline at the turn of the twentieth century, the school-centred audio-visual narratives are back in favour. The trend is connected to the growth of the post-network television and the so-called over-the-top services (OTT). Second, the substantial part of Rita’s wide appeal is related to the show’s innovative application of the conventions known from the earlier Scandinavian productions and themes from serials about “difficult women”. This particularly concerns the show’s adept exploration of the resilient and anti-heroic female lead character. Third, Rita is regarded as an early indication of the shift in the ways school life and teachers are represented in the media today. The author stipulates that the show may augur the emergence of many similar complex televisual images of teachers in the near future.

Zarys mechanizmów językowych w niemieckich kawałach

Author(s): Dorota Biadala / Language(s): Polish Issue: 2/2021

Obiektem bliższej obserwacji w niniejszym artykule jest językowa analiza niemieckich kawałów (dowcipów) jako krótkich form humorystycznych, w szczególności analiza zawartych w nich „nieporozumień” językowych, które są strategicznym wyróżnikiem gatunkowym tych tekstów. Ich głównym zadaniem jest zażartowanie z kogoś i rozśmieszenie innych. Przeprowadzona analiza lingwistyczna „nieporozumień” językowych porusza różne aspekty komunikacyjne osadzone w perspektywie społecznej: zarówno pragmatykę komunikacji międzykulturowej, kreatywność w komunikacji wewnątrzkulturowej, jak i humor w kulturze i komunikacji. Materiał badawczy wykorzystany do niniejszej analizy tworzy korpus utworzony z ponad 400 niemieckich kawałów pochodzących z różnych źródeł, w większości zaczerpniętych ze zbiorów internetowych. Celem niniejszego opracowania jest zaprezentowanie różnych perspektyw badawczych i analiza językowych mechanizmów służących tworzeniu „nieporozumień” językowych na podstawie wprowadzonych 13-tu kategorii opisujących bliżej gatunek tekstu ‘kawał’ z uwzględnieniem niemieckiej specyfiki kulturowej. // The main subject of this article is the linguistic analysis of German jokes as the short humorous formats, emphasis is placed on the analysis of various language-related “misunderstandings” found in these jokes, whose are strategic genre differentiator of these texts. Their main function is to make fun of someone and to make others laugh. The analysis of these language-related “misunderstandings” raises various communicative issues that are rooted in the social perspective, such as: pragmatics of intercultural communication, creativity in intracultural communication, or humour in culture and in communication. The research material used for this analysis is composed of over four hundred German jokes coming from various sources, with the largest number of texts from internet sources. The aim of this publication is to present various research perspectives and to analyse linguistic mechanisms used in the creation of language-related “misunderstandings” on the basis of thirteen categories that describe the genre ‘joke’ considering the German cultural specificity.

O nienaukowym umiłowaniu języka:

Author(s): Krzysztof Ozga / Language(s): Polish Issue: 2/2021

Celem artykułu jest analiza treści (postów, memów) publikowanych przez administratora społeczności wirtualnej „The Language Nerds” w serwisie społecznościowym Instagram, a także wybranych, powiązanych z nimi komentarzy zamieszczanych przez członków społeczności zarówno na Instagramie jak i Facebooku. Badanie jest próbą odpowiedzi na pytanie, jakiego typu treści stanowią zasadnicze spoiwo grupy. W tym celu dokonana została klasyfikacja postów w oparciu o wyróżnione w procesie ich kreowania dominanty funkcjonalne. Wyodrębniono sześć zasadniczych klas: 1. memy o dominującej funkcji humorystycznej, 2. zagadki logicznojęzykowe, 3. posty kreowane w oparciu o specyfikę obrazowania pojęć w danym języku (językowy obraz świata), 4. posty o dominującej funkcji metajęzykowej, 5. posty o dominującej funkcji prezentatywnej (charakteryzujące prototypowego członka grupy własnej), 6. posty o charakterze wypowiedzi argumentacyjnych. Następnie każda z klas została szczegółowo opisana i zilustrowana wybranymi przykładami spośród 220 przebadanych postów. Zawartość treściowa wszystkich wyróżnionych klas wskazuje, że zasadniczym czynnikiem integrującym społeczność jest język, przy czym istotna jest wykazana w badaniu różnorodność perspektyw jego wykorzystania jako narzędzia konstruowania tożsamości członków społeczności. W świetle przeprowadzonej analizy statystycznej największą rolę w generowaniu homogeniczności grupy odgrywa humor językowy. // The aim of the article is to analyse the content (posts, memes) published by the administrator of the virtual community „The Language Nerds” on the social networking service Instagram and also selected related comments posted by the members of the community on both Instagram and Facebook. The study addresses the issue of what kind of content serves to build up the integrity of the group. For this purpose a classification of posts was made with regard to the functions dominating in the process of their creation. Six major classes were identified: 1. memes with humour as the dominant feature, 2. logico-linguistic puzzles, 3. posts created on the basis of how notions are conceptualized in a particular language (Linguistic Worldview), 4. posts with a dominant metalinguistic function, 5. posts in which the function characterizing a prototypical member of the ingroup prevails, 6. posts fashioned as argumentative statements. Subsequently, each class was described in detail and illustrated with examples selected from the set of all of the 220 analysed posts. The content of all the classes distinguished in the research indicates that language is the central factor integrating the community, but – as shown in the study – no less significant is the diversity of focus on the particular aspects of language and its use that serves as a tool for constructing the social identity of the community members. The statistics obtained indicate that it is linguistic humour that plays the most important role in generating group homogeneity.

Senior Citizens as an Underresearched Age Group of Audiovisual Translation Users

Author(s): Sonia Szkriba / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2021

In recent years, approaches to audiovisual translation and media accessibility services have shifted from serving one group of viewers only towards a more universal design that takes into account a wider range of users. In line with that approach, some scholars point out, for example, that subtitling for the deaf and hard of hearing (SDH) or accessibility applications created with the blind and partially-sighted in mind could prove beneficial to senior citizens. This group of viewers is likely to experience age-related sensori-motor and cognitive decline, which may significantly influence their film-watching experience as well as their preference for an AVT method. As populations in many countries are aging, senior citizens might be considered an important part of potential cinema clientele. Unfortunately, since studies in AVT have concentrated on younger audiences, little is known about senior citizens’ specific preferences concerning audiovisual translation. The objective of this article is to briefly characterise senior citizens as recipients of audiovisual translation and discuss the possibilities for future studies on the subject.

Before the political cartoonist, there was the Vidusaka:

Author(s): Snehal P. Sanathanan,Vinod Balakrishnan / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2021

Political cartooning was one of many cultural products that colonial rule introduced to India. This British legacy has been used to produce narratives about the nature and history of Indian cartooning. However, these narratives have, invariably, overlooked the distinctly Indian cultural ethos as well as the Indian satirical tradition. This paper proposes an alternative model by positing that in the Indian satirical tradition, the Vidusaka – the comic figure in Sanskrit drama - has been an antecedent to the political cartoonist in terms of social and political roles, as well as in the nature and the purpose of the humour. The paper also locates the principles of caricaturing in precolonial Indian visual arts, and presents the early vernacular cartoons as the point of convergence between the local satirical tradition and the Western format of the political cartoon which laid the foundation for a modern yet specifically Indian sensibility.

Multilingual humour in audiovisual translation.

Author(s): Noelia Marqués Cobeta / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2021

This commentary aims to take up the gauntlet thrown down by Dore (2019) with her article about multilingual humour in the Italian dubbed version of the series Modern Family. She suggested that the scenes included in the article could be analysed in other languages, so it was an interesting proposal to carry out the analysis of the Spanish dubbed version, since the L2 in the source text coincides with the target text language. Thus, this fact makes the translation process an arduous activity in these language combinations. Multilingualism is therefore considered the central element in this study. It is a reflection of the current social movement and the increase of multi-ethnic communities worldwide. This fact leads to citizens who use their knowledge to assert their own identity; as a consequence, audiovisual producers are also aware of this situation and exploit this phenomenon. Modern Family is an example of this reality and introduces characters, like Gloria Delgado-Pritchett, as a role model to show an increasingly common tendency, the use of multilingual and multi-ethnic characters that reflect this new social situation. Thanks to the selected examples, we will see whether the use of multilingualism as a source of humour is also transmitted to the Spanish dubbed version, as it did in the Italian dubbed version studied by the abovementioned scholar.

Book review

Author(s): Joanna Szerszunowicz / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2021

Book review

Author(s): Salvatore Attardo / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2021

РАЗВИЈАЊЕ ИНТЕРАКЦИЈЕ У ИНСТИТУЦИОНАЛНОМ КОНТЕКСТУ

Author(s): Jovana Ž. Bojić / Language(s): Serbian Issue: 76/2021

Il presente contributo intende illustrare e analizzare il modo in cui si sviluppa l’interazione in una classe in cui viene studiata una lingua straniera. Sic- come il contesto istituzionale presenta varie strutture comunicative, alcune ricerche hanno affermato che l’interazione, ovvero la comunicazione insegnante-alunno, si sviluppa principalmente tramite le domande che fanno gli insegnanti e attraverso le risposte degli alunni. Quindi, abbiamo esposto vari tipi di domande che l’insegnante può fare per stimolare l’interazione in classe. Inoltre, abbiamo rappresentato al- cune strategie, ovvero alcune attività didattiche che il docente può organizzare per migliorare la produzione orale dei discenti. Siamo giunti alla conclusione che lo scopo dell’apprendimento di una lingua straniera è quello di sviluppare e di raggiungere la competenza comunicativa, che sarà possibile grazie alle techniche che applicherà l’insegnante per favorire l’interazione in classe.

Проф. Димитър Веселинов на 60 години

Author(s): Mihal Pavlov / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 1/2022

Cross-Cultural Communication and Linguistic Cross-Fertilization: Yiddish and its Survival under the Israeli Language

Author(s): Ghil`ad Zuckermann / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2021

This article introduces cross-cultural communication and linguistic cross-fertilization by exploring the fascinating and multifaceted Yiddish language and its survival in Israeli, the result of the fin-de-siècle Hebrew revival. Yiddish is a 1,000-year-old Germanic language with Latin, Hebrew, and Aramaic substrates, with most dialects having been influenced by Slavonic languages. Yiddish is characterized by a unique style that embeds psycho-ostensive expressions throughout its discourse.

Instances of (un)translatability in Ion Creangă’s “Amintiri din copilărie”/ ”Memories of my boyhood”

Author(s): Andra Iulia Ursa / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2022

These days, writing about untranslatability may seem courageous, as more and more voices associate this issue with translation incapacity and, instead, advocate for creative remedies or even reject such an instance. This study does not deal with a contemporary novel, nor does it have to do with a powerful textual space. However, we believe that translation theories mainly focus on analyses of a certain category of languages, and raise questions of discrepancies between subordinate and dominant cultures, a tendency which derives from the proneness of the international publishing industry to favour certain languages and types of writing. We are not aiming for a debate around the subject of publishing politics or endeavours, but rather we try to cast some light on the ambitious project of rendering vernacular into a powerful language. This paper deals with the work of a great Moldavian storyteller who contributes significantly to the enhancement of expressiveness through linguistic characteristics that occur informally. We hypothesise that the vibrant vernacular writing “Memories of my boyhood” creates potential instances of untranslatability, due to significant differences between the Romanian variety and English, not necessarily in the linguistic inventory but rather in the cognitive structures of the readership. Therefore, the case study focuses on how source text and target text readers infer meaning from interjections and terms of address, originally belonging to the Moldavian modes of expression. Although the translators re-create these short utterances, due to a lack of a similar background from the part of the receiving culture, we witness a limitation on conveying their original intentionality, emotion and plethora of meanings.

Easy-to-read in Romania: current status and future perspectives in a European context

Author(s): Marcela Fărcaşiu,Daniel Dejica,Simona Şimon,Annamaria Kilyeni / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2022

As the European Union’s Strategy for people with disabilities has been extended to 2030, emphasising the need for these people’s social inclusion, which also comprises accessibility to different information and documents, Romania has to align its legislation and best practices in order to solve its problems concerning this topic. Therefore, this paper focuses on an important aspect of social inclusion, namely Easy-to-Read (E2R) language, which is paramount for the disabled people’s access to information, culture and education. It starts by presenting the concept of Easy-to-Read across Europe, its perception and implementation by various countries, to finally delve into the current situation of Easy-to-Read in Romania. By looking at the analysis and reports on the previous governmental strategies regarding people with disabilities (and especially reading disabilities, for the purpose of this paper), it can be said that Romania still faces challenges in this respect and needs to work on making documents and information accessible by first creating E2R guidelines and then implementing them in printed documents (e.g. adapted textbooks, healthcare leaflets) as well as in the electronic information (e.g. government websites). The paper also traces some future perspectives concerning Easy-to-Read in Romania, namely the Train2Validate “Professional training for Easy-to-Read facilitators and validators” (T2V) project, an Erasmus+ programme, a collaboration between various European countries, that Romania is part of, which goes one step further into helping people with reading disabilities and creating professional roles for them, i.e. facilitators and validators, in order to integrate them on the employment market. Moreover, this research will hopefully raise awareness of the importance of conducting other studies on creating Easy-to-Read guidelines and on simplifying the text according to the different target groups of people with reading disabilities or difficulties and to different text types.

Идентичността като пребиваване в Другия

Author(s): Magdalena Kostova-Panayotova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 2/2022

The article focuses on Michael Ondaatje’s novel The English Patient, which deals with the issues of identity, belonging to the nation, family, community, friends. According to the ideas of the text, the realization through the Other, the care of the person whom you “flowed into”, whose soul has become more important than family and homeland, is the empathy that is necessary to overcome pain, war, loss and boundaries. The time in the novel unfolds in a specific historical period, against the backdrop of one of the most tragic episodes of the twentieth century, yet the culturological context of The English Patient includes the Antiquity and Renaissance art, history and music, fine arts, as well as the European prose of the XIX century. By shaking the idea of national priorities, the narrative, shows that the history of European civilization is irreducible to simply war and destruction.

Медицински конотации в понятието „криза“

Author(s): Iveta Tasheva / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 2/2022

This paper attempts to show how medical terminology and medical connotations mark concepts that later become central to philosophical, cultural, political, and social discourse. In this case, the chosen concept is the notion of crisis, which has been central to medicine since antiquity, has marked with meanings all subsequent epochs, and has become significant for our entire modernity. In short, it shows how medical connotations carry over to unrestricted uses in the broader context of language, and the concept of crisis is open to uses of different orders and in diverse contexts. To arrive at the conviction that its use as a metaphor for states of decline, failure, degeneration, ruin prevails. It is said to be a crisis, but as in medicine, it refers to deterioration.

Book review

Author(s): Dafina Genova / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2022

Laughing along?

Author(s): Meredith Marra / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2022

Successfully joining a new workplace community is demanding, especially when this involvescrossing national boundaries in addition to team boundaries. For outsiders, humour is anarea that arguably presents a challenge to full participation, particularly when localunderstandings are not shared, nor even recognized as distinctive. Newcomers face thechallenge of navigating the trajectory from legitimate peripheral member towards core status(adopting the terms of the Community of Practice model). This involves cooperating withothers in interaction, including engaging with humour and laughter as a way of indicatingbelonging. Here belonging is operationalized using the two dimensions proposed by Antonsich(2010), namely (1) a sense of belonging and (2) the politics of belonging as evidenced throughnegotiation with others. Applying an Interactional Sociolinguistic approach, I offer analysis ofnaturally occurring workplace interactions and reflections from skilled migrant interns in NewZealand workplaces. I discuss the place of laughter in attempts to demonstrate teammembership, arguing that these attempts at belonging require the cooperation andendorsement of insiders. The findings indicate that, however benevolently intentioned, thelocal colleagues’ use of humour, and their reactions to the humour and laughter produced bythe skilled migrant interns, often results in a sense of othering and exclusion. This is keenlyfelt by the interns who note the difficulties that taken for granted practices create in theiracceptance and progress. In many cases the result is laughing along, as an outward signal offit, rather than laughing with which suggests a deeper sense of belonging.

Book review

Author(s): Lydia Amir / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2022