INTERSEMIOTIC TRANSLATION AND THE TUMULTUOUS WORLD OF GRAFFITI AND SCRATCHITI

Author(s): Felix Nicolau / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2014

Translation Studies has crossed a tumultuous interval of theorization. But has it passed the linguistic limits instituted by a semiotician like Umberto Eco? Wouldn’t be the time to access more courageously the intersemiotic interregnum with its heterogeneous transfer of signs? As it happens in advertising, concrete poetry, tattoos, and stage or filmed version of famous texts? We have gradually accepted that in the postcolonial and cross-cultural epoch what matters is not consensus, but negotiation and understanding. We assimilated the postmodern lesson about Grand Narratives (J–F. Lyotard) and the subjectivity of recorded history. So, we have to question ourselves about the role of translation and translators in a post-industrial society which blends globalized edutainment and corporatist efficiency, prejudice, reverse colonialism and anti-establishment movements. What type of equivalence are we supposed to choose in order to persuade today? The ekphrastic approach of translations may be better tuned to out gadgetized and image-informed epoch.

TONY BLAIR AND HIS POLITICAL STYLE: FROM PAYING TRIBUTE TO THE PRINCESS OF WALES TO REFORMING THE HOUSE OF LORDS

Author(s): Marina-Cristiana Rotaru / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2014

A politician’s discourse is shaped by both the ideological position of his party as well as his views of the world and his style interpreted as a way of being. Styles reveal identities and, in their turn, identities influence the political discourse, making it more accessible, more in tune with the position of the general public or more abstract, more remote. As a politician, Tony Blair has carved a particular style, an interesting mix of features that aims to, and often seems to reveal both the public individual and the private person. Unlike Margaret Thatcher who, in her own words, was a conviction politician, Blair claimed to be a consensus politician, able to bring together both Left Wing and RightWing values in a discourse of reconciling themes.

FEMININITY IN "REMARKABLE CREATURES" BY TRACY CHEVALIER

Author(s): Raluca Ghențulescu / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2014

In her novel Remarkable Creatures, Tracy Chevalier tries to retrace the representation of women in the past, by focusing on a less known problem: the contribution of two women paleontologists of the 19th century, a time when the access of women in science was forbidden. The “remarkable creatures” are not the only fossils they discover; the women themselves are seen as «curiosities» in a world dominated by men. The novel is based on a double perspective, on a dialogue between the two main characters, Elizabeth Philpot and Mary Anning, who display alternative aspects of femininity (women’s friendship, women’s role in the Victorian society, the contradiction between the two women’s free spirit expressed in science and the religious dogma of the time).

PAST EVENTS

Author(s): Carmen Ardelean / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2014

FUNCTIONAL-SEMANTIC TYPES OF SPEECH IN JOURNALISTIC MESSAGES

Author(s): Nataliya Panasenko / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2016

Journalistic messages can be classified according to their size, according to the style they belong to, according to different types of journalism (rational and emotional), etc. Journalistic message as a text of specific content and composition has been the object of research in stylistics, text linguistics, and journalism. This multidisciplinary approach shows that scholars from different schools and countries understand messages and their properties in a different way. The author presents these different approaches in the article, makes their comparative analysis, and expresses her own understanding of this topic combining types of messages with functional-semantic types of speech.

SARCASM IN MARKETING (CASE STUDY OF THE BANK ZUNO)

Author(s): Jana Hubinová / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2016

As per Merriam-Webster´s online dictionary, sarcasm is “the use of words that mean the opposite of what you really want to say especially in order to insult someone, to show irritation, or to be funny”.1 In regards to new-age marketing, sarcasm is one of very popular PR tools how to attract attention of potential clients, especially the ones of so-called Generation Y, also called Millennials. Generation Y (born in between 1977 and 1994), currently the youngest productive generation, becomes more and more often the target group of newly launched projects – such as newly born branches of already existing companies, brand new trademarks that aim to attract them and slightly more aggressive marketing tactics that our parents were not used to when marketing, as a sales communication methodology, was officially born in the last century. While speaking of successful implementation of sarcasm as the vehicle tool used to attract new potential customers, a great example of an extremely effective targeting for such a sarcastic campaign was the launch of trade mark ZUNO, a daughter brand of Austrian Raiffeisen Bank International, aimed at Middle and Eastern Europe market that was for the first time employed in 2011 in Slovakia, as the sample market.

Między kanonem literackim a kulturą zwielokrotnioną

Author(s): Maria Delaperrière / Language(s): Polish Issue: 2/2016

Contemporary cultural changes force Polish literary critics to constantly change their views on literature. Traditional literary canon is prone to stagnation and inertia, but multiculturalism may lead to a dangerous melting in the multiplied maze of cultural interconnections. Trying to overcome such antinomies, the author of the article focuses on the criteria that are important in the reception of Polish culture abroad. Literary canon is not regarded as a standard, but it is worth taking into consideration as an exposition of some general aesthetic, axiological and worldview changes.

Dzieje tłumaczeń, czyli o historii, której nie ma

Author(s): Jerzy Święch / Language(s): Polish Issue: 2/2016

Translations have been an interesting part of the history of literature. What has been their function and meaning in different literary epochs? Did they promote new tendencies or influence the creativity of the writers? What has been underestimated so far is the art of translation itself, that is, the development of techniques and styles of translation according to changes in the translator’s work conditions, especially the emancipation, secularization and professionalization of the profession, so that they have been seen as equal in importance to the writers themselves. What should be analyzed are the procedures and practices of translation, which can be interpreted according to contemporary textology. The history of the art of translation is also inspired by contemporary cultural studies, because it regards translation as an institution and focuses on translation discourse, that is, the complex of images, ideas and metaphors that each translator must respect when considering their readers. The tradition of translation is partly different from literary tradition in that the rules of ‘good translation’ promoted at certain times create a codex of a translator’s work.

Wielonurtowość polonistycznych badań językoznawczych. Próba typologii

Author(s): Magdalena Pastuch / Language(s): Polish Issue: 2/2016

The article aims at creating a schema that can be used to structure Polonistic linguistic research. The author suggests basic categories, such as METHODOLOGY and METHOD, SUBJECT and SOURCES. Each category, though derived from a different area has specific and relevant information. Each research project described according to such categories would be clearly depicted and placed in an appropriate position within Polonistic linguistics.

Wielojęzyczna Polska – język romski w kontakcie z polszczyzną

Author(s): Anna-Maria Meyer / Language(s): Polish Issue: 2/2016

There are a wide range of minority languages in Poland – including such languages as Karaite, Lemko and Romani. Polish and international linguists have been studying such minority languages and their relationship with Polish recently, but a lot remains to be done. Such languages are extremely valuable and they must be regarded by the Polonistic linguists as of importance. The article discusses in particular the case of the Romani language. The specifics of the relationship between Polish and Romani languages are discussed in comparison with the relationship between Polish and other languages in Poland.

Srebrny ekran i paryski bruk. Filmowe portrety polskich emigrantów w produkcjach zagranicznych i międzynarodowych (1976–2011)

Author(s): Kris Van Heuckelom / Language(s): Polish Issue: 2/2016

The article looks into the changing on-screen treatment of Polish immigrant characters living on ‘the Paris pavement’. The corpus of film productions under discussion includes Roman Polański’s “The Tenant” (1976), Peter Kassovitz’s “Mariage blanc” (1986), Costa Gavras’s “La petite apocalypse” (1993), Krzysztof Kieślowski’s “Trois couleurs: Blanc” (1994), Paweł Pawlikowski’s “The Woman in the Fifth” (2011) and Małgorzata Szumowska’s “Elles” (2011). As a comparative analysis of the films involved indicates, both the immigrant characters and the urban space associated with them are subject to gradual changes (although some remarkable spatial motifs, such as the balcony and the roof, make their appearance both in the older and the newer productions). If the earlier films tend to focus on the – often geopolitically connoted – marginalization and degradation of male (anti)heroes in the city’s historical center (or its immediate vicinity), then the more recent films shift focus to the urban periphery, where the Polish characters become part of what Dina Iordanova has called the ‘metropolitan multicultural margins’, along with other, economically underprivileged newcomers from various parts of the (postcolonial and post-Communist) world.

Varia: Rzeczy jako źródło pamięci ostatecznego. Na przykładzie „Kampucza, godzina zero” Zbigniewa Domarańczyka

Author(s): Bernadetta Darska / Language(s): Polish Issue: 2/2016

The article aims at describing the genocide that happened in Cambodia. It takes into consideration its specific character and focuses on what occurred there. During the Khmer Rouge’s dictatorship not only were hundreds of thousands of people murdered (about 2.5 million victims according to different sources), but also negative symbols became connected with objects of everyday use. Such objects have become a source of memories about events which were final, inevitable and traumatic.

UNA NOVEDOSA ARQUITECTURA SOCIAL Y LINGŰĹSTICA DEL MADRID DE LOS `80

Author(s): Cristina Gherman / Language(s): Spanish Issue: 2/2013

The present study represents a short itinerary through Madrid’s recent history during the Spanish Transition from an interdisciplinary perspective which proposes revisiting the social and linguistic behaviour of the Movida madrilena phenomenon. The political events of the eighties had a significant impact on Spanish society contributing to the acquirement of its ethicoaesthetical values. La Movida creates a new linguistic identity which invades not only the street, but also the artistic and cultural environment of the city. Thus, we discover an aesthetic lacking ethics, translated by a freedom of language and a frivolous turn of phrase. A filmmaker like Pedro Almodovar or writers such as Antonio de Villena and Juan Madrid are only a few examples pleading for artistic and literary emancipation as a ludic invective against political and social life.

Les onomatopées et les théories de la glotto-genèse, II p.

Author(s): Danguolė Melnikienė / Language(s): French Issue: 29/2016

Les onomatopées, cette forme curieuse de la combinaison des « mots » et du « chant », constituent depuis longtemps un objet de recherche pour les philosophes, linguistes et lexicographes. Nées à différentes époques historiques, elles ont continué à prendre de l’ampleur au cours des deux derniers siècles et sont susceptibles de mettre en relief les aspects les plus importants de ce phénomène qui oscille entre philosophie du langage et linguistique. Dans cet article, composé de deux parties, nous nous intéressons aux théories de la glotto-genèse, créées de l’antiquité à nos jours, qui sont souvent considérées comme parfaitement onomatopéiques. Mais le rôle de l’onomatopée y est-il vraiment aussi capital qu’on le prétend ? Que se cache exactement derrière la notion d’onomatopée ? Cette dernière coïncide-t-elle pleinement avec la notion de l’origine, créée à l’époque antique ? Afin de répondre aux questions formulées ci-dessus, nous avons étudié de nombreux textes appartenant à différentes époques : des auteurs antiques d’abord (Platon, Aristote), puis des philosophes et des écrivains du XVIIe (Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz), du XVIIIe (Johann Gottfried Herder, Jean-Jacques Rousseau) et du XIXe (Charles Nodier) siècles, et enfin des auteurs du XXe siècle (Otto Jespersen, Gérard Genette, Henri Meschonnic). Nous avons essayé d’y dépister les traces des théories onomatopéiques de la glotto-genèse et de les présenter à la lumière des recherches linguistiques actuelles.

Językowe formy budowania równowagi w relacjach międzynarodowych. Lingwistyczna analiza listu biskupów polskich do biskupów niemieckich z 1965 roku

Author(s): Waldemar Czachur / Language(s): Polish Issue: 3/2016

In his article, Waldemar Czachur makes an attempt of analysing the Reconciliation Letter of the Polish Bishops to their German Brothers of 1965 in terms of strategies aimed at building balance in international relations. The section which outlines the historical background of the letter and its political significance for Poland and the Polish-German relations is followed by linguistic analysis of subsequent parts of the letter to look at various balancing strategies between appreciating oneself and the recipient and protecting oneself and the recipient in the spirit of Goffman’s ritual equilibrium.

Sposoby realizacji funkcji perswazyjnej w ogłoszeniach z dziedzin: praca/ nauka zawodu zamieszczanych w dzienniku „Czas” w drugiej połowie XIX wieku

Author(s): Ewelina Gajewska / Language(s): Polish Issue: 3/2016

The article examines job and professional training advertisements published in Krakow in the daily newspaper “Czas” between 1850 and 1890. The analysed material includes both: job offers and announcements of job seekers. In the education section of the newspaper the advertisements are published by schools, enterprises, teachers’ institutions and individuals ready to accept pupils for apprenticeship programs. The analysis covers the persuasive vocabulary (the role of the name of the advertiser, most common adjectives and adverbs evaluating the service), genre of the advertisement (announcement, request, letter, and all sorts of hybrid forms) as well as the grammatical level of the analysed texts (persuasive aspect of compound sentences). The analysis of the material leads to the conclusion that the advertisements published in the “Czas” newspaper between 1850 and 1890 rarely realise the persuasive function only. Their persuasive role was realised through the selection of vocabulary and genre as well as by modifying and combining features of various genres.

Językoznawcza i logopedyczna analiza syntetycznej metody wywoływania zębowej głoski zwarto-szczelinowej

Author(s): Danuta Pluta-Wojciechowska / Language(s): Polish Issue: 3/2016

The author Danuta Pluta-Wojciechowska presents certain reflections on the methods of sound elicitation. She offers the linguistic analysis, as well as, the analysis from the point of view of speech therapy of the synthetic method of sound learning providing, at same time, the example of therapy where professionals dealt with case of dental affricative sound. In the following section of the text, the relevance of linguistic knowledge and the theory of speech therapy in the course of planning the providing speech treatment was stressed.

Telewizyjny dyskurs polityczny

Author(s): Ewa Szkudlarek-Śmiechowicz / Language(s): Polish Issue: 3/2016

This article describes polish political discourse on TV. The author considers four parameters of discourse’s general organization. They are: (1) profiling of discourse’s community, (2) generic conventions, which are preponderant on TV and typical in political discourse, (3) primary classes of discourse’s participants, (4) relationship: the discourse world and reality.

Archiwalia: The Identifying Function of Language

Author(s): Władysław Lubaś / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2016

The linguistic literature (Buhler, Jakobson) mostly mentions six functions of language, paying little attention to the identifying function. Following the assumption that language is not an ‘ordinaty’ element of culture, but is its main basis, we believe that it has more and less stable elements, whose functions are arranged hierarchically.The identifying function has medium stability, is historically variable and becomes particularly important during intensive political changes or (nationalistic) conflicts. An example might be the recent split of Serbo-Croatian into tree languages. The identifying function is always connected with evaluation, which often exaggerates the positive character of a group and its language. Other groups and other languages can be perceived as worse. The identifying function is realized both individually (it can be identified with the expressive function of an individual then) and in a group. In this role it is often used or even abused in modern culture and especially politics. Instead of synonyms and periphrastic expressions we suggest that Polish linguists should make use of the term identifying function of language defined as a nationally or internationally protected function (based on cultural, ideological, or – less frequantly – religious elements) which enables a group of people of common aims, beliefs, ideas and interests to create a community.

How to Write an American Death Notice: Some Guidelines for Novice Obituarists

Author(s): Grzegorz Cebrat / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2016

The article aims at helping non-native speakers of English to write death notices, following the requirements of American tradition of the genre. It is based on the theoretical research into the genre, carried out by its author, who analyzed 1076 contemporary New York Times notices, according to Moves and Steps model of genre analysis by J. Swales and V. Bhatia. Having distinguished the death notice from the obituary, the author presents the communicative functions of the genre and its structure, consisting of seven moves, each made up of one to seven steps. Their presentation and brief analysis is accompanied by 100 patterns and templates, which allows intermediate (B1–B2) students of English to create their own texts successfully step by step.