Dostępność książek i czasopism

Author(s): Daria Jankowiak / Language(s): Polish Issue: 08/2012

The paper discusses statistical sources on books and magazines released in Poland since 1990. During this period several separate studies have been carried out to collect information about the place of books in Polish homes, reading, book lending, as well as the local publishing market development. Those studies include household budget survey, participation in culture, and also reports obtained from public libraries (and from the National Library). The collected information about books and journals shows the current and past trends in research, as well as changes in the status of books in the last two decades (1990–2009). The article presents also information on expenditures for books and magazines in households, home book collections (in terms of ownership of books printed and e-books), available in public libraries, as well as data from the publishing market.

Making Love and Make-Belief: Male Sexual Barter in Dov Freiberg’s To Survive Sobibor

Author(s): Raphael Utz / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2020

After escaping the German mass killing facility in Sobibór on 14 October 1943, Dov Freiberg and Semyon Rozenfeld survived in hiding near Chelm until the arrival of the Red Army in July 1944. In 1945, Freiberg testified before the Central Jewish Historical Commission, and in 1988, he published his much more extensive memoirs To Survive Sobibor. Both texts cover the period of hiding, during which Freiberg, Rozenfeld and the brothers Dawid and Józef Serczuk were taken in by two women. The two sources reveal an episode of male sexual barter, as the male group established rational relationships with the two women in order to stabilize a precarious situation. By comparing both of Freiberg’s texts, it becomes clear that so-called late testimonies are rich and unjustly underrated source-material.

„To się objawiało w rozmaitych uwagach”. Rozmowa z Avivą Blum-Wachs

Author(s): Sylwia Chutnik,Natalia Judzińska / Language(s): Polish Issue: 1/2020

The article is a record of an interview with the Holocaust survivor, Aviva Blum-Wachs, and reveals the tension between biography, memory, concealment and oblivion. The interview is preceded by the theoretical introduction, where authoresses introduce main categories from the field of memory and gender studies. An important element of the article is an outline of contexts and deep focus on both interlocutors’ and her mother’s biography.

Zdjęcie z konkursu piękności i inne dokumenty osobiste. O pracy badawczej i poszukiwaniu znaczeń „czarnych dziur” – na przykładzie rekonstrukcji biografii Zygmunta Baumana

Author(s): Izabela Wagner / Language(s): Polish Issue: 1/2020

The article focuses on extracting from the shadows certain events that, for strategic or accidental reasons, did not leave any traces in the archives, testimonies and various documents of people who were the subject of research (most often in the case of the reconstruction of their biographies). This text refers to a situation in which the problem is not so much the lack of data as their excess, as well as numerous legends that have grown up around the main figure of the reconstruction of life history – Zygmunt Bauman. The article emphasizes the importance of context and meanings accompanying the recreated biography, which enables a better understanding of the main character.

Po wykładzie wysłuchanym na stojąco. Strategie uciszania głosów żydowskich studentek wobec getta ławkowego

Author(s): Natalia Judzińska / Language(s): Polish Issue: 1/2020

In my article I propose an outline of a comparative analysis of two disciplinary proceedings initiated against students of the Mathematics and Natural Science Faculty of Stefan Batory University in Vilnius, Rywka Profitkier and Estera Tajc, before the introduction of the so-called ghetto benches. Two female students refused to subordinate to the student practice at that time, and did not take a seat on the left side of the lecture hall. Hence, they both listened to the lecture standing between the benches. I will situate my analysis in the context of the events of the entire 1936/1937 academic year, in which the university was closed for almost three months due to the anti-Jewish violence. The sources consist of the documents of two disciplinary proceedings based on events that occurred only one day apart, but most importantly, they took a similar course. However, due to the different strategies chosen by the female students, the sanctions imposed on them for not subordinating to the practice of taking seats assigned to Jews at the time were significantly different.

Detachment of empathy:

Author(s): Ron Aharoni / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2020

This is a sequel to a previous paper (Aharoni 2018), in which I suggested that the game of humour is played not between two meanings of the same carrier, but between meaning and its carrier: the two are detached from each other by some means. In the present paper I want to substantiate this thesis by some evidence, the main one being referred to in the title of the paper. It is that two well-known theories of humour, both presently neglected to a large extent, are based on this mechanism. In both the carrier of meaning is not words, but actions. In fact, one of the main messages of the paper is that often the carrier of meaning in jokes, and in humour in general, are actions. I will try to show that both Bergson’s “automatic behaviour” theory and the superiority (or derision) theory are based on detachment of empathy, namely of identification. Since, as I will try to show, empathy and identification are man’s (and even animals’) main tool in deciphering meanings of actions, this results in detaching actions from their meanings.

Conceptual integration theory and British humour:

Author(s): Joanna Jabłońska-Hood / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2019

Conceptual integration theory (henceforth CIT), also known as conceptual blending, was devised by Fauconnier and Turner (2002) as a model for meaning construction and interpretation. It is based on the notion of a mental space, which originated in Fauconnier's early research (1998). Mental spaces are structures that constitute information pertaining to a particular concept (Fauconnier and Turner 2002: 40). Interestingly, mental spaces can be linked together and blended so as to produce a novel quality. In this manner, conceptual integration serves as a theoretical model that throws light on creativity in language use. In my paper, I will apply CIT to British humour in order to use its multiway blending together with its dynamic, online running of the blended contents for the purpose of comedy elucidation. It is crucial to observe that British humour is a complex phenomenon which pertains to many different levels of interpretation, i.e. a linguistic, cultural or discursive. CIT possesses a well-suited cognitive apparatus which can encompass the complexity of British humour with all its layers. The primary goal of the article is to analyse a selected scene from a sitcom entitled Miranda in order to show the validity of the theory in respect of humour studies. In particular, I will undertake to demonstrate that CIT, with a special emphasis on its principles such as compression and the emergent structure of the blend can deal with many processes that accumulate within British humour and result in laughter. Simultaneously, I will try to demonstrate that frame-shifting, as proposed by Coulson (2015: pp. 167-190), can be of help to CIT in explaining humour.

Metapragmatic stereotypes and humour:

Author(s): Vasia Tsami / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2019

The present study concentrates on the potential of mass culture texts to impose specific metapragmatic stereotypes (Agha 2007) through humour on the wider audience. Metapragmatic stereotypes constitute speakers’ internalized models of how language should or should not be used; such models guide speakers’ own language use and enable them to make evaluations about their own language behaviour or that of others. In this context, I explore the dominant metapragmatic stereotypes for the interpretation and perception of humorous mass culture texts. To this end, I analyse a humorous Greek TV advertisement of a telecommunications company. Drawing upon Coupland’s (2007) conceptualization of style and the General Theory of Verbal Humour (Attardo 2001), I intend to show that humour reflects, sustains, and reproduces the dominant metapragmatic stereotypes of linguistic homogenisation and monolingualism (Blommaert & Rampton 2011). Then, I explore how the audience perceives the representation of stylistic choices in mass culture texts and, more specifically, in the analysed advertisement. My informants were 96 students of the last two grades of a Greek elementary school. The recipients’ responses show that their metapragmatic stereotypes are aligned with the dominant ones: they approach stylistic choices as strictly-defined systems used in specific social contexts and they expect the alignment of TV fictional characters with linguistic homogeneity. My findings suggest that humour stigmatises specific styles, and that the audience perceive the respective (and reinforced through humour) metapragmatic stereotypes as guidelines for “correct” stylistic use. Furthermore, it seems that through humour, such stereotypes usually go unnoticed in mass culture texts and may even become naturalised, as they are framed in a “trivial” and “non-serious” manner.

Audiovisual translation of puns in animated films:

Author(s): Elena Aleksandrova / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2019

The translation of the pun is one of the most challenging issues for translators and interpreters. Sometimes, puns, especially those containing realia, are considered to be untranslatable. Most translation strategies and procedures offered in previous findings for the translation of realia-based puns are not appropriate for audiovisual translations of animated films, for either dubbing or subtitling, because of the specificity of the target audience, and the genre. The problem of choosing the most relevant strategy and procedures for realia-based puns is underexplored. To narrow the gap, metamodern and semiotic approaches are applied to the translation of puns. In accordance with the semiotic approach, a pun is considered as a type of language game based on the use of the asymmetry of the form, and the content of the sign. The “Quasi-translation” strategy discussed in this paper reflects the metamodern attitude towards the game, whereby “game change” is one of the basic postulates. “Quasi-translation” involves three types of translation procedures: quasi-localisation, quasi-globalisation, and quasi-glocalisation. The term “quasi-glocalisation” is also used to denote the general strategy for the translation of audiovisual works containing realia-based puns, which involves: 1) oscillation between the need to adapt the translation to the target culture, and the need to preserve the culturally-marked components of the original; and 2) the reproduction of “atmosphere” (the common reality of the perceiver and the perceived). This insight can be used by audiovisual translator-practitioners, and university teachers in the course of translation theory and practice.

Book review

Author(s): Jocelyn Chey / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2019

Breaking frame and frame-shifting in Bassem Youssef’s satirical TV show al-Bernāmeg

Author(s): Mohamed Mifdal / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2019

This paper reviews how humor is made in terms of three theoretical models. First, it draws onthe contribution of the structural semantics to the understanding of the text of the joke,especially the related notion of isotopy and the linear organization of the text of the joke.Second, this paper discusses humor in light of the Semantic Script Theory of Humor (SSTH),and the General Theory of Verbal Humor (GTVH). Third, this paper draws also on twopragmatic and discursive approaches, namely Grice’s cooperative principle, and Simpson’smodel of satire as a discourse. This paper argues that semantic incongruities and theirresolutions, as well as the violations of the cooperation principle can be best apprehended inlight of the frames theory as developed in social sciences by Erving Goffman and frameshiftingtheory as it has been developed by Seana Coulson. The aim of this paper is to revealthe mechanism used to produce humor and laughter in one of the most popular satirical showsin the Arab world, Bassem Youssef’s al-Bernāmeg. The focus is not only on what humor/satiredoes (ridicule, mockery, attack of targets, overstepping of boundaries…), but also on how itdoes it (violation of codes, breaking frames, frame-shifting, conceptual blending) and whythese discursive strategies are used (implications in light of historical and cultural context).This paper also argues that the generation of humor can be based broadly on breaking frames,which is inclusive of incongruity (both verbal and contextual), but studied in a multimodalcontent where incongruity is based on breaking and shattering frames that are constructed inverbal and visual forms. Humor generation is conducted through a continuous chain-likeprocess of building, shattering, and rebuilding frames. It also deals with the frame-shiftingand conceptual blending mechanisms at the level of interpretation and the construction of themeaning of humor. The aim is to account for the creative and flexible use of language forsatiric purposes and thus to enhance the ability of traditional frame-based systems, includingscript-opposition theory to account for such flexibility in light of context and with reference tobackground.

Individual differences in the way observers perceive humour styles

Author(s): Robyn Brown,Bruce Findlay,Jay K. Brinker / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2019

Humour has been conceptualised as styles, which vary based on their function(Martin et al. 2003). Research examining if and how observers perceive this intent islimited. The current study addresses this research gap by examining the perceptionsof Martin et al.’s (2003) four humour styles. Additionally and of particular interestwas whether self-defeating humour and another self-disparaging humour style,namely self-deprecating humour, were perceived as two independent humour styles.Despite being similar in content, self-deprecating humour is associated with higherself-esteem and self-defeating humour with lower self-esteem. Two hundred and fourstudents watched comedy clips and completed a survey online. Participants wereasked to categorise each video clip by humour style and to rate the self-esteem of thetarget (i.e. producer). Results revealed that humour styles are distinguishable byobservers with participants’ predominantly selecting one humour style over the othersfor each clip. In support of the second hypothesis, targets who were categorised asusing self-deprecating humour were perceived as having higher self-esteem thanthose categorised as using self-defeating humour, illustrating a distinction in theperception of these humour styles at an interpersonal level.

Academic event report

Author(s): Kerry Mullan / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2019

Conversational humour in a Nigerian radio news programme:

Author(s): Blessing T. Inya,Onwu Inya / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2018

This paper investigates the Generic Structure Potential (GSP) of Lati inu aka aka Biodun/Kayode (LIABK), a Nigerian secondary gatekeeping radio news programme, with the aim of indicating the stages of the genre where conversational humour typically occurs, and then it analyses humour types in the data through the neo-Gricean concept of untruthfulness and pragmatic act theory. The data for the study constitute a ten hour audio recording of Lati inu aka aka Biodun/Kayode from two radio stations in Ekiti and Ondo States, South-Western Nigeria. The GSP of LIABK is constituted by five obligatory elements: Opening (O), Advertisement (A), Pre-news Presentation (PnP), News Presentation (NP) and Closing (C). The genre-based expectations for O, PnP and C, and then NP are to provide entertainment and information to the listeners respectively. Thus, humour typically occurs in the O, PnP, and C stages of the programme, and rarely occurs in NP. Four humour types are indicated: song-as-humour, absurdity, joint fantasising, and speaker-meaning-telic humour respectively. While song-as-humour resists being neatly categorised as autotelic humour, absurdity and joint fantasising are easily characterised as thus. The pragmatic act analysis reveals the incremental, sequential, and co-constructed nature of the humour types. Furthermore, the pragmemes of entertainment and offering of opinion by the news presenters constitute the affordances or genre-based expectations that constrain the social activities that constitute LIABK. The study contributes to the scholarship on secondary gatekeeping in Nigeria broadcast media, conversational humour, and pragmatics.

Sharing a laugh at others:

Author(s): Béatrice Priego-Valverde / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2018

The aim of this article is to clarify the fuzzy notion of “successful humour”. It focuses on humorous sequences in French face-to-face interactions which are both successful and have a same type of target: a collective “Other” (foreign culture, a French or foreign institution, a French or foreign socio-professional group). It will be shown that laughing about/at others (with all the aggressiveness this could imply) is not inconsistent with the necessary collaborative aspect of the conversation. On the contrary, the necessary collaboration between the participants will be highlighted through analysing humour in two different but complementary ways. Firstly, analysing humour through one specific target (the collective “Other”) will show that the participants rely on shared knowledge to display fictitious identities allowing them to construct humour. Secondly, a structural analysis of successful humorous sequences will deepen the notion of successful humour, highlighting two different structures: a two-part structure and a three-part structure. While the terms “successful humour” will be restricted to the former, the notion of “humorous convergence” will be proposed to refer to the latter. This study is based on 51 successful humorous sequences extracted from three face-to-face interactions audio- and video-recorded in an anechoic room at Aix-Marseille University, France.

Humour in online comments regarding Montenegro’s accession to NATO

Author(s): Milena Dževerdanović-Pejović / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2018

The empirical analysis in this paper deals with establishing humour examples based on script opposition patterns in online comments regarding Montenegro’s accession to NATO. It is established that the opposing scripts prevailing in the comments on political setting in Montenegro are heavily dependent on Montenegro’s turbulent history and dominant collective scripts such as pride and bravery. As online comments are an emerging genre, a reference to the influence of computer-mediated communication was also made, where pragmatic interpretation called for the help of critical discourse analysis. The results show that the script opposition parameters enable not only linguistic but also pragmatic revelations about Montenegrin people and their chief values or scripts. Script opposition examples within commenters’ standpoints are explained with reference to diachronic level and the modern values in Montenegro.

Humour of the intimate:

Author(s): Şenay Yavuz Görkem / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2018

This study focuses on the women policies of the Turkish government and the female humour that is created in response to these policies. A humour magazine is used as the main source since this specific magazine, which is named Bayan Yanı (The Seat Next to a Lady), has the privilege of being the only humour magazine created solely by female caricaturists and writers in Turkey. Six samples of female humour related to intimate matters are selected purposefully from 16 issues of this magazine published between January 2015 and June 2016 and analysed in content, tone, and function. The aim is to develop an understanding on female humour, especially the humour of the intimate, created to lead the public to question the effectiveness of political decisions and practices related to women policies.

Academic event report

Author(s): Anna Krasowska / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2018

Book review

Author(s): María Angeles Ruiz-Moneva / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2018

School for a Hollow Life or The Pedagogical Poem 2.0

Author(s): Hrvoje Jurić / Language(s): English Issue: 18/2021

In addition to medical and public health issues, the 2020 coronavirus pandemic raised some serious philosophical, (bio)ethical, social, political and legal questions that are essentially not new, although they appear under a new light. Among them is also the issue of education, because the coronavirus pandemic has accentuated the digitalisation and alienation trends in the field of education, urging us to consider not only the problems of education during the pandemic, but also the systemic problems in education, science and knowledge in the era of technoscience and neoliberal economy and politics.