PORADNIK JĘZYKOWY

ISSUE 6 / 2014

ARTICLES AND DISSERTATIONS

  • Magdalena Danielewiczowa : Clinging to spódnica (a skirt). Specification and generalisation in the dictionary description of expressions

    The author of this paper formulates a thesis that – in a semantic lexicographic description – two seemingly contradictory trends need to be continuously reconciled, namely striving for an adequate generalisation of the properties of the describes expressions and the obligation to draw conclusions from detailed data. The failure to satisfy any of these requirements directly leads to basic errors in the proposed definitions of meanings.

    This thesis is illustrated with examples of expressions falling under the entry spódnica (a skirt) in Wielki słownik języka polskiego (Great Dictionary of Polish) edited by P. Żmigrodzki. This paper primarily provides a critical commentary to the description of the unit _w spódnicy (_in a skirt), which is included in this study and which the author finds inadequate and incomplete. In the conclusion part of the text, she presents her own solution to this mini-problem.

  • Patrycja Pałka : Regular polysemy in verbs in general dictionaries of Polish
    Numerous examples of distinguishing meanings in an intuitive and inconsistent manner can be found in the lexicographic practice. This is related to the accusation, which has been repeatedly brought against authors of dictionaries, that a description does not conform to postulates of linguistic theories. On the one hand, the difficulty consists in the impossibility to fully reflect a given convention of a linguistic description in a general dictionary. On the other hand, adapting the concept of a given dictionary to the current state of linguistic knowledge contradicts the lexicographic tradition and recipient habits. Therefore, this paper aims to determine whether and how general dictionaries of Polish record the types of regular polysemy in verbs identified by Jurij D. Apresjan. The manner of presenting the phenomenon of productive polysemy is discussed in the first place. The types of regular polysemy that are usually not recorded by dictionaries, since the difference between the meanings of a given verb comes down to the difference of diathesis, are presented next. The manner in which the presence of the described linguistic phenomenon in the structure of an entry is manifested if a given semantic shift is not reflected in the form of separate meanings (subentries) is also demonstrated. Finally, the types of regular shifts that are typically recorded by dictionaries although their descriptions, apart from those with metaphoric grounds, are most inconsistent are distinguished.
  • Małgorzata B. Majewska, Mateusz Żółtak : Statistics in Słownik wileński (Vilnius Dictionary). Etymological information
    This paper attempts to present the borrowings recorded in Słownik wileński (Vilnius Dictionary) in a statistical manner. The list of language abbreviations indicated by the authors of the Dictionary as source languages in individual entries are confronted with the list of abbreviations included in the Dictionary. The obtained figures are compared with ones derived from two other dictionaries of Polish.
  • Agnieszka Cejmer : A few comments on language units such as [ktoś] czuje [coś] ([someone] feels [something])

    The object of the description in this paper are perceptual language units with the segment czuć (to feel) and their equivalents in English and French. This paper is a contribution to a detailed semantic analysis of these units.

    Research on verbal units of language is conducted in the context of other linguistic studies, in particular the study by Romuald Grzesiak (1983), Åke Viberg (1983) and Anna Wierzbicka (2006). Certain theses on the discussed units, which were formulated by the mentioned authors, are subject to criticism. Grzesiak’s conviction about the existence of three homonymic perceptual predicates czuć I (to feel I), czuć II (to feel II) and czuć III (to feel III) and Wierzbicka’s idea according to which czuć (to feel) is considered an elementary unit are found most controversial. The presented discussion on semantic properties of the discussed units prove the falseness of those theses. At the same time, semantic components of perceptual units with the segment czuć (to feel), which should be used in semantic explication of the units, emerge as a result of the research.

  • Aleksander Kiklewicz : Lexical meaning of the noun and its function in the semantic structure of sentences
    This paper deals with the relationship between the position of the nominal group in the semantic (propositional) structure of sentences and the word meaning of the base noun. The starting point is an idea about a functional dependence between these two parameters of elementary syntactic units. The method to prove this thesis is a psycholinguistic experiment. An analysis of the experiment results shows that the relationship between semantics and syntax is symmetric-asymmetric in nature: syntactic functions of lexical units are partly programmed in the language system, which determines the stability of verbal communication, and partly these functions are conditioned by language practices and language use situations, which determines its second feature — ergonomics, i.e. adaptation to the environment.
  • Magdalena Derwojedowa : On quasi-numeral expressions
    This paper describes Polish nominal structures, the components of which are numeral nouns with nominal numeral derivatives (e.g. JEDENASTKA, DWUSETKA, TYSIĄCZKA). These self-contained wholes are similar to ordinal adjectives with respect to their internal structure (Cf. Derwojedowa 2011), yet are not deemed numerals even in traditional classifications. Despite their interesting syntactic properties, they have not been described in more detail. Relational grammar, as approached by I. A. Mielczuk (1974, 1988), is adopted as a surface description model. The study proposes a surface syntactic description of the discussed structures: syntactic alignments and relations with the external context – first and foremost, adopting a solution rejecting the separation of an independent syntactic relation for units of the discussed type, unlike in the case of ordinal adjectives or fractional structures. The internal structure of sequences such as przykczterysta czterdziestka czwórka as part of a uniform set of relations, which is convergent with the description of ordinal and fractional self-contained wholes, is also described in detail.

OLD AND CONTEMPORARY DICTIONARIES

  • Magdalena Majdak : Jan Karłowicz, Adam Antoni Kryński, Władysław Niedźwiedzki (eds), Słownik języka polskiego (Dictionary of Polish), Warsaw 1900–1927

POLISH GRAMMAR

  • Izabela Winiarska-Górska : Krótka a prosta nauka czytania i pisania języka polskiego (A short and easy lesson of reading and writing in Polish ) by Jan Seklucjan

REVIEWS

  • Monika Famielec : Ewa Binkuńska, Językowy obraz świata w tekstach religijnych grupy wyznaniowej „Rodzina” oraz Kościoła Zjednoczeniowego (A linguistic image of the world in religious texts of the “Family” faith community and Unifi cation Church ), Bydgoszcz 2012
  • Bogdan Walczak : Karolina Ruta, „Wyrażać niewyrażalne”. Analiza językowo-stylistyczna tetralogii Jezus z Nazarethu Romana Brandstaettera (“To express the inexpressible”. A linguistic and stylistic analysis of the Jesus of Nasareth tetralogy by Roman Brandstaetter ), Warsaw 2013

EXPLANATIONS OF WORDS AND EXPRESSIONS

WORDS AND PHRASES

BIOGRAPHICAL ENTRIES AND MEMOIRS

  • Stanisław Cygan : Two survey questionnaires for research on regional vocabulary by Barbara Bartnicka