Interdisciplinary Perspectives in Cross-Cultural Communication

Edited by

Adam Bednarek

LINCOM ACADEMIC PUBLISHERS

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PREFACE

Dear Reader,

thank you for taking interest in this publication.

Today to an even larger extent than in the past centuries, communication frequently takes place between individuals and institutions representing different national and cultural backgrounds. This has resulted in a vast body of theoretical discussions on the relation between language, culture and discourse, as well as in the emergence of empirical research on intercultural encounters. The authors have decided to focus on discourse functional and pragmatic analysis of social communication and refer to the status of functional linguistics in relation to such disciplines as sociolinguistics, anthropology, social psychology, cognitive linguistics and culture studies.

The following volume is thus a collection of papers, which I find crucial to the matter at hand. Scholars from Poland, Taiwan, Germany and the Netherlands have agreed to participate in the project.

The Lodz International Studies Academy is member of the International Communication Association and we have attempted to deal with the issues presented above during previous conferences and thus far we have published the following volumes:

• The Media and International Communication Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk Barbara / Pludowski Tomasz / Tanno Dolores Valencia (eds.) Frankfurt am Main, Berlin, Bern, Bruxelles, New York, Oxford, Wien, 2007. 442 pp., num. fig. and tables ISBN 978-3-631-56707-4 pb.

• Intercultural Europe: Arenas of Difference, Communication and Mediation Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk Barbara / Pułaczewska Hanna (eds). Stuttgart: ibidem. 2010

• Interdisciplinary Approaches to Communicaton Studies Bednarek Adam / Witczak-Plisiecka Iwona (eds). Wydawnictwo WSSM, Łódź 2011

The present volume is a continuation of our endeavours to study communication and organization of various parameters of analysis. I believe that it will prove to be an important addition in the growing field of cross-cultural communication. These are my fondest wishes.

Adam Bednarek Ph.D.

January, 2011

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ABOUT THE AUTHORS:

Adam Bednarek, University of Łódź; LISA, Poland (abed@uni.lodz.pl)

Adam Bednarek received his Ph.D. in linguistics from the University of Łódź in 2008 with his dissertation focusing on the intricacies of Canadian English, with emphasis on the lexical level. He is currently affiliated at the Lodz International Studies Adcademy and the University of Lodz. His scientific interests revolve around translation studies (computer applications in particular), dialectology and sociolingustics. He has published a series of papers plus three books and co-edited one volume on intercultural communication.

Dorota Biadala, University of Heidelberg, Germany (dorota.biadala@slav.uni-heidelberg.de)

Dorota Biadala, holds a Ph.D in linguistics and specializes in teaching German as a foreign language. German and Slavic studies researcher and faculty at the University of Heidelberg in Germany. She is a graduate of German and Polish studies and law. Her primary work focuses on german-polish comparative linguistics and the issues of specialized texts. Her major publications include: „Zum Ausdruck der Temporalität im Deutschen und im Polnischen“.

Agata Blichewicz, Radboud University, the Netherlands(a.blichewicz@gmail.com)

Agata Blichewicz studied Modern Greek and English Philology in Warsaw. She was also an Erasmus student at the University of Crete. Lately she graduated in Linguistics at Radboud University Nijmegen. During her master there she did an internship in the Nijmegen Gesture Centre under Asli Ozyurek's supervision. She studied the functions of the Greek pragmatic gestures and helped with other gesture projects. She also worked as a student assistant in the Max Plank Institute in the Evolutionary processes in language and culture group, on the motion events in Indo-European languages.

Łukasz Bogucki, University of Łódź; LISA, Poland (lukasz.bogucki@gmail.com)

Prof. Łukasz Bogucki teaches translation and interpreting theory and practice at WSSM and Łódź University. A freelance translator and long-time teacher of English, he has written three books and over twenty papers on various aspects of translation and linguistics; he has also edited and co-edited two volumes. His main academic interest is in audiovisual translation, particularly subtitling. He is a member of the editorial board of JoSTrans, Journal of Specialised Translation.

Elżbieta Jendrych, Koźmiński University, Poland (jendrych@kozminski.edu.pl)

Elżbieta Jendrych is the Head of the Languages Centre and the Director of the Business Studies in English Postgraduate Program for Teachers. She graduated from Warsaw University and got her Ph.D. degree in linguistics there. Her research interest is in business terminology, phraseology and in corpus studies for teaching purposes. Elżbieta Jendrych is the author and co-author of 10 books and numerous articles on corpus studies, teaching

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Business English, designing materials for ESP and teacher training. She works as an English teacher and a teacher trainer. She is an examiner for English for Business exams (LCCI) and a reporter for Pearson Longman.

Barbara Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk University of Łódź; LISA, Poland (blt@uni.lodz.pl)

Prof. Dr habil. Barbara Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk is professor ordinarius of English language and applied linguistics at the University of Lodz, where she holds the position of Chair of English Language and Applied Linguistics. She is also professor at Lodz International Studies Academy (WSSM) and Chair of British and American Studies. Her research interests are primarily in semantics and pragmatics of natural language, corpus linguistics and their applications in translation studies, lexicography and discourse analysis. She has published a number of books and papers in those areas and organized numerous international conferences and seminars. Over the years prof. Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk has been invited to read papers at international conferences and to lecture and conduct seminars at European and American universities.

Anna Pałczyńska University of Łódź, Poland (a.u.palczynska@gmail.com)

Anna Palczynska is a PhD student in the Department of Pragmatics at the University of Lódz a. Her master’s thesis was on the cultural side of multimedia translation and during her doctoral studies she decided to concentrate on social aspects of language. Currently she is working on issues connected with language and gender.

Tatiana Szczygłowska, University of Bielsko Biała, Poland (tania_n@op.pl)

Tatiana Szczygłowska is a university teacher with over 10 years of teaching experience. Currently, she is a lecturer at the University of Bielsko-Biała, specializing in translation studies. Her research interests also include contrastive discourse analysis, with special focus on written academic discourse.

Jerzy Tomaszczyk; LISA, Poland (tomas@uni.lodz.pl)

Jerzy Tomaszczyk has been on the faculty of the Lodz Academy of International Studies since 1997. He has taught courses in history of English and historical linguistics, European Studies, and translation. His academic interests are in lexicography, bilingualism and language contact.

Louis Wei-lun Lu, National Taiwan University of Taiwan, Taiwan(wllu@ntu.edu.tw)

Louis Wei-lun Lu received his Ph.D. in linguistics from National Taiwan University in 2011, and is currently a visiting researcher at Leiden University. His research focuses on the cognitive-functional aspect of language (Chinese and English), with evidence from authentic linguistic corpora.

Lily I-Wen Su, National Taiwan University of Taiwan, Taiwan(iwensu@ntu.edu.tw)

Lily I-wen Su received her Ph.D. in linguistics from the University of Hawaii, and has been teaching at National Taiwan University since she came back to Taiwan. Besides cognitive pragmatics, she is interested in syntax and semantics, and also in applying her linguistic

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knowledge to language teaching. Her recent research in metaphor and subjectivity convinces her that it is possible to combine what she studies to her life.

Halina Wisniewska, Koźmiński University (halinannawu@gmail.com)

Halina Wisniewska works at Kozminski University, Warsaw, where she is the head of International Business Communication Section and a lecturer. She teaches Business Studies in English and International Business Communication to undergraduate and post-graduate students. Her current post-doctoral research is focused on various aspects of cross-cultural business communication, yet her professional interests include also issues related to teaching materials development, testing and assessment in ESP classroom, CLIL in tertiary education, and teaching adult learners. She is the author and co-author of content-led ESP textbooks, an e-learning course and articles on ELT.

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Barbara Lewandowska Tomaszczyk

Lodz International Studies Academy, University of Lodz, Poland

Blurring the boundaries : A Model of Online Computer-Mediated Communication Activities (OCA)

1. Introduction

What can be witnessed in the contemporary digital world when compared with more traditional modes of communicating is the blurring of the boundaries between various parameters in Computer-Mediated Communication (CMC). The so-called ‘traditional media’, frequently available on-line, and new media in different forms such as posts which interpret and evaluate the materials in the traditional media, blogs or on-line social networking and discussions on the internet fora are exemplary instances. Another facet of the hybridity is observed with respect to the traditional division of the communication act, particularly with respect to the relationship between the Sender (Author) and the Addressee (Audience) of the message.

The present research is conducted within a European Concerted Research Action designated as COST Action IS0906: Transforming Audiences, Transforming Societies, and the Polish project Przemiany w postrzeganiu rzeczywistości i język nowych mediów ‘Changes in the perception of the reality and the language of new media’, particularly the Working Group which focuses on the Information Communication Technology and the use of computer-mediated communication with reference to the identification of new types of the Author(s) – Audience(s) relationships, as well as evolving social relationships in contemporary times 1.

New methods of the analysis of CMC materials, involving an integration of qualitative and quantitative methods, are presented in the paper. They combine language corpus study with the cognitive and pragmatic perspectives on language. The concept of Interconnectivity is proposed and explored here (see Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk 2010b) and added as one of the essential parameters of the CMC user’s On-line Activity measure (OCA Model). Samples of the materials are analysed, which come from two main sources: traditional media and new media (internet editions of the news, blogs and posts), and refer to current political events.

2. Properties of CMC

Contacts among people are growing via CMC. Due to the increasing frequencies and range of

1 The present research is supported by a Polish Ministry of Science and Higher Education grant Przemiany w postrzeganiu rzeczywistości a język nowych mediów ‘Transformations in the perception of reality and the Language of new media”, correlated with a European Concerted Research Action designated as COST Action IS0906: Transforming Audiences, Transforming Societies.

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contacts individual and cultural differences in communication get more and more obliterated. This is also strengthened via the internet media language and emerging transcultural codes, identities and conventions. And yet, the entrenchment of group norms and culture-specific preferences is clearly visible. The differences surface when the same political events are reported in the media and CMC users post their comments and opinions. As will be argued further, a discussion of ‘sheer content transmission’, without recourse to the political, religious, economic, etc. norms, is simply untenable (cf. Hinnenkamp 2009:189).

Audiences have been experiencing major transformations of their media and communication environment. Researchers have stressed these tendencies while contemporary technological devices reinforce and extend these movements and there is no limiting line to them.

Herring (2004a, 2004b, 2007) lists a number of medium properties, which distinguish CMC from other types of communication. They include synchronicity, message transmission, persistence of transcript, size of message buffer, channels of communication, anonymous messaging, private messaging, filtering and quoting. Each of them is characteristic of some type of CMC, which can be either synchronous or asynchronous, one- or two-way in one-to-one, one-to-many and many-to-one and many-to-many configurations, the text can be stored or deleted, limited or unlimited as to the size. The user can post verbal, visual, audio messages or combinations thereof. Messages can be anonymous or signed, can be private or public as far as the addressee is concerned. The messages can be filtered or not and other users can employ the quotation system in their responses.

3. Classical models of communication

Any transfer of information from the Sender (S) to the Receiver or Addressee (A) is referred to as communication. The sending and receiving of information take place in a special, basically cybernetic arrangement , which involves sending a signal which causes a change in the environment (E) and, in turn, affects the system (SYS) itself via feedback (F). This causes the system to adapt to new conditions (see Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk 2010a:15-16). The schema can be graphically simplified as follows (Fig. 1):

S ⇓A

SYS F E

Fig. 1. A communication model

When the S wants to convey a message about an aspect of the outside reality such as e.g. I’m cold in her s/he can encode the message in terms of a verbal system. Then the message is transmitted to A via a Channel of Communication. When the message reaches the A, s/he decodes it. In order for a message to be comprehended both S and A must use the same code or form (e.g. natural language). What should be emphasized is the fact that in the natural language interaction the S’s intended message may not always be identified as such by A. The context or situation as well as the knowledge of the world may be different for the sender and for the addressee of the message, which influences its interpretation. The same sentence I’m cold in here then can be uttered with a different intentional load e.g.: as a simple informational statement, as a request to, say, close the window, as a suggestion to leave the place, or, on the contrary, to stay in, etc. The disclosing of the S’s intentions is not always simple or straightforward for the A.

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An analogous situation takes place in CMC and can be considered even more difficult to interpret as the author of a message (S) may be distant and more often than not remain not visible to the A (audience). Therefore the contextual clue or body signals will not be within the addressee’s range of perception and interpretation. Inaccessibility of paralinguistic signals of the message, even if mediated more and more often by a growing set of iconic symbols in CMC, as well as the parameters of anonymity, play against the prototypical interpretative system of information exchange.

4. CMC functions of language

Language is used to perform different communicative functions (Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk 2010a: 19-20 for an interpretation and examples), which are all present in CMC. The following major language functions have been proposed in linguistic literature: Referential Function, in which language is used to point to objects and events in the actual world context or in the universe determined by the participants of a verbal interaction, as e.g. in Tom is a painter. The Emotive Function is shown when a language user talks about an emotion (emotion language) or displays it verbally (emotional language). The Conative or Persuasive Function presents tools to make addressee inclined to do something, while the Poetic Function attracts the addressee’s attention to the form as much as to the meaning. The Metalinguistic Function signifies using the same system for description and for investigation, i.e. using language to explain linguistic phenomena and the Performative Function is related to performing frequently ritualised acts via using language, in other words “doing things with words”, to quote the classic Austinian definition.

Even though all these functions can be observed in CMC, commonly in combinations, other new functions are evolving, like what I dub the Luddic Function, when the user employs the medium to play and get entertainment.

5. User-generated content

With the advent and development of CMC a new type of language user has been evolving – a hybrid, or blending, between the Author and the Addressee. One aspect of this process has to be more fully explained at this point. No proposal is made here that in the classical type of communication no interchange of these roles is observed. On the contrary, in his design features of language Hockett (1958) lists interchangeability as one of its major properties, shared not only among humans but within the entire animate world of primates. And yet, there exists some special aspect of blurring of this boundary in CMC. The communication world of the art and media in particular has been typically divided into those who are authors and the others who constitute their audience. In other words, active language providers and fairly silent audiences. This distinction imposes a passive image of a typical language receiver, which has been monopolizing the scene for centuries not only in the world of drama, then film or television, but also in the circles of novelists and poets and their captive audiences.

The internet CMC technologies dramatically change the picture. The official journalists in the press, radio and TV, start being interrupted and negated, their contributions compromised and what used to be passive receivers are transforming into active actors/audiences. Hybridisation, rooted also in anonymity, has its harvesting and uncovers true reception of the content officially generated. User-generated content challenges mainstream truths. However, even in such a context the question of the extent to which new media are a truly empowering tool for

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new audiences remains not fully understood yet. CMC audience is not one uniform social stratum. Even though it goes without saying that it is the younger rather than older, somewhat better educated and with higher financial resources that constitute the core of CMC users, at least in Poland, this is not the case that they form a single undifferentiated social class. One can also conjecture that different technological parameters such as sychronicity, type of message transmission, persistence of transcript (duration), size of message buffer, channels of communication (oral, written, visual, aural, or their combinations), anonymity, privacy and filtering (cf. Herring 2004a, 2004b, 2007), all contribute in various ways to the diversification of the audience and contribute to differences in computer-mediated discourse, or, in fact, discourses, if we want to be more precise.

6. Oral and written discourse: a hybrid

What have been observed for a few decades now on the stage of the media are different types of the blurring of the boundaries not only between the functions of the Author and the Audience, referred to in the last section, but also between the language modes – spoken and written, between types of genres such as a conversation, narration or description, the blurring of the boundaries between private and public domains, between the real and the virtual worlds. At present, various web tools combined with mobile information and communication technologies not only reinforce these tendencies but are probably the original strongest sources of these hybridisation processes in the media.

7. Message re-conceptualization and CMC users’ identities

The investigation of the role and function of the Addressee in the theory of communication, has uncovered a different reality than that which had been proposed before. As was mentioned above, in the place of a patient viewer, reader or a conversational interactant, there emerges an active participant who does not passively receive the message but who contributes to the incoming knowledge, shapes it and gives the receiving message the final form. In other words, the recipient does not simply decode the incoming message, s/he constructs it anew and the final effect is a re-conceptualization of the message received (Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk 2010c).

The re-conceptualization has a number of sources. They are both the addressee’s knowledge of the world, the social and cultural parameters of the interaction, an immediate context, and, last but not least, the intentions of the addressees to construct their identities. In the case of CMC, the identities projected in the virtual world. The media landscape is constantly changing, which affects the user’s practicies. Web tools, mobile information and communication technologies, the original sources of these hybridisation processes in the media, stimulate the user’s manipulation with their selves projected in the net. However, what can be observed simultaneously, is certain anchoring of CMC participants in one’s own system of beliefs and convictions, reluctance to change, which seems a fairly unexpected property considering the fast running changes in the landscape created or portrayed in the web.

8. On-line CMC Activity (OCA) Model

To represent Computer-Mediated Communication what is proposed in this section is a Model of Overall Online CMC Activities (OCA). It involves a number of quantitative and qualitative parameters. The quantitative parameters comprise an Interconnectivity Value (IV), which

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equals the number of interacting participants and the number of jointly constructed discourse turns. Furthermore, OCA is additionally estimated by the length of each S’s utterance in each turn, measured in terms of a number of words, their type:token ratio, the keyness of each author’s lexical repertoire, i.e. the frequency of the words used in all posts by a given author, measured with respect to a reference corpus. Additionally, the number and type of evaluation responses (support vs non-support votes), drawn from the internet materials, contributes to the value. The qualitative parameters explore the lexical patterns, lexical choices, syntactic structures and discourse behaviour preferences of a given participant, his/her figurative language uses, and, together with the quantitative values of each of the qualitative factor, they constitute a CMC user’s Online Discourse Activity (ODA).

Apart from the linguistic discourse behaviour, CMC users employ various visual and acoustic systems which are all responsible for a user’s overall CMC activity (OCA). OCA then covers both a user’s ODA as well as other semiotic resources (vocal, visual), which complement the former.

Interconnectivity designates the strength of connection of each individual user with all other users in the same topic domain (thread). Interconnectivity can be calculated from raw quantitative blog data as a sum total of turns with respect to each participant (see (5) below). Dedicated visualization software can be used to receive CMC Interconnectivity visualisation graphs. Graphs in (1), (2), (3) and (4) below were generated by Piotr Pęzik and Łukasz Dróżdż (Lodz University) with the use of Gephi – an open source graph visualisation and manipulation software. 2

2 Note form the editor: Due to the emmence difficulty of presenting such detailed elements within a single picture frame, the quality may not be satisfactory.12

Graph 1

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In (1) a graph shows all interconnectivity links with respect to all single-authored blogs researched, while (2) is one interconnectivity detailed instance of one randomly selected post ((1) and (2) are generated from the blog by Joanna Senyszyn, a Polish left-wing politician).

Graph 2

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Graph (3) illustrates all replies as appeared in one blog (by Janusz Korwin-Mikke, a Polish radical right-wing politician)

Graph 3

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The graphs illustrate the complexity of the Interconnectivity parameter and can be analysed in a more fine-grained format (4).

Graph 4

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The nicks of the top bloggers active in the blog in and the frequencies of their responses, i.e. respective Interconnectivity Values, are given in (5). The total number of the authors and commentators, who participated in this blog till March 31, 2011, comprises 3507 users.

All the data in the blog serve as the basis for calculating the individual Interconnectivity Value and the Interconnectivity Profile of each of the users.

(5)

Top users and numbers of turns in the blog of Janusz Korwin-Mikke

comment_author response_to cnt

~Hodyn JKM 36

~Jarun JKM 36

~Hodyn ~Hodyn 23

~wINS Law JKM 19

~FJS Southampton ~FJS Southampton 18

~HubertP JKM 18

~Jacekzarazek JKM 14

~FJS Southampton JKM 14

~troll JKM 13

~gay friend JKM 13

~barawok JKM 13

~jA JKM 12

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~Bogdan liczy JKM 11

~JKM ~JKM 11

~Jarun ~Jarun 11

~Karol Kobylarz JKM 11

~FJS Southampton ~Hodyn 11

~Bael JKM 9

forumowy_paul@onet.eu JKM 9

~hubert JKM 9

~obiektywny JKM 9

~JKM JKM 8

~... ~... 8

An additional quantitative parameter of the CMC activity refers to possible support –non-support marking as indicated by the users. They are most representative of and concordant with the users’ ideological and political profiles.

To reassume what has been discussed in this section, (see (6) below for a diagrammatic representation), it is proposed that a model of overall Online CMC Activities (OCA) should subsume all quantitative discourse and non-verbal activity of all and each of the users, qualitative parameters of discourse of visual and acoustic type, which cover patterns of verbal and non-verbal behaviour, and combine the parameters to present an overall online CMC activity.

(6) Model of Overall Online CMC Activities (OCA)

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* QUANTITATIVE Parameters

Online Discourse Activity (Quantitative ODA)

- Interconnectivity Value (IV)

- Length of utterance in each turn (number of words),

- Type/token ratio (repetitions)

- Item Frequency

- Keyness (vs. a reference corpus)

- Support/Non-support frequency

Online Non-verbal Activity (visual, acoustic) (ONA)

* QUALITATIVE Parameters

Online Discourse Activity (Qualitative ODA)

- Lexical Choices

- Lexical Patterns

- Syntactic structures

- Discourse behaviour

- Figurative uses (absolute frequencies, variance)

- Ideological preferences (marking)

Online Non-verbal Activity (visual, acoustic) (ONA)

OVERALL CMC Activity:

Quantitative ODA

Qualitative ODA

O Non-verbal A

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9. Materials and Research Methodology

9.1. Methods

On the methodological level, CMC analysis represents an integration of qualitative and quantitative factors as well as the cognitive and pragmatic aspects of the language used. In the section to follow of the present research an attempt is made to show how to integrate the frameworks applied so far and encompass both micro and macro-level analyses of language (see Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk & Dziwirek 2009, Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk & Tomaszczyk 2010).

9.2. CMC corpora

The materials used in this research comes from two main sources: traditional and new media. Thus, among other sources, members of the PELCRA team of the Chair of English Language and Applied Linguistics of Lodz University have access to a vast collection of digitized newspapers as well as television and radio transcripts (cf. Pęzik 2011, Walinski & Pęzik 2007). We have also been collecting the Polish Usenet archives and have access to large resources of English Usenet archives.

The name Usenet is used to refer to a heterogenous system of computer discussion groups. Its users participate in discussions by sending emails, i.e. posts, to one or many named newsgroups, initiating a discussion on a new topic or replying to posts by other users. It is important to note that the newsgroups, while divided in thematic hierarchies – eg. soc.politics.uk or sci.physics. The posts are not moderated in any way, and no other message filtering is used. Any user can post any content, not necessarily related to the name of the group, so they are likely to present authentic, unsupervised opinions, in which framing is more subtle and not readily identifiable.

It might be mentioned that Usenet as a medium provides the researcher with an extremely large and comprehensive collection of readily accessible texts stored in a consistent, well-described format and structured thematically (as of 2010, the 10 largest of the over 20 000 active newsgroups would receive over 30 000 messages per day). Stylistically, Usenet and other types of post exchanges present a corpus of largely informal language, with many features specific rather to conversational, spoken discourse. At the same time, its language bears all marks of so-called internet speech, exhibiting traits characteristic chiefly of this new medium as discussed in the sections above. The contents of the conversations reflect the language, as a mixture of different voices, which range from almost professional advice on niche topics to highly polarised opinions on politics and current affairs to mere banter, not infrequently with slang, vulgar and abusive uses.

Other materials used here in the present study are blogs and posts published in response to the traditional media articles, which will be discussed in the sections to follow.

10. CMC & political events

An example of CMC discussed in the present paper comes from English and Polish discussion fora. The objective is to identify the strategies users apply to express their perception of a selected political event and to construct their on-line identity in this particular internet

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activity.

A quantitative-qualitative analysis of the perception of the Polish pre-Parliament-election scene as seen in Polish and English groups of users is presented and a distinction in their sentiments uncovered interpreted in selected current Polish and English posts collected in October, 2011.

10.1. Participant structure and the construction of the self

Individual perception of political events by different group of users is connected with the variability in group self-categorization. The theory of maximizing a given social identity by conforming to a given group self-perception can account for a relative conformity in the judgments of proponents and opponents in a given group of CMC users. Self-categorization principles in the perception of social identities are based on Rosch’s prototype theory (Rosch 1978) and its development in numerous papers. Particularly revealing in this respect is the paper ”Self-enhancement and self-categorization leash – Evidence for a dual-process model of first- and third-person perceptions” by Jinguang Zhang (2010).

10.2. Sources

The internet sources used in the present study come from five different corpora collected at the Department of English Language and Applied Linguistics of Lodz University. Three Polish sources are blogs, others involve a Polish open forum and the Polish Usenet. The English data are samples of the English blogs and the English Usenet. All the materials were accessed and collected between 4 - 6 October 2011 at the following websites:

(i)Polish blogs from blog.onet.pl and those accessed at

http://frazeo.pl/catalogue_by_date.jsp

(ii)Polish open forum www.forumowisko.pl

(iii)Polish Usenet

(iv)English blogs [search via top topics of a day with the advanced search function]:

http://frazeo.com/catalogue_by_date.jsp and those accessed at http://blogsearch.google.com/

(v)English Usenet

Out of the source domains, those on politics were searched and eventually those related to Polish Parliamentary elections (October 9th , 2011), were investigated. For the sake of completeness the relevant materials from the Usenet were also identified and investigated.

10.3. Quantitative data

The following amounts of Polish blog data were examined for the purposes of the present work:

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(7)

Type Texts Authors Words

Post 12,828 1,195 4,786,048

Comment 120,796 34,508 5,231,211

What should be noted at this point is the phenomenon of possible complex interchangeability of communication, which presupposes a possibility of a user to employ more than one nick. Our assumption concerning the authorship here is that by an Author we understand a person using the same nick. The blog data shows the following regularity with reference to the word frequency per one post and per one comment:

(8)

1 author – average 10 posts

Average 400 words per 1 post

Average close to 40 words for 1 comment

shows significant quantitative differences as in (9) The Usenet structure (e.g. newsgrupa pl.soc.polityka accessed from 01/12/2010 - 03/30/2011) below:

(9)Texts: 23 952Words: 1 921 185Authors: 686

1 author – average 30 posts(Average – 85 words for one text)

The data shows that the Usenet, with a small number of authors talking to one another, is in retreat while other modes of CMC are developing from the point of view of quantitative parameters.

11. Dataset description

In the present section a selection of the data from a small comparable collection of texts on Polish parliamentary pre-election discussions from English and Polish newspaper article and

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their commentaries are presented (see Appendices for the full texts and the discussion fora). The size of the two collections is not identical (compare the quantitative information in the Appendices) – the Polish corpus is larger, so the conclusions can only be treated as tentative. Nevertheless, the picture revealed is interesting and symptomatic as it presents the local Polish as opposed to the English speaking Polish and English perspectives on the political questions discussed on-line.

Two sets (English and Polish) of keywords were generated from the internet collections, taking a combination of the Longman and Microconcord data to be the reference in the former and a 20-million Polish PELCRA Sampler to serve as the reference corpus in the latter.

The English data generate the following keywords (Wordsmith Tools) in the decreasing order of frequency:

(10)

English Keywords (contrasted with 15 million Longman/Microconcord Sampler)

1 poland

2 tusk

3 kaczynski

4 palikot

5 wojewódzki

6 po

7 godson

8 polish

9 poles

10 pis

11 jaroslaw

12 adekoya

13 remi

14 Civic

15 election

16 warsaw

17 fake

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18 nowak

19 banknotes

20 modernising

The Polish keyword list is as follows (the reference is a 20-million Polish PELCRA corpus; the units omitted refer to extratextual data or signify the nicknames used):

(11) Polish Keywords (contrasted with 20-million Pelcra Sampler)

2 PIS 15

3 GOŚĆ 21

4 WALENTYNOWICZ 10

5 ODPOWIEDZ 10

7 KACZYŃSKI 11

8 UK 7

13 LUBIE 4

14 OBYWATELSTWO 6

15 ZASADA 7

16 PRAWA 13

17 JAROSŁAW 7

18 PODTRZYMAŁA 3

19 POLSKĄ 8

20 DZIADU 3

21 DEBACIE 4

23 GDAŃSKU 5

24 WRÓCĄ 4

25 POMORZU 3

26 PODKREŚLIŁ 3

24

27 GŁOSOWAĆ 4

28 WALCZYŁA 3

The keywords indicate differences in the thematic focus between English and Polish users. The English data describe all major Polish parties and their chairmen, participating in the election race with similar frequencies. The Polish materials on the other hand clearly focus on the Law and Justice party (PIS), Jarosław Kaczyński, its leader and his pre-election tour to Gdansk, as well as other, much more controversial issues such as the role of Anna Walentynowicz, a representative of anti-Walesa part of the Solidarity movement in Poland, or make reference to an infamous remark of the late President Lech Kaczyński to one of the protesters (Spieprzaj dziadu! ‘Fuck off, you beggar!). The Polish discussion is more hectic, its participation structure looks more varied and the use of language much more emotional, evidenced both in the number of vulgarisms and colloquialisms, frequently from beyond the norms of social and cultural appropriateness as well as in the distribution of support/non-support voices in the discussion (see Appendices for the numerical values). The demographic details concerning the users are obviously not clearly known while the use of their native tongue is indicative of both their educational and social background and possibly the demographic properties such as age and frequently gender in the Polish data (Polish is an inflectional language with the nominal, adjectival and verbal categorial marking for the category of grammatical gender).

12. Conclusion

While the process of the formation of the CMC user identities in the English texts looks more blurred, the Polish data reveal active negotiation of the complex meanings encoded in the political media texts, thus supporting two (or more) kinds of opposing social identities represented in this discussion. The Interconnectivity Values are higher with respect to Polish users from Poland and represent more frequent turns and shorter sentences (see Appendices for the numerical values). The framing for these opposing identity conceptualizations is both of the cultural, social, ideological and linguistic character. The concentration on different topics portrays the direct interests of two groups of CMC participants – both of the Polish background, but clearly of fairly diverging predilections. A similar hiatus is noted in the Polish posts and comments with respect to political and ideological preferences. This divergence is also noted in the English posts even though the temperature of the exchanges is lower (more specialized and formal language, less emotional in qualitative and quantitative terms).

The title blurring of the boundaries between genres and modes of expression so clearly noted, refers also to other forms of blurring of the boundaries: between what is considered acceptable and what is deemed as inappropriate in social and linguistic conventions. One can also conjecture that all those types of one-to-many, many-to-one and many-to-many CMC are modes which exemplify the formation and structuring of projected CMC individual and social identities of the users in statu nascendi. However, what is most salient on the other hand, is a certain steadfastness in the users’ opinions, a certain impermeability to the arguments of both individual opponents as well as to those of the opposite camp members treated as a group, representing more than an ad hoc assemblage of people but in fact portraying fairly well-entrenched divisions in a society.

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References

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—. 2004b. “Online Communication: Through the Lens of Discourse”. In M. Consalvo, N. K. Baym, J. Hunsinger, K. Bruhn Jensen, J. Logie, M. Murero, & L. R. Shade (Eds.), Internet Research Annual (pp. 65-76). New York, NY: Peter Lang.

—. 2007. “A Faceted Classification Scheme for Computer-Mediated Discourse”. language@internet, 4.

Hinnenkamp, Volker. 2009. “Intercultural communication”. In: Gunter Senft, Jan-Ola Östman, Jef Verschueren (eds.) Amsterdam: John Benjamins. 185-201.

Hockett, Charles F. 1958. A Course in Modern Linguistics. New York: Macmillan.

Jinguang Zhang. 2010. ”Self-enhancement and self-categorization leash – Evidence for a dual-process model of first- and third-person perceptions” Human Communication Research vol. 36, no. 2, 190-215.

Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk, Barbara (ed.). 2010a. New Ways to Language. Łódź: Łódź University Press.

—. 2010b. ”Dynamic interactions in blogs and the Usenet”. Paper delivered at Transforming Audiences, Transforming Societies COST Action 0906 Conference, Zagreb.

—. 2010c ”Re-conceptualization and the emergence of discourse meaning as a theory of translation”. In: Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk, Barbara & Marel Thelen (eds.) Meaning in Translation. Frankfurt a. Main: Peter Lang.

Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk, Barbara & Katarzyna Dziwirek (eds.). 2009. Studies in Cognitive Corpus Linguistics. Frankfurt a. Main: Peter Lang.

Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk, Barbara & Jerzy Tomaszczyk. 2010. ”How much. Europe?. In: Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk, Barbara and Hanna Pulaczewska (eds.). Intercultural Europe: Arenas of Difference, Communication and Mediation. CINTEUS vol. 7, Stuttgart: ibidem-Verlag. 61-84.

Pęzik Piotr. 2011. “Providing corpus feedback for translators with the PELCRA Search Engine for NKJP” In S. Goźdź-Roszkowski (ed.) Explorations across Languages and Corpora PALC 2009. Peter Lang: Frankfurt am Main. 135-144.

Rosch, Eleonor. 1978 “Principles of categorization”. In: E. Rosch and B. B. Lyold (eds) Cognition and Categorization. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum. 27-48.

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Waliński Jacek, and Piotr Pęzik. 2007. “Web access interface to the PELCRA referential corpus of Polish”. In B. Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk (ed.) Practical Applications in Language and Computers PALC 2003. Peter Lang: Frankfurt am Main.

APPENDICES

APPENDIX 1StatisticsENGLISHText 1 (interview – Polish political landscape) – Polish participants (Poland) / translation523 wordsText 2 (information about polling stations) – English author194 wordsText 3 (commentary – PO (Civic Platform) vs PIS (aw & Justice) ) – Polish author (UK)684 wordsTexts TOTAL: 1401 words

Comments (3) – 616 words (229, 163, 224)native English – varied political preferences 1 - - PIS supporter, 1 – PO supporter, 1 – neutral); long turns, language formal (complex syntax, the items dumb/naive/ignorant used – informal but not vulgar,etc.)

POLISH Text 4 (Should emigrants have voting rights?) 523 words (Pole from UK)Comments 7 ( 2 – most active, highest Interconnectivity Value), 858 words, short turns( average 15 words), 1 – most active, longest turns (average 180 words), emotional content; standard unmarked choice of words;

Texts 5,6,7 (Jarosław Kaczyński in Gdańsk/debate/ Solidarity monument, Walentynowicz’s house) - news (95 first words in the abstract)Comments Text 5 - (9) (281 words) Text 6 – (3) (164 words)Text 7 – (9) (345 words)emotional, short turns, casual, colloquial, sarcastic, vulgar, high Interconnectivity Value

Political preferences (support/non-support : - (against) PIS (9)- (against) PO (2)+ (pro) PIS (2)

APPENDIX 2Internet materials (selection of texts)A. English(1) EURONEWS October 6th,2011

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This Sunday Poland will hold elections for its two houses of parliament. It is a dual between the two main parties: Civic Platform and Law and Justice.To discuss Poland’s political landscape today, euronews spoke with the journalist Igor Janke, who is also writes editorials for the newspaper ‘Rzeczpospolita’, and was the founder of Salon24, a highly-popular commentary and information website.Thomas Siemienski, euronews: “Poles will not only be voting for different political parties but for different visions of their country. What choice are they being given as far as Poland’s future?”Igor Janke: “To tell you the truth, it’s a very emotional choice because the two main parties are not very different. The disagreement mainly centres around the question of whether Poland must be reformed in a more dynamic way, if its sovereignty must be heightened, including within the European Union, whether the country should be more autonomous in foreign policy, whether the time has come to take difficult decisions, for instance concerning the economy.”euronews: “Well, seen from the outside, Poland seems like a sort of oasis, having successfully maintained its economy rather well. Why then has the electoral campaign at times resembled a life and death struggle, with the adversary perceived as if it threatened the country’s survival?”Janke: “It is actually a struggle for the adversary’s political death. The reason behind this is the two camps’ common origin. There was a time when the two adversaries were good friends. Today they have become almost enemies — certainly political enemies. The clash between them deepened still more with the Smolensk disaster. This aroused, on one hand, a lot of conspiracy theories, and on another a lot of serious criticism against the government.”euronews: “In the duel between Civic Platform and Law and Justice, Donald Tusk’s party has always been seen as the favourite. Suddenly, in recent public surveys, we see that his adversary, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, has very nearly caught up to him. How did this sudden balancing out of the two parties’ chances happen?”Janke: “Civic Platform’s position is the most difficult because after four years in government, there is a widespread feeling that Tusk’s team has failed to resolve numerous problems. They say it themselves: ‘We have not done everything there was to do, but now we’re going to try to do better’. It’s not the sort of message that’s going to sweep the voters off their feet. Law and Justice are benefiting from this in quite a clever way, pointing out all the government’s faults. They are building up an image of Jaroslaw Kaczynski as the alternative national leader.” euronews: “Just two parties dominate. Where is the Polish left? The Democratic Left Alliance (SLD) party shows six to eight percent of voter intentions. Are the Poles so much to the political right?”Janke: “On one side the Poles are, yes, more conservative than most other people. The left is very clearly in a full-blown crisis. That’s partly due to their not having a strong leader in their midst. Thanks to that, Civic Platform has cleverly managed to win over part of the left’s voters, eroding the SLD still further.”

(2) Cast vote for Polish Elections 2011 in HatfieldBy Ross Logan , Reporter Tuesday, October 4, 2011 6:24 AM

POLISH nationals living in Welwyn Hatfield will be able to vote in their country’s upcoming parliamentary elections.The nation votes on Sunday, with current Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s Civic Platform party marginally ahead of the conservative Law and Justice party in recent polls.And Polish migrants who want to have their say in who runs their country can do so, by going to Hatfield Fire Station in Wellfield Road on October 9.It is the only polling station for the elections in Hertfordshire, and just one of two throughout the East of England, alongside Cambridge.The station will be open from 7am until 9pm for residents to cast their vote.Those eligible to vote have until tomorrow (October 6) to register at www.londynkg.polemb.netMichal Siewniak, who organised the polling station in Hatfield, said: “Hatfield is in the heart of the county, and Hatfield Fire Station is well known to many members of the community.“I feel this is a superb promotion for the town, borough and for the county. “It is an opportunity to engage with those who are living and working here and I hope it will bring a lot of fantastic outcomes.”

(3) Polish election: heating upOctober 6, 2011 3:43 pm by Jan Cienski

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Poland doesn’t have an amusement park worthy of the name – but the stomach-dropping thrills of roller coasters can easily be replicated, first in the wild fluctuations of the zloty against the euro, dollar and Swiss franc, and now in the huge variability of opinion polls just days before Sunday’s parliamentary election.The election is turning out to be more difficult than expected for the ruling Civic Platform (PO) party of premier Donald Tusk, which is battling the nationalists of the opposition Law and Justice (PiS) party.The PiS, under the leadership of former prime minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski, has surged in opinion polls, causing growing concern among investors and analysts.Mujtaba Rahman, an analyst with the Eurasia Group, explained in a new research note:PiS’s poll numbers have dramatically improved over the course of the last week – in a minority of the polls it has been in a dead heat with the PO – meaning there is an increasing chance that PiS may actually win the election (15%). The spike in PiS’s poll numbers are in keeping with previous episodes (historically, PiS has always been underestimated in the polls because of the “political correctness” factor-namely, many of the major organizations that use face-to-face questionnaires aren’t able to capture the support for PiS from its less educated base, given they sometimes feels uncomfortable revealing their views to younger, better educated pollsters)As Rahman noted, the chances of Kaczynski actually forming a government are fairly low as all of the parties likely making it into the next parliament have said they would not form a government with him – aware of his reputation of devouring smaller coalition partners.But low is not zero, which is worrying business. Even if Kaczynski is not returned as Poland’s next prime minister (and the recent fuss over anti-German comments by Kaczynski makes it less likely), the post-election landscape on Monday morning could see Tusk scrambling to build a very wide coalition with unreliable parties, like a new populist movement led by anticlerical millionaire Janusz Palikot, which could hurt confidence in Poland.John Duckworth, head of the CEE operations of Jones Lang LaSalle, the real estate firm, is concerned that deals in the pipeline could be put off if Poland is hit by political instability.He said:

In the last 24 months Poland has managed to differentiate itself from many European markets as being a relative haven of political stability and economic growth. In times where investment decisions and choices are under a highly critical microscope, it is key that momentum is maintained for Poland if the flow of FDI is maintained and investor confidence in a wider fragile market remains intact. The forthcoming elections will be an important litmus test that will either back continued and mature growth, or a change in direction based upon perhaps more opaque and populist drivers.

The concern was also echoed by Wood & Co., a central European investment bank.“It is just three days ahead of the scheduled general elections on 9 October and the result looks highly uncertain,” writes the bank’s Mark Robinson in a note entitled Polish elections: Dice or roulette?. “A different, less market-friendly result is a distinct possibility, especially as support for the PiS has solidified in recent weeks and Hungary’s populist government continues its PiS-like agenda.”At stake is Poland’s fiscal consolidation programme – the government hopes (somewhat optimistically) to drive the budget deficit below 3 per cent of gross domestic product by next year, which would be difficult to achieve under the PiS – a party which has made fairly lavish pre-election promises, and which has a paucity of economists to call on to take senior jobs. The PiS could also follow in the steps of the Hungarians and gut the private leg of the state pension system, and a proposed banking tax would also dent the profits of banks.As well, any new government would again set off the merry-go round of job changes at the top of state-controlled companies – a traditional feature of Polish power changes.That might just more of an amusement park than Polish business and investors can bear.

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Comments October 6 7:23pm (1)It is outrageous how one-sided and weak this article is. If anyone follows the situation there from any other source(s), it becomes obvious that situation is more complicated and less democratic, more like present day Ukraine or Putin’s Russia. I’m not a fan of one political side; but you can’t take politics in Poland at face value. Executive, administrative, and legislative, powers are monopolized on one side and in one set of hands, as well as most mainstream media, so the constant topic in the local press and “mandated” headlines in Poland are about reminding everyone how “evil and destructive” the opposition is (mostly that PIS party). That’s, obviously, when the ruling camp has not much good to brag about. Opposition which in reality is very weak and impotent, and practically means very little; yet we must hear so much about it and the threats it poses, even here. Even if the “much-feared”, as it is presented here, PIS wins by a minor margin and still very far from any majority (and that’s even not likely), they would be sidelined, because every other party qualifying to the parliament, under current polls, represents the current coalition. Sorry to use harsh language and speculation, but just makes me wonder if Mr. Cienski is this dumb, naive / ignorant, or follows a certain script because he wants to or maybe “has to”.

(2)@ m.r.

Everyone is entitled to their own theory (conspiracy or otherwise), and their own innuendos :(

But the issue Mr. Cienski describes is very real - Poland's govt predicts 4% GDP growth, I think that if the sentiment, investment and growth climate in Europe persist they'll be lucky to get 2%, but that will happen as long as the markets have confidence in the direction and political stability of the govt. Frankly, an unstable coalition will be almost - in outside investors' eyes be as bad as any populist party.

Remember, PiS lowered taxes - and... ... that didn't markedly improve investor perception - because it's the perception of political stability and, first and foremost, predictability that count. Not much different from the stock market: Overshooting your quarterly estimate by a wide margin is only slightly better than under-performing.

PS: You can tell more about a person by what he says about others than you can by what others say about him (Leo Aikman)

(3)Comparing Poland’s democracy to the situation in Russia or in Ukraine is preposterous – no opposition leaders are on trial in Poland, there is no legal or financial barrier preventing parties from campaigning, and there is a broad range of opinions in the mainstream media – from the Gazeta Wyborcza, which is strongly in favour of the government, to Rzeczpospolita which backs Law and Justice. Over the last two decades, Poland has built up a democratic system that doesn’t differ much in quality and openness from that seen in most of western Europe. As for the attitudes surrounding a possible PiS victory, the views of the business people and analysts in the article are real, and such a victory would have an impact on how Poland is perceived, with attendant consequences for investment decisions and the exchange rate. It is true that it will be difficult for PiS to build a coalition, but that largely stems from its record of devouring its smaller allies during its 2005-2007 stint in government, and from the often radical views of its leaders – which scares off potential partners. To say that all the parties in parliament, including the ex-communist SLD and potentially the populist Palikot movement “represents the current coalition” is simply incorrect. Finally, “dumb, naive / ignorant” is entirely possible (ask my wife), but “has to” is simply ridiculous. B. Polish(1) 04.10.2011 09:55 14 Czy emigranci powinni głosować?

Wiem jakie są przepisy. Wiem, że każdy obywatel RP ma prawo do głosowania w wyborach do najwyższych władz państwowych. Tyle, że ja zawsze skupiam się na elementach praktycznych, teorie pozostawiając teoretykom. Mnie bardziej interesuje moralny i etyczny aspekt narzucania komuś swoich fanaberii.Wiem, na Salonie24, generalnie propisowskim, głosy starej, patriotycznej emigracji to istotny składnik elektoratu i wszelkie próby zmiany prawa byłyby natychmiast okrzyknięte zamachem na Prawa Człowieka. Nie szkodzi. Ja piszę o wymiarze praktycznym, pomijając już oczywisty fakt, że najnowsza migracja do bogatszych krajów Unii jest zdecydowanie antypisowska i proplatformerska. Mniejsza akurat o te niuanse. W czym rzecz. Otóż ja, podobnie jak 2-3 milionów rodaków żyjemy w innych krajach. Tu zarabiamy pieniądze (prawdziwe

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pieniądze), tu prowadzimy swoje życie. Tu Polacy się osiedlają i zapuszczają korzenie. Tu płacimy podatki, tu robimy kwalifikacje zawodowe (tutejsze!), tu ludzie robią dyplomy, pobierają się, posyłają dzieci do tutejszych szkół. Tutaj, na zachodzie Europy 2-3 milionów Polaków znalazło swój nowy dom, swoją drugą ojczyznę. Lokalną ojczyznę. I teraz my wszyscy, żyjący sobie tutaj spokojnym, ustabilizowanym zyciem, żyjąc w innym systemie społecznym, gospodarczym - mamy dyktować rodakom pozostałym jeszcze w kraju, kto ma nimi rządzić! Moim zdaniem jest to co najmniej niestosowne. To tak jakby ktoś chciał dyktować swoim kuzynom, jak mają urządzić sobie sypialnię...

Polacy żyjący za granicami nie poniosą konsekwencji swoich wyborów. Ot, mogą głosować na ugrupowanie (nie wnikam w upodobania polityczne, bo to nie ma w tym wywodzie znaczenia), które rozwali polską gospodarkę lub system społeczny, emerytalny itp. Nie oni poniosą tego konsekwencje, tylko Polacy żyjący w Polsce!Oczywiście, że wielu myśli o powrocie. Z moich obserwacji wynika, że o powrocie do Polski myśli zdecydowana większość migrantów. Ale ci ludzie nie wracają. Z roku na rok odkładają plany powrotu w nieskończoność. Jeśli już, to na chwilę, zderzając się z polską rzeczywistością, niemożnością, mentalnością - stwierdzają, że jeszcze wiele wody musi w Wiśle upłynąć, żeby tu się dało żyć. I nie chodzi wcale o sprawy materialne. Bo np. w UK dla większości żyjących tu Polaków wcale tak słodko nie jest. Ja sobie nie wyobrażam jak ci ludzie żyją, zarabiając w różnych fabrykach, na zmywakach najniższe wynagrodzenie. To jest przecież wegetacja. Ja płacę tygodniowo więcej podatków niż zdecydowana większość polskich migrantów zarabia! Gnieżdżą się w kilka rodzin w dużych domach, korzystając ze wspólnych łazienek i kuchni. Jak Cyganie. Do Polski nie chcą jednak wracać. Ale głosować pojadą do konsulatu.Owszem, są i tacy, którzy mają plan odłożenia jakiejś kasy i zainwestowania po powrocie w jakiś super biznes. Amen. Jest to jakaś licząca się grupa, która rzeczywiście ma nie tylko praktyczne, ale moralne prawo do wybierania władz w Polsce. Ale tego moralnego prawa nie mają osoby (takie jak ja), które do Polski wrócą tylko wtedy, gdy mnie stąd wyrzucą. Albo zmieni się diametralnie mentalność polskich urzędników, polityków, czy choćby sprzedawczyń w sklepach przez litość nie wymieniając ludzi sprzedających samochody...Absolutnie prawa do głosowania nie powinny mieć osoby posiadające drugie obywatelstwo. Skoro przyjąłeś obywatelstwo kraju, w którym osiadłeś, to tam głosuj, tam wybieraj władze, których działalność będzie miała bezposredni wpływ na twoje życie. Nie wybieraj władz ludziom, na których możesz się wypiąć i stwierdzić:" a dobrze wam tak teraz...". Koniec cytatu... COMMENTS@ autor

Oczywiście, że nie powinni. A jeżeli komuś naprawdę zależy to niech to pokaże i przyjedzie na wybory do kraju.TAKTOJA 0 123 | 04.10.2011 10:10

@TakToJano to byłby juz fanatyk. Chciałbyś, żeby tacy wybierali władzę w Polsce?NIEPOKORNY Z UK 46 284 | 04.10.2011 10:15

@AutorOczywiście, ze powinni ;) ,

zresztą, wszyscy w domu już głosowaliśmyna pierwszego z brzegu, jedynkę na pierwszej karcie.

@Zasada HeisenbergaAle dlaczego? Podaj mi choć jeden argument dlaczego głosowałeś? Nie musi być merytoryczny, bo takich nie ma...

Ciekawe i ważne pytanieAutorze, poruszyłeś problem tyle istotny co drażliwy. Dobrze, że głos ten padł właśnie od emigranta.Od dawna myślałem o tej kwestii w podobny sposób, widząc w tym jakąś niekonsekwencję. O większości tych co wyjechali, zwłaszcza dawno, można z całą pewnością powiedzieć że nie wrócą. Mają za granicą rodziny, domy, pracę, przyjaciół. Sam znam kilkoro takich emigrantów z lat 80tych. Mimo, że utrzymują z Polską kontakt i czują się Polakami, czy daje im to prawo by o Polsce

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decydować skoro nie wiąże ich z nią nic poza sentymentem. Nie wnikając w powody, które ich do emigracji zachęciły czy zmusiły - oni już wybrali.Nie chcę tym nikomu odbierać prawa do polskości, patriotyzmu, przywiązania. Jestem za utrzymywaniem ciasnych więzi z emigracją, za ułatwieniami w dostępie do kraju, języka, kultury. Ale gwarancja równych praw wyborczych to według mnie nadmiar kurtuazji.I jak Autorze wspomniałeś, nie ma tu żadnego znaczenia jakie są poglądy polityczne emigracji. Mam też nadzieję, że dyskusja na ten temat również pokona utrwaloną na S24 granicę i podziały.PIWO LUBIE 0 31 | 04.10.2011 10:38

@piwo lubieDziękuję za świetny merytorycznie komentarz. Dobra ta wstawka o kurtuazji. Bo póki emigracja, to był bilet w jedną stronę, to nie stanowił istotnego elektoratu. Od czasu wejścia do Unii i wyjazdu milionów Polaków za pracą, za godnym życiem, zmieniło się to radykalnie. Już poprzednie wybory do Sejmu, gdzie znacząca część emigracja stała w wielogodzinnych kolejkach do urny, powinna wywołać dyskusję. A nie wywołała. Jeszcze jedna istotna sprawa zamieciona pod dywan...pozdrawiam serdecznieNIEPOKORNY Z UK 46 284 | 04.10.2011 10:47

@niepokorny z UKPo pierwszemam takie prawo bo mam obywatelstwo polskiepo drugie

jestem w tym osobiście zainteresowany bo mam dom w Polsce za który regularnie place podatek od nieruchomości oraz vat i podatek akcyzowy za energie i media.ZASADA HEISENBERGA 0 91 | 04.10.2011 10:50

@ autorOczywiscie, ze powinni - jak dlugo sa polskimi podatnikami, zgodnie ze stara amerykanska zasada ' no taxation without represenation'. Jako ze kazdy Obywatel Polski, zyjacy legalnie za granica, jezeli ma jakikolwiek dochod w Polsce (w tym z odsetek bankowych) musi skladac corocznie PIT dla nierezydentow, dlaczego nie mialby miec takiego prawa?Etycznie , bardziej kontrowersyjne dla mnie jest glosowanie Obywateli,posiadajacych podwojne obywatelstwo, nieplacacych podatkow w Polsce i majacych stale miejsce zamieszkania poza RP. Z tym ze wtedy idac przykladem Irlandii trzeba stworzyc inny mechanizm zwiazania diaspory z krajem.TOMTOR 0 3 | 04.10.2011 10:57 nieco wyjaśnia. Ale dom w Polsce mogą mieć przecież także obywatele innych państw. Mogą miec firmy płacące dużo większe podatki niz Pan. I co? Dać im prawo do wyboru posła?NIEPOKORNY Z UK 46 284 | 04.10.2011 11:02

@tomtorAno dlatego, że jego rezydencja, interesy życiowe są gdzie indziej. podatki płacą nawet turyści kupujący ciupagę pod Giewontem...NIEPOKORNY Z UK 46 284 | 04.10.2011 11:03

@Zasada HeisenbergaDlatego też dyskusja ma bardziej charakter etyczny niż prawny. Nie ma mechanizmu, i raczej nie da się go stworzyć na gruncie prawa, który by w jakikolwiek sposób dyskryminował obywateli Polski ze względu na ich "chwilowe" przebywanie. Chwilowe wziąłem w cudzysłów, bo chyba to sprawia, że różnimy się poglądami.Poza przytoczonym w poprzednim komentarzu emigrantami, znam też ludzi, których kariera nieustannie rzuca po całym świecie, w Polsce bywają rzadko, a na dodatek nie zmieni się to przez kolejne lata. Znam takich, którzy wyjechali na rok, dwa, trzy by podratować budżet i ułatwić sobie start w Polsce. Ich intencje i plany są jednak ściśle związane z Polską. Nie zostają obywatelami innych państw, nie sprzedają domów w Polsce i nie zamykają kont.Co jednak z tymi, którzy sami o sobie wiedzą, że do Polski nigdy nie wrócą? Nikt im obywatelstwa, a więc prawa głosu nie odbierze. A jakie oni mają prawo by nam tę Polskę meblować według swego pomysłu?Może jakiś okres karencji by się przydał? Np, jeśli w ciągu ostatnich 5 czy 10 lat nie mieszkałeś w

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kraju przez co najmniej pół roku, nie masz głosu. Jak wrócisz na owe pół roku chociaż, odzyskujesz głos.PIWO LUBIE 0 31 | 04.10.2011 11:16

@niepokorny z UK>>Dać im prawo do wyboru posła?skoro mają obywatelstwo polskie, dlaczego nie?ZASADA HEISENBERGA 0 91 | 04.10.2011 11:16

@piwo lubieMyślę, ze obywatelstwo plus podatek dochodowy lub od nieruchomości powinien być wystarczający do zachowania prawa wyborczego.Ja wiem ze wrócę i dlatego bronie swojego prawa.a ci którzy wiedza, ze do Polski nie wrócą to raczej nie są zainteresowani i nie głosują.ZASADA HEISENBERGA 0 91 | 04.10.2011 11:28

NiepokornyPowinni (utrzymuję, mam prawo żądać):

http://hekatonchejres.salon24.pl/349493,moj-kandydat-gazeta-dom

Pozdrawiam serdecznieROLEX 625 15100 | 04.10.2011 11:57

(4) Jarosław Kaczyński w Gdańsku

Jarosław Kaczyński w czwartek wczesnym popołudniem dotarł pociągiem do Gdańska, gdzie spędzi przedostatni dzień kampanii. Jak mówił, to dla niego symboliczna "podróż do zwycięstwa". Po drodze Kaczyński mobilizował lokalnych działaczy PiS do aktywności w ostatnie dni przed wyborami.Jego zdaniem "Walentynowicz stając się zaczynem buntu, który wstrząsnął nie tylko Polską, ale także światem, wpisała się w polską historię, jak bardzo niewielu ludzi".

Jak podkreślił, bez Walentynowicz ruch, jakim była Solidarność, by nie powstał.

- To ona podtrzymała strajk w momencie, kiedy opadał, to ona w dziejach tego ruchu strzegła w sposób najbardziej twardy i bezkompromisowy

Comments Dość Kaczyńskiego! Kubs (gość) 07.10.11, 12:25:50 Nie chcemy Kaczyńskiego już nigdy więcej! Dajmy szanse pokazać co potrafi Palikot... Ja zagłosuję teraz na Biedronia! Lesniczy gajowy (gość) 07.10.11, 11:29:38 nie wywołuj tuska z lasu!!!!! Prezio Gazda z Diabelnej (gość) 07.10.11, 08:06:44 Prezio nie byłby sobą gdyby nie ściemniał. niech pokarze mi jakąś prominentną osobę z opozycji która widziała go w tym pociągu no chyba że jechał do brata. Mówiąc o p Walentynowicz że ona podtrzymała strajk w stoczni zapomniał pewnie bo go tam nie było o p Krzywonos no ale ona dzisiaj jest w PO a to jest be dla Prezia i jest przekaz z centrali PiS o awarii tramwaju. Może mohery wierzą Preziowi ale normalni ludzie to już nie wybory. (1) Robotnik. (gość) 06.10.11, 22:10:08 Zlodzieje na pomorzu tez sie boja, dlatego nie chca glosowac na PiS!!!!! zlodzieje... krzysztof (gość) 07.10.11, 01:52:54 alez oni sa czlonkami pis! No, i byłbym zapomniał - wszystko przez te lemingi :) Polihistor (gość) 06.10.11, 21:50:43 Sto lat, Panie Prezesie!I wygrania miażdżącą przewagą.

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Jeśli nie teraz, to w najbliższym czasie.Kiedy Polacy zagadają po węgiersku. :)

Lemingom z forum pozdrowienie! Polihistor (gość) 06.10.11, 21:33:52 Powiem krótko: chamstwo i jad mają jakieś tam swoje znaczenie, ale tylko do czasu.W długim okresie (czasami bardzo długim, niestety, ale zawsze ograniczonym), górę biorą czynniki racjonalne.I to one decydują ostatecznie o postawach, wyborach, ocenach.Dlatego, skoro już musicie, używajcie sobie dziś, nieszczęśni frustraci. Może będzie wam - dzięki temu - przez chwilę lżej?Ja wiem, nie przybędzie wam od tego pieniędzy, ani szacunku ludzkiego, ani baby/chłopa, ani nawet połówki.Ale może zagłuszycie w sobie to, co was boli?No, to wrzeszczcie sobie dalej.Nuże, niech was kaczki! :)

(5) KACZYŃSKI WZIĄŁ UDZIAŁ W DEBACIE Biuro Polityczne Prawa i Sprawiedliwości (gość) 06.10.11, 16:49:33 JAROSŁAW KACZYŃSKI WZIĄŁ UDZIAŁ W DEBACIE: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DdWSVaRBmA

CommentsNasz napoleonek podróżuje pociągiem niczym dyktator Korei Płn. wow (gość) 06.10.11, 16:29:50 ;) Tupet i zachęta i im podobni ! (1) BiziTo (gość) 06.10.11, 16:27:14 odpowiem wam tym samym językiem-to wy spieprzajcie z pomorza razem z PO-platformą bo z platformy szybko się spada i takie chamstwo dobrze żeby spadło zaraz pod koła tych obecnie "super szybkich pociągów " a być tak ślepym i głosować na peło i palikota to na pewno obudzisz się z rękoma w fekaliach nocnika i twoje dzieci niedorozwinięte i żebracze chleba na wykopkach na saksach, ile w tobie ordynarności i podłości zakuty łbie przedstawicielu Kapo w PO - śmierdzisz i spi.....aj z Polski.!!Bizy A kto tu mówi o platformie debilu? Żenada a (gość) 07.10.11, 08:23:48 Wszystko inne niż PiS jest 100 razy lepsze. Widać jendoznacznie, że jesteś maniakiem PiS'u i że nie nawidzisz PO. Ja nigdzie nie napisałem że chwalę PO. Następnym razem się zastanów zamiast od razu wyzywać od Kapo PO itp. ! +2 / -5 zgłoś naruszenie odpowiedz (6) Jarosław Kaczyński przed domem Walentynowicz i Pomnikiem Stoczniowców w Gdańsku

2011-10-06 07:46:36, aktualizacja: 2011-10-06 16:30:05

Jarosław Kaczyński w czwartek wczesnym popołudniem dotarł pociągiem do Gdańska, gdzie spędzi przedostatni dzień kampanii. Jak mówił, to dla niego symboliczna "podróż do zwycięstwa". Po drodze Kaczyński mobilizował lokalnych działaczy PiS do aktywności w ostatnie dni przed wyborami. Visual materialJego zdaniem "Walentynowicz stając się zaczynem buntu, który wstrząsnął nie tylko Polską, ale także światem, wpisała się w polską historię, jak bardzo niewielu ludzi".

Jak podkreślił, bez Walentynowicz ruch, jakim była Solidarność, by nie powstał.

- To ona podtrzymała strajk w momencie, kiedy opadał, to ona w dziejach tego ruchu strzegła w sposób najbardziej twardy i bezkompromisowy jego podstawowych wartości. Dlatego zasługuje na szczególną pamięć - zaznaczył prezes PiS.

W jego opinii, śmierć Walentynowicz w katastrofie lotniczej pod Smoleńskiem także miała wymiar symboliczny, gdyż - jak podkreślił - zamknęła w sposób niezwykły ten nadzwyczajny życiorys.

Jarosław Kaczyński spotkał się z gdańskimi stoczniowcami (FILM, ZDJĘCIA)

Annę Walentynowicz wspominała też Joanna Gwiazda, żona innej legendy "S" - Andrzeja Gwiazdy, kandydata

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PiS do Senatu.

- Ania przez cały czas walczyła o to samo, wyznawała te same wartości, walczyła o prawa pracownicze, o godziwą płacę, o bezpieczne warunki pracy, walczyła o wolność słowa, żeby nikt nie był represjonowany za poglądy - mówiła.

Uroczystość przed domem Walentynowicz zakłóciło pojawienie się kobiety z pudełkiem po pizzy; gdy je otworzyła ukazał się napis "Spieprzaj dziadu". Natychmiast podbiegli do niej mężczyźni w kamizelkach z napisem "Stocznia Gdańsk", zabrali pudełko i zmusili do opuszczenia miejsca konferencji. Nie było przepychanek ani krzyków. Odbyło się to w asyście, obecnego na miejscu, policjanta.

Gdynia: Jarosław Kaczyński krytykuje rząd za postawę wobec gospodarki morskiejNa dworcu PKP w Gdańsku szefa PiS - jak na innych stacjach, na których zatrzymywał się pociąg - witali działacze jego partii; byli tam też sympatycy PO i Ruchu Palikota. Zwolennicy PiS-u wznosili m.in. okrzyki: "Zwyciężymy!" i "Bóg, Honor, Ojczyzna"; z kolei sympatycy Platformy mieli transparenty z napisami: "Polska w budowie".

Delegacja PiS na czele z prezesem partii złożyła również kwiaty na grobie Anny Walentynowicz na gdańskim Srebrzysku. W przedostatnim dniu kampanii wyborczej prezes PiS złożył także kwiaty pod PomnikiemPoległych Stoczniowców w Gdańsku.

Comments

PO albo nie będzie emerytur? as (gość) 06.10.11, 16:15:54 Tusk właśnie mówił, ze jeżeli nie zagłosujemy na PO nie będzie emerytur!!! Poziom Łukaszenki! Tak straszy Polaków! Żal słuchać tego typa! PO już się stołków w radach nadzorczych (tych których jeszcze nie obsadziła) i sejmie nie może doczekać. +2 / -2 Autokorekta / oksza (gość) 06.10.11, 15:11:09 No proszę: pisałem POMOŻE, a myślałem o naszym regionie.I co , chłopaki - jak RZYĆ ?? 0 / 0 @ z @ anty PiS / oksza (gość) 06.10.11, 15:07:58 Ta agresja w niczym wam nie pomorze.Więcej ludzkich uczuć ! +1 / 0 Co za tupet a (gość) 06.10.11, 15:05:10 Wy pie ** alaj dziadu z pomorza! +6 / -3 Zachęcam Pana Prezesa z (gość) 06.10.11, 13:01:19 do kolejnych wskazówek, gdzie stał On, a gdzie stało ZOMO +6 / -1 . anty PiS (gość) 06.10.11, 12:14:06 Panu J.Kaczyńskiemu na Pomorzu mówimy "spieprzaj dziadu!" +13 / -7 Wybory (1) Hera (gość) 06.10.11, 11:21:59 Mam taką nadzieję,że co niektórym nam do po może w wyborze odpowiedniego kandydata na sejm i bardzo chciałabym,by to był ktoś z PIS-u.Cztery lata temu obiecano nam tanie państwo,a co mamy drożyznę na każdym kroku:czynsze,gaz,prąd,nie mówiąc o żywności,która drożeje z miesiąca na miesiąc.Brak miejsc pracy dla młodych i godziwych zarobków dla tych co ją posiadają.Wyprzedaż najbardziej dochodowych zakładów pracy,zniszczenie stoczni i współpracującymi z nimi zakładami,a obecnie podjęcie sprzedaży najbardziej nowoczesnej i dochodowej rafinerii w Gdańsku,nie mówiąc o bałaganie na budowach i wielkich korupcjach z

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nimi związanych,a także trwonienie pieniędzy z tzw. funduszy unijnych.Przykład ul.Kartuska w Gdańsku:dwa lata temu zmodernizowano część ulicy łącznie z chodnikiem,obecnie ponownie wykonano modernizację tego chodnika ponieważ puszczono tą stroną ścieżkę rowerową.Czy to nie jest trwonienie pieniędzy?Mam nadzieję,że dokonamy dobrego wyboru w niedzielę. +4 / -9 Jak zwykle temat kartuskiej na wszystkich forach/ chyba od niedoszłych "rządzących miastem" mieszkanka ul kartuskiej (gość) 06.10.11, 16:40:04 w ,którym miejscu ten chodnik modernizowano 2 lata temu i robiono to teraz?. Coś się komuś pomyliło. WITAMY cep (gość) 06.10.11, 09:51:06 Pana JKaczynskiego na pomorzu gdzie powstala S

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