Sophia – the Personification of Divine Wisdom in the Culture of Novgorod the Great from 13th to 15th Century

The idea of Sophia – the personified Wisdom of God served as a symbol of independence and identity of the republic in the political culture of Novgorod the Great. In Old Russian chronicles and other narrative sources which can be connected with Novgorod, one may find statements showing that – in the eyes of the Novgorodians themselves – Wisdom was not only one of the main attributes of God, but also a separate character, a kind of divine being, who could be interpreted as patronesses and supernatural protector of the city-state. Construction of the temple of Hagia Sophia in Novgorod is usually dated to 1045–1050. In the source material one can find information that Novgorodian Sophia church was undoubtedly the most significant and important monument in the city. The theme of Wisdom of God is also a very prominent topic in Novgorodian historiography and literature. Moreover, the feminine personification of God’s Wisdom can also be found on the coins, emitted by the city-state from 1420.This article has been written under the research project funded by the National Science Centre (Sophia – the Personification of Divine Wisdom: the History of the Notion in the Byzantine-Slavonic Culture, 2011/03/N/HS2/00890)

Births to single mothers: Age- and education-related changes in Poland between 1985 and 2010

Background: In Poland the share of non-marital births has increased steadily for more than two decades. Studies differentiating between births to unmarried partnered and unpartnered women are rare. Objective: This paper examines the age- and education-related changes in the share of births to unpartnered women in a setting characterised by a rising non-marital birth ratio. Methods: I use Polish birth registers for the years 1985 to 2011, which cover all births between 1985 and 2010 and contain some information on the parents (e.g., date of birth, education, and marital status at the time of the child's birth). Results: In the analysed period the share of births to unpartnered women was stable at a level of 3%-5% of all births. Substantial increases were only noted among the least educated and teenage mothers, whose values exceeded 20% and 30%, respectively, in 2010. The share of teenagers among unpartnered mothers rose from around a quarter to more than one-third. Conclusions: In Poland the share of births to unpartnered women remained stable in the period 1985-2010, but the number of the youngest and least educated mothers in this share increased

Open resources of knowledge illustrated with an example of scientific institutions in Lodz with particular focus on the University of Lodz

Artykuł został opublikowany w: Otwarte zasoby wiedzy. Nowe zadania uczelni i bibliotek w rozwoju komunikacji naukowej - Materiały konferencyjne Kraków–Zakopane, 15–17 czerwca 2011 Praca zbiorowa pod redakcją Marka M. Górskiego i Marzeny Marcinek KrakówThe purpose of this article is to discuss the issue of open resources of knowledge that are made available by scientific institutions in Lodz. The paper comprises characterisation of Open Access resources including scientific periodicals, scientific repositories (already existing ones such as ECNIS and those in the process of being set up, e.g. the repositories of Lodz University and the Technical University of Lodz), digital libraries and other databases offering on-line access to their resources. Other issues presented in the article are: the process of creating or modifying periodicals for the purposes of the Open Access model, financing, indexing and solutions for copyrights regarding such resources. The paper also includes the results of a survey done at the University of Lodz, the purpose of which was to demonstrate how much the university’s research and academic staff know about the subject of Open Access. The article will also discuss the institutional repository which is being created by the University of Lodz and the Library of the University of Lodz, and whose function will be to collect and store scientific publications and didactic materials by employees of Lodz University. The article will also present characterisation of scientific Open Access periodicals edited and created by scientific institutions in Lodz, inter alia the University of Lodz, the Institute of Biopolymers and Chemical Fibres, the Institute of Paediatrics (the Medical University of Lodz), the Military Teaching Hospital, and the Medical University of Lodz. The main purpose of the article is to demonstrate the development of Open Access-based resources of knowledge, especially in the scientific community of Lodz

The Role of Gender in Language Communication: A Short Overview

The paper deals with the development of the gender concept and the way it is moving away from the notions of binary thinking. Its influence on the methods of linguistic analysis is taken into consideration. Different feminist ideologies – liberal, radical, socialist and cultural feminism as well as the feminism of power – are presented in the context of their view on women-men relations. Other ideologies that shape the idea of ‘doing gender’ are shown, too. All of them – postmodernism, identity politics and the globalization trend - come from outside linguistics. The binary classification is usually made automatically as an obvious and natural one. It is done against a strong tendency to underline the fuzziness of male-female boundaries in the philosophical speculations that are a starting point for the research in many disciplines

The logical aspects of a language and humorous texts The role of the logical mechanism in jokes

"The objective of this paper is a presentation of the relations between the logical aspects of a language and the study of jokes. The linguistic material used in sample analyses comprises modern texts about mathematicians which render the specific way of thinking attributed to this group within joke stereotypes. Bearing in mind that humour is frequently connected with creativity and an ability to depart from patterns, we should assume that when humorous texts are creative and break the rules, when they are inconsistent with standards and exceptional - and thus illogical - they fulfil their ludic purpose very well. Another fundamental issue is the existence and function of so-called nonsense humour which - being contrary to the principles of logic - constitutes a separate whole. Its distinction would imply that the remaining types of humorous texts are rational, that is logical. Thus humour may be both logical and illogical. The main objective of this paper is search for an answer to the question whether the logical mechanism is obligatorily present in every type of humour. ""The objective of this paper is a presentation of the relations between the logical aspects of a language and the study of jokes. The linguistic material used in sample analyses comprises modern texts about mathematicians which render the specific way of thinking attributed to this group within joke stereotypes. Bearing in mind that humour is frequently connected with creativity and an ability to depart from patterns, we should assume that when humorous texts are creative and break the rules, when they are inconsistent with standards and exceptional - and thus illogical - they fulfil their ludic purpose very well. Another fundamental issue is the existence and function of so-called nonsense humour which - being contrary to the principles of logic - constitutes a separate whole. Its distinction would imply that the remaining types of humorous texts are rational, that is logical. Thus humour may be both logical and illogical. The main objective of this paper is search for an answer to the question whether the logical mechanism is obligatorily present in every type of humour.

Polish Jokes about Americans

The objective of the present paper is to analyze the character of Polish jokes about Americans and to find out what these jokes say about Poles. The latter question results from the assumption that stereotypes reveal more about those who propagate them than about those who allegedly represent particular traits. The popularity of Americans is a certain novelty in contemporary Polish jokes and this fact could be interpreted as another element in the processes of so-called McDonaldization. The texts are presented by the chronology of events they refer to. Americans are perceived by Poles as the enemies of the Russians, and so as a positive protagonist, a symbol of the high standard of living and an embodiment of the dream of success and freedom. Wide open spaces and big American cities, cowboys, Indians, Hollywood and Coca Cola are other symbols frequently occurring in jokes. AIDS and drug addictions are also supposed to be the products of America altogether with American right to carry arms, litigiousness and death penalty. Another feature of the  Americans readily exploited by scoffers is a relatively short history and the hypocrisy of American political correctness. The general image of an American emerging from the analyzed jokes is largely positive and definitely more colorful than the image of a Pole in American jokes. Contextual references included in jokes show the knowledge of the Poles about America. And it does not really matter if this knowledge sometimes seems to be only a reflection of the image created and widespread by and for the use of the Americans themselves

Fertility and education in Poland during state socialism

Background: Studies on fertility in Poland focus on the turbulent transition period and its consequences. However, during state socialism significant societal and demographic changes took place. Objective: This article studies the macro-level relationship between education and completed fertility of Polish women born between 1930 and 1959, and tries to assess how changes in women's educational structure affected fertility. Methods: Using data from the large-scale Fertility Survey 2002 that accompanied the Polish population census, I first look into fertility trends by education and five-year cohorts. Then, by applying Cho's and Retherford's decomposition analysis and direct standardisation, I assess the role of women's educational expansion in fertility changes. Results: Despite profound structural changes and the ruling egalitarian ideology, the educational gradient in completed fertility remained strongly negative in all analysed cohorts. The observed decline in completed fertility from 2.51 in the 1930-34 cohort to 2.22 in the 1955-59 cohort can be explained by the expansion of female education. Had the educational structure not changed, the completed fertility of the youngest cohort would have been slightly higher than that of the oldest cohort. Conclusions: Under state socialism in Poland, better-educated women had on average fewer children than the less educated. The expansion of female education played an important role in fertility decline

Creating Gender in Texts. A Study in Two Testimonies

Celem artykułu jest pokazanie, w jaki sposób można badać relacje między płcią nadawcy a kształtem wypowiedzi, jakie podobieństwa bądź rozbieżności ujawniają są w przedstawianych fragmentach męskiego i kobiecego świata oraz w jakim stopniu otrzymany obraz przystaje do zachowań językowych stereotypowo wiązanych z płcią. Przed[1]miotem analizy są dwa teksty, tzw. świadectwa [nawrócenia]. Jako metodę zastosowano krytyczną analizę dyskursu uzupełnioną, proponowanym przez kognitywistów, profilowaniem. Główne, poddane wersyfikacji, tezy o różnicach w dyskursie żeńskim i męskim do[1]tyczą zakresu tematycznego, stopnia subiektywizacji tekstu, jego nasycenia emocjonalizmami oraz odzwierciedlającej się w wypowiedziach biernej lub czynnej postawy nadawcy wobec życia