ПОЛЬСЬКА МОВА ДЛЯ ВСІХ: МІЖКУЛЬТУРНИЙ МІСТ У ЄВРОПУ

Franciszek Leja (1885–1979) and His Memoirs Dawniej było inaczej (‘It Was Different in the Past’) The article aims to present previously unpublished memoirs of mathematician Franciszek Leja, spanning the years 1885–1958 – from his birth to his participation in the International Congress of Mathematicians in Edinburgh. Leja recalls the childhood of a peasant son struggling with poverty, his education at the folk school in Grodzisk and the public school in Leżajsk. Then he describes his studies at a gymnasium in Jarosław and at the University of Lviv (Lwów). He recalls the difficult path to obtaining a doctorate and habilitation at a time when he had to balance his scientific studies with work in Galician junior high schools (1910–1924) and briefly describes his scholarship in France and England (1912/1913, scholarship from the Kretkowski Fund). The penultimate section consists of Leja’s recollections from a 12-year period of work at the Warsaw University of Technology, where he was a professor of mathematics at the Faculty of Chemistry, and when he took over the chair of mathematics at the Jagiellonian University in 1936 and then from his scientific visit to France, which took place on the eve of the war. The last, unfinished chapter was devoted to his recollections of the arrest of Jagiellonian University professors on 6 November 1939, his clandestine teaching during the war, and his post-war visits abroad. The memoirs are preceded by Leja’s short biography. Numerous footnotes were added, expanding and correcting the information provided in the original text and illustrations.

Anna Frajlich: Departures, Returns, Memory

Introduction. In today’s globalized world, managers increasingly operate within transnational teams, where diverse cultures, languages, and managerial traditions intersect. This format of work requires not only professional competence but also the ability to adapt to cultural hybridity. The psychological adaptation of a manager is a key factor for effective intercultural interaction, encompassing cultural intelligence, cognitive flexibility, stress resilience, and communication skills. Methods. The study employed a mixed-methods approach combining quantitative (surveys, correlation analysis) and qualitative methods (semi-structured interviews). Standardized scales were used to assess intercultural adaptability, stress resilience, and subjective well-being (including the Kirkman-Rosen scales and an adapted version of Pak’s Cultural Adaptability Scale). The research was based on an interdisciplinary transnational approach and considered the context of cultural hybridity, cognitive flexibility, emotional regulation, and interpersonal communication. Results. The most effective strategies for reducing intercultural stress were found to be regular intercultural training (positively evaluated by 80% of respondents), peer support, and informal mentoring. High levels of cultural intelligence and cognitive flexibility were shown to correlate with lower anxiety, better adaptation, and greater leadership effectiveness in multicultural environments. Empirical evidence confirmed that managers with more than one year of international experience demonstrated lower stress levels and higher performance in solving intercultural challenges. Based on the analysis, a generalized model of managers’ adaptive components in culturally hybrid environments was proposed, including cultural intelligence, communicative competence, cognitive flexibility, emotional regulation, and adaptive leadership. Conclusions. The findings confirm that key factors of a manager’s psychological adaptation to cultural hybridity in transnational interactions include a high level of cultural intelligence, well-developed interpersonal communication skills, cognitive flexibility, and adaptive leadership capacity. The study also highlights the importance of targeted programs for the development of intercultural competencies, stress management training, and the cultivation of communicative flexibility.

Kazimierz Maria Krzyzanowski (13th of February 1893–15th June 1927) Krzyzanowski was the son of Stanislaw, who was a professor of history at Jagiellonian University, and Wanda, nee Studnicka. His younger brother, Witold, was a professor of political economy and dean of the Law Faculty at Jagiellonian University. After his matura exams at St. Anne’s gymnasium he began to study at the Law Faculty at Jagiellonian University. After graduation he went on to complete a doctoral degree. In the meantime, he spent one term listening to lectures at the University of Vienna. Following which he started to work as a volunteer apprentice in the National Bank of Poland. He also began an apprenticeship as a barrister. After the First World War he worked at the State Treasury Solicitors’ Office, first in Cracow, then in Vilnius. His work in public administration had its influence on Krzyzanowski’s academic interests. In 1924 he published Trybunal Kompetencyjny. Studium z zakresu polskiego prawa publicznego, which qualified him for UJ’s veniam legendi in 1925. At the same time, due principally to a shortage of scientific staff, a chair of administrative law at the Stefan Batory University in Vilnius sat vacant. Krzyzanowski seemed to be the best candidate, but negotiations between the State Treasury Solicitors’ Office and the University were very long. Krzyzanowski was forced to give lectures as a substitute professor for several years, because the Ministry of Religion and Public Education didn’t permit him to be a titular professor. They treated his work at the University as being extraneous. Finally, on January 1, 1927 Krzyzanowski was reassigned to the State Treasury Solicitors’ Office in Vilnius and he also received permission to lecture at the University in Vilnius. Unfortunately, he died within a few months after a short illness. The paper contains a biography of Kazimierz Maria Krzyzanowski, along with an inventory of his scientific output.

Introduction

The Origins of Polish Language Studies at Poznań University
 Linguistic studies on the Polish language and literature were first conducted at the Faculty of Philosophy of Poznań University (established in 1919). Studies on literary theory were pursued in the Department of History of Polish Literature, whereas linguistic studies in the Department of Slavic Philology and Indo-European Linguistics. Initially, these studies were supervised by scholars who came from the Jagiellonian University in Cracow: Mikołaj Rudnicki and Tadeusz Lehr-Spławiński, as well as Stanisław Dobrzycki who was active in two fields, theory of literature and linguistics. It was only in 1922 that the Department of the Polish Language was established thanks to the efforts of Edward Klich, who also came from Cracow. At first, Polish language studies at Poznań University concentrated on two fields: onomastics (with components of etymology), and dialectology. More comprehensive research was conducted since the establishment of the Department of the Polish Language which was joined by a new generation of linguists, including graduates of Poznań University.

The paper examines the origins and language skills of the officers and cadets of the 40th Infantry Regiment “Ritter von Pino” on the eve of World War I. The research was based on the regiment’s seniority list from 1 July 1914. Additionally, more detailed personnel documents such as qualification lists (Qualifikationslisten) were used to shed light on interesting cases, including officers struggling with the Polish language and those proficient in it but ascribed to distant, German-speaking crown lands of Austria-Hungary. The paper focuses on the ratio of Polish-speaking officers to men, over 90 per cent of whom were Polish. Most officers and cadets (both career and reserve) stemmed from Czech lands. Those from Galicia constituted 23 per cent of the entire cohort. As far as language skills are concerned, most career officers demonstrated at least basic proficiency in Polish. Some officers lacked proficiency in any official language beyond German, indicating potential communication challenges. The paper concludes by emphasising the significance of language proficiency within the regiment and its implications for communication, especially during the war. High losses among career officers meant that the importance of reserve officers grew, but most of them knew no Polish.

Universities around the world are increasingly under pressure to ‘internationalise’ and to support and embrace multicultural student bodies and learning environments. At the same time, ‘internationalisation’ is often associated with issues that complicate and pressurise the experiences of ‘international students’ as they attempt to identify and acculturate in their new settings, both socially and educationally, such as blockages in cultural understanding, language barriers and complexities of cross-cultural collaboration. This paper sets out a novel approach to solving these issues for a particular set of students (the large proportion of Chinese studying in Ireland, and specifically in Dublin) by creating original cross-cultural collaborative games (coded by Python) and using gamification based on a new bespoke technology system. This design aims to bridge the gaps in understanding between cultures and to provide an enhanced experience which may even be seen to exceed the levels of engagement of students collaborating in ‘live’ environments. The gamification provides a fun and safe way for Chinese and Irish students to share their culture and language, through unique cross-cultural collaborative games set in a customised bilingually-designed virtual world on a new 3D virtual cloud platform. SMARTlab is developing this unique platform with Hao2 and 3DICC's Terf (an immersive 3D unified collaboration platform integrating game dynamics and adjustable features) and OpenSIM. Our novel collaborative platform further integrates the unique ‘Virtual World in A Backpack’ with a bespoke personalised learning platform in development (Sensei). We show that virtual exposure to Ireland and ‘Irishness’ and the chance to collaborate over time with Irish students can lessen the impact of cultural change and reduce the symptoms of isolation, leading to a more empower and enjoyable learning experience.

The Association for the Study of Medical Education (ASME) sponsored a symposium on the theme of Examining the Evidence with Regard to Character, Personality and Values in Medical School Selection which was held on October 14, 2013 at the University of Sheffield Medical School in the United Kingdom. I was invited to speak about credibility issues related to personality assessments in health profession educations. To my pleasant surprise, I found the European audience receptive (more than their counterparts in the United States) to the idea of using personality assessments in admission decisions. There seems to be a hesitation among leaders in medical education in the United States to use personality assessments for selection purposes. They argue that convincing evidence is needed to support using personality assessments in medical school admission. In my presentation, I provided evidence to refute the argument against using personality assessments in admission decisions. Because of our extensive research at Jefferson Medical College on the topic of empathy in medical education and patient care, I placed the emphasis on credibility of evidence for using assessments of empathy, as a personality attribute, in the selection of applicants and professional development of students in any academic health profession institution. The editor of this journal who has a keen interest in medical education issues attended the symposium and suggested that I write an opinion piece about the issue for international audience of the journal. This editorial is based, in part, on my presentation at that symposium. Why is personality relevant to medical school admissions? There is a consensus among behavioral and social scholars that personality plays an unquestionable role in human behavior. In the practice of medicine, the importance of personality in professional assessments has been acknowledged in a paradigm of physician performance.1,2 There is a large volume of research in medical education about the contribution of personality to academic achievement, clinical competence, and specialty interest of doctors-in-training and in-practice.3 The notion that personality is a contributing factor to academic achievement, clinical competence, career choice, and professional behavior implies that personality should be considered as a pertinent measure not only for the assessment of professional development of doctors-in-training, but more importantly as an additional requirement for the admission of qualified applicants to medical schools.

This paper constitutes a reflective account of inclusive approaches in two children’s music projects, both aiming to foster group creativity alongside cross-cultural awareness and understanding. The first of these projects involved sharing songs composed by children and young people from a special needs school in Mostar, Bosnia-Herzegovina, with a primary school choir in Edinburgh, Scotland. The second project, in Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina, focused on group song-writing and performance involving three groups of children from ethnically separated schools, alongside a choir from a school for children with visual impairments. On reflection, we discuss cross-cultural musical collaboration as an effective means of bringing children together across social and cultural divides in order to share new experiences while building respect for differences. We hope projects such as these may represent the first step towards the ultimate goal of encouraging and nurturing more inclusive friendships between children who might not otherwise have opportunities to interact with each other.

Sebastian Petrycy—Famous Polish Physician

The use of the Ukrainian word «ssavtsi» (= «suctorial») and its synonym «zviri» (= «beasts») to designate the class Mammalia is considered. It is shown that the word «zviri» is traditional, but over time the share of publications with the term «ssavtsi» increases, an in general there are twice as many of them. The similar meaning of these terms is conditional, and the author adheres to the usage of «ssavtsi» for the class Mammalia and «zviri» for the subclass Theria (= «placental»). The analysis of previous literature sources showed that the term «ssavtsi» appeared in scientific circulation only in 1910, in the textbook «Zoology» by I. Verkhratsky, and precisely as a plural noun with an iotized «i» («ssavtsї»). The author explains the latter as underlining the emphasis of the syllable, in contrast to predecessor terms, which were participles. This format was later changed to an iotless «i» with the appearance of writing the nomen in singular («ssavets»). There is a number of words based on the verb «ssaty» (= «to suck»), in particular «ssushchi», «ssachi», and «ssawchi in the prehistory of the appearance of the term «ssavtsi». The latter variant is not found in Ukrainian-language sources, but it was coined in the Polish language by M. Novytsky, a native of Galicia and Podolia, who after defending his thesis (in Lviv in 1863) became a professor at the Jagiellonian University, where he published a series of textbooks changing the meaning of «ssące» («zwierzęta ssące») and the noun «ssąwce» (the modern form is «ssaki»). An analogous term was present in the Czech language («ssawci» modernised as «savci»), from which textbooks were translated by activists of the Ruthenian movements. Thanks to the educational activities of the Ukrainian Scientific Society (USS), it was included in textbooks and reference books (written by I. Rakovsky, M. Charlemagne, and I. Verkhratsky in 1919–1922). One of its first popularisers was V. Hnatiuk, the compiler of the ethnographic collection «Animal Epic» (1916), who listed the articles according to systematics and used the nomen «Ssavtsi» (Mammals) for the title of the section. The further distribution of this term can also be explained by the fact that the monosyllabic form has become fixed in all the neighbouring languages: Czech «savci», Polish «ssaki», Slovak «cicavce» and others. To some extent, it was also the answer to the Latin composite name Mammalia (mamma = «mammary gland», -alia = «the one possesses»), and the suffix «-ets» in Ukrainian is a completely corresponding formant.

The article seeks to outline the activities of linguistic research centers within Polish higher educational institutions, where “Ukrainian Language and Literature” specialists are trained, Ukrainian studies disciplines are taught, and Ukrainian is studied as a foreign language. Based on the achievements of linguists, the most prominent linguistic research centers include the Warsaw center (University of Warsaw), the Wrocław center (University of Wrocław), the Kraków center (Jagiellonian University), the Lublin center (John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin and Maria Curie-Skłodowska University), and the Poznań center (Adam Mickiewicz University). These scientific centers, which advance Ukrainian linguistics, were established through the dedicated efforts of renowned scholars, such as M. Lesiv and F. Chyzhevskyi (Lublin), A. Falowski (Kraków), and D. Wieczorek (Wrocław). Their students and successors continue their legacy, including I. Mytnyk (Warsaw), P. Yuzvikevych (Wrocław), A. Dudek-Shumigai, M. Koider and M. Oliynyk (Lublin). Significant contributions have also been made by Ukrainian linguists currently working in Polish universities, such as I. Kononenko and S. Romaniuk (Warsaw), O. Beley (Wrocław), and L. Frolyak (Lublin), among others, as well as by visiting professors who promote Ukrainian scholarship internationally (e.g., P. Hrytsenko, A. Zahnitko, O. Serbenska, M. Skab). Key research areas of Polish linguists include dialectology, onomastics, terminology, the history of the Ukrainian language, lexicology, word formation, grammar, stylistics, modern Ukrainian language culture, lexicography, terminography, phraseography, ethnolinguistics, Ukrainian linguistic folklore studies, sociolinguistics, theological linguistics, comparative studies of Ukrainian and Polish languages, translation studies, and linguodidactics.

Lwów School of Dermatology at the time of the Austro-Hungary monarchy

The major works by Bruno Schulz and Witold Gombrowicz were translated into Japanese in the 1960s, mainly by Yukio Kudō. I was enchanted by those Japanese texts to such an extent that I decided to abandon French literature and switch to Polish contemporary literature. In 1974, I came to Poland on a post-graduate fellowship of the Polish government, and I began studies in literature and the Polish language at the Jagiellonian University. During that two-year stay in Krakow, my view of Polish literature changed several times. The phase well established in the Japanese translations I had known ended quickly. Then I began to “hunt” for promising Polish authors not yet present in world literature. I thus discovered the prolific, esoteric and difficult Teodor Parnicki (1908–1988). This essay is my description of my “penetrating” the world of the Polish language at that time.