From the Proverbs to Modern Media. Formation of People Identity Through Education of Language Stereotypes of Neighbors

Abstract

Introduction. The paper deals with the phenomenon of language as a marker of people's identity, which is formed by building boundaries and describing relationships, primarily between neighbors. The aim of the research work is to analyze the forms of expression of journalists in the media.Methodology and sources. The report examines materials from the main release of the News of the first Polish television channel, concerning the two neighbors of the Poles, that is, the Germans and Russians. The collected material covers the period of November 16, 2015, that is, from the day of the inauguration of the new Polish government (which has a completely different approach to Poland’s foreign affairs than its predecessors) until December 31, 2016. Created and described on the basis of the collected material stereotypes of German and Russian in modern Poland will be compared with the stereotypes of these two peoples, familiar to Poles by proverbs, which were found in the explanatory dictionaries of the Polish language, as well as in other dictionaries of proverbs and sayings. The linguistic analysis of the text, the socio-psychological-linguistic foundations of the formation of auto-and heterostereotypes, mass-media discourse and its impact on recipients were used as the theoretical basis for the arguments presented in the paper.Results and discussion. In Polish dictionaries, and dictionaries of Proverbs and sayings it was found 38 Proverbs Russian Proverbs and 107 of the Germans. It was analyzed how many of them are positive and how many negative traits of Russians and Germans. As for the Russian, positive traits can be found in only 6 of 38 Proverbs (15.7 percent). There are 18 positive of 107 sayings about Germans in Polish sources (16.8 percent). Specified number of Proverbs shows that the poles hand down from generation to generation a negative image of their neighbors. On the basis of material collected from "News" channel images of Russians and Germans were made up as well. During the period under review, any positive information about Russia and Russian has not appeared. As for the Germans, it is also dominated by a negative image, and, if to speak about positive things, they are never left without comment, which contains a warning.Conclusion. Heterostereotypes play an active role in fostering the way of thinking of contemporaries and, one can assume, representatives of the next generations, since popular wisdom and historical experience are passed on from generation to generation in each country. Heterostereotypes often become reality themselves, are inherited and acquire new symbolic meanings, and are updated depending on the political situation. A comparison of the heterostereotypes of Russian and German in Polish proverbs, the oldest of which were found in a dictionary published in 1830, with modern heterostereotypes from the main release of “News” proves that the description of the phenomenon of stereotypes in each new historical era is an important scientific problem.