FORMS OF ADDRESS AND THEIR MEANING IN CONTRAST IN POLISH AND RUSSIAN LANGUAGES

Many studies in contemporary linguistics focus on investigating politeness and rudeness in language. This paper, however, has not been intended as a contrastive study of the phenomena in question. Language politeness and rudeness are conveyed by means of expressions of politeness and rudeness which are perceived as entrenched and recurring in specific situations. These expressions convey the expected meaning of politeness and rudeness accepted in the model of social behaviour. If one uses the explicative method such expressions could be reduced to the following formula ‘I inform you that I follow a verbal conduct defined as polite’. Owing to the emergence of parallel corpora of particular languages, it is nowadays easier to collect data for research on forms of address as well as on expressions of politeness in the first half of the 21 century. Investigating the meaning of forms of address, which are part of linguistic repertoire used to express politeness and rudeness should be regarded as an interesting area of research. It is the consequence of the increasing importance of intercultural communication, expansion of international cooperation, and formation of new standards of interpersonal communication aimed at achieving mutual understanding without resorting to violence. It is worth mentioning that currently there are no bilingual dictionaries which would include practical rules for using forms of address. Moreover, dictionaries (especially bilingual ones) also do not list classifiers of politeness, which becomes a shortcoming as regards the purposes of translation and teaching foreign languages. The aforementioned problems apply to print as well as computer dictionaries. A reliable list of forms of address and their meaning may become helpful in intercultural communication. It would be also important to create a Contemporary Dictionary of Expressions of Politeness and Rudeness in a paper as well as a computer version.


Introduction
Contrastive research on forms of address in Polish and Russian may contribute much to the field of language rudeness and politeness.Penelope Brown, Stephen C. Levinson (2008), Richard J. Watts (2003), Małgorzata Marcjanik (2002Marcjanik ( , 2007)), Małgorzata Kita (2005), Tatiana Voroncova (2006), Romuald Huszcza (2006), Valentin Goldin (2009), and other linguists focussed in their works on the category of politeness in different languages.It may stimulate a deeper analysis of forms of address as part of language politeness and rudeness in contrastive studies.The present paper constitutes a first step towards investigating forms of address and their meanings in paper and computer dictionaries The topic of this article has not been studied contrastively in the recent years.In the 21 st century, parallel corpora developed for some languages (Dimitrova, Koseska 2009;Dimitrova, Koseska, Roszko, D., Roszko, R., 2010;Duszkin, Satoła-Staśkowiak, 2011;Dimitrova, Koseska, 2012) made easier collecting data for research on forms and expressions of address and politeness.So far the studies in this field have focused mainly on data coming from specific languages.Currently, there is no monolingual as well as bilingual dictionary which would give the meaning of forms of address.
Contrastive research shows that each time two languages are compared, the comparison may be performed from a different perspective, which opens up new fields of inquiry.The reader may wish to consult the results of Polish-Russian contrastive research done by M. Vsievolodova and her School of Comparative Studies in Slavic Languages (prepositions).V. Koseska-Toszewa and M. Korytkowska Polish-Bulgarian carried out contrastive studies on the categories of definiteness and indefiniteness and others.R. Roszko and D. Roszko, and others investigated the same problem in Polish and Lithuanian (Roszko, D., 2012;Roszko, R., 2012).
The meaning of forms of address, which are part of linguistic repertoire used to express politeness and rudeness should be regarded as an important area of research, which is due to the increasing importance of intercultural communication, expansion of international cooperation, and the emergence of new norms of interpersonal communication focused on achieving a mutual agreement without violence (Marshall B. Rosenberg, 2003).The research on the forms of address in Polish and Russian in a contrastive aspect may become a significant contribution to the development of the next generation of paper and computer dictionaries as well as to the practice of teaching foreign languages.
Our research has been based on the examples heard and recorded in a written form.We have used parallel corpora including texts the 20 th and 21 st century as well as existing paper and computer dictionaries.

The category of politeness in language
Expressing politeness and rudeness in a natural language is not only a subject of linguistics research.Various scientific disciplines such as philosophy, pragmatics, psychology, cultural studies, ethnography, and other sciences have taken politeness and rudeness as a subject of research as well.The German linguist Klaus Vorderwulbeck emphasises that "the expressions of politeness belong to language, whereas politeness itself is not a linguistic phenomenon and lies beyond language" (Tomiczek, 1992).The present research focuses on linguistic forms of politeness and their meaning.
Małgorzata Marcjanik argues that politeness is perceived as "a kind of a social game.This game has roots in people's customs and fulfils the mental needs of a human" (Marcjanik, 1997).Therefore, "the problem of language politeness does not rest at the level of the information content of an expression, but on the level of interpersonal relation, which is to be established and held" (Kita, 2005).
If one regards politeness as a semantic category, it should stay in opposition to rudeness.Politeness seems to be a clear notion, defined by Penelope Brown and Steven Levinson as "a kind of strategy of human language activity which is accomplished with the routine means of expression and prosodic elements and also with no verbal means such as gestures, mimic, and other which concentrate on social and conventional norms.This politeness aims at respecting our own and our partner's image" (Brown, Levison, 1987).What is, however, the meaning of rudeness?The easiest definition would describe rudeness as anything but politeness.Richard Watts explains "[. . .] (im)politeness is a term that is struggled over at present, has been struggled over in the past and will, in all probability, continue to be struggled over in future".When it is placed in specific time, space, and society, the definition of politeness is likely to change.Expressions in language used in one period of time and in that time perceived as polite by the society may become impolite in another period (cf. the Russian form gospodin in the 19 th century with its perception in the USSR times of the 20 th century and finally its modern meaning; or the Polish word towarzysz as used in the second part of 20 th century with its meaning today).Nevertheless, it is necessary that all the expressions used as forms of address in the course of history of a given language be mentioned and described in dictionaries.
The semantic categories of politeness and rudeness should always be investigated as located in a specific time and space.It should be emphasised that this category must take into account the sociolinguistic aspect, a given nation's mentality, or even the political system of a country.In comparative research, the foreign language spoken by the interlocutor should also be taken into consideration, since it is the moment when politeness derived from one's own culture mixes with the politeness expressed in the culture in which the act of speech takes place.In a monolingual environment or in an act of speech where two native speakers used their native tongue, the problems of communication will not be as frequent as in a multilingual environment and among interlocutors who are bilingual native speakers of two different languages.The choice of a language is connected with the choice of an entire system of cultural codes which are expressed in different ways in a given language (Jaskot, 2009).Such "cultural behaviours" are expressed with the help of linguistic means typical for a given language.It often happens that one cultural code used in one language may seem unclear in the act of speech carried out in another language, which may be illustrated by the following example: compare the Polish neutral form Dzień dobry, panie dziekanie ("Good morning, dean") and the Russian Добрый день, господин декан!(reported by a Russian native speaker who heard it in Spain).The latter is a one-to-one loan translation.Another example may concern a Russian person addressing a dean with his first name or patronymic (Добрый день, Иван Петрович).Yet another example would be a Polish person saying Poproszę rachunek, chłopcze!("Can I have the bill, boy?"), which is not neutral and pejorative1 .
One should consider the semantic category of politeness and rudeness as a multifaceted structure.Language politeness and rudeness are conveyed by means of expressions of politeness which are perceived as entrenched and recurring in specific situations.These expressions convey the expected meaning of politeness and rudeness accepted as the model of behaviour in a given society.If one uses the explicative method such expressions could be reduced to the following formula: "I inform you that I follow a verbal conduct defined as polite" (Ożóg 1990).
Expressions of politeness include also forms of address (German Form der Anrede, Spanish formas apelativas, Polish formy adresatywne, Russian обращение, Bulgarian обръщение).Forms of address are the most important linguistic means used to negotiate the relation between interlocutors (Kerbrat-Orecchioni, 2005).
The primary concern of the present paper are the ways of addressing the interlocutor and the meaning of forms of address, which is motivated by the claim of Goldin (2009) that the largest change in Russian over the past twenty-five years has occurred in the semantic aspect of forms of address.
The importance of expressions of politeness is emphasised by Ożóg (1990): "The expression of politeness with which we choose to address our interlocutor is a very important issue in the spoken language.This is due to the fact that the way we address the interlocutor often has a substantial impact on the subsequent course of the conversation as well as its final outcome".
The form of address and its meaning as a lexical unit was placed in the centre of attention during the creation of next-generation dictionaries.The Group for Corpus Linguistics and Semantics in the Institute of Slavic Studies, Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw published the Polish-Bulgarian Dictionary (in cooperation with IMI BAN) and Russian-Bulgarian-Polish Dictionary, which include a few dozen of lexical units treated as forms of address.
The analysis of monolingual and bilingual dictionaries of Polish, Russian, and Bulgarian yielded the following conclusions.Firstly, monolingual dictionaries often describe the meaning of forms of address including their scope of use in a given culture.Nevertheless, the descriptions are insufficient to use given lexemes in real speech in accordance with the usage patterns sanctioned by a given culture (cf. the example of the lexeme matka "mother" below).Secondly, in traditional bilingual dictionaries forms of address are usually disregarded and the user does not receive the information about the correct patterns of use of a given lexical unit, which would conform to the norms currently accepted by the society.
In order to illustrate the abovementioned issues we have chosen to present a contrastive analysis of the lexeme matka/mama (Eng."mother/mum").
In the Dictionary of Polish Language (http://www.sjp.pwn.pl/)we read the following definition of the lexeme matka/mama (translated into English by the author): matka ("mother") 1. woman who gave birth to and usually brings up a child 2. female animal having offspring 3. main, superior, or model object in comparison to similar objects 4. source of something 5. master plan 6. nun having a high-ranked function in a convent 7. in team sports: the main player, or the team leader 8. among some insects: a female able to reproduce 9. spoken: familiarly about one's wife, mother, mother of children, or elderly woman mama ("mum") 1. mother or mother-in-law In the Dictionary of Russian Language (http://www.gramota.ru/)we find the following definition of this lexeme (translated into English by the author).
мать ("mother") 1. Woman who gave birth to children and has a relationship with them or woman who has or had children 2. Thing perceived as close, loved, cherished and/or being spiritually important for somebody 3. Female animal having offspring 4. Thing which gives rise to something else; source or beginning 5. Spoken, familiar : word used to refer to one's wife 6. Wife of an Orthodox priest or a nun мама ("mum") 1. Mother (used by children to speak of their mother) 2. Mother-in-law (used to refer to one's particular mother-in-law) Let us compare only the meanings of each lexeme which include forms of address.According the Dictionary of Polish Language (point 6) and the Dictionary of Russian Language (point 6) the lexemes matka/мать can as a form of address, however, there is no information about possible usage of this lexeme as an appellative form.
Polish matka przełożona ("Mother Superior") -is the form of address concerning a nun situated high in the hierarchy of a convent and here it is possible to use the appellative form of address -Matko Przełożona! ("Mother Superior!").Russian мать-игуменья is not accepted in Russian culture as a form of addressing a nun of higher rank.The correct forms of address would as follows: the Russian Orthodox expression -матушка Николая ("Nikolai's mother") and the neutral expression used by people who are not members of the Russian Orthodox Church -мать Варвара ("mother Barbara").
In the description of the lexeme мама in Russian (point 1 and 2) and mama in Polish we find the information about the possibility of using them as forms of address, however, this information is neither comprehensive nor satisfactory.In both languages this lexeme has the function of the form of addressing one's own mother and mother-in-law (indicated in the Dictionary of Russian Language), however, in Russian culture this lexeme is used interchangeably with the expression in the form of the mother's first name with her patronymic name, e.g.Любовь Адреевна ("Lyubov Andreevna", literally: "Lyubov, the daughter of Andrei)2 .
The Dictionary of Polish Language indicates the form of address in the clearest way in point 5 and point 9, where the stylistic context and the context of use are mentioned.
To sum up, it should be stressed that monolingual dictionaries show the functions of forms of address, but it is not satisfactory to consider it as the base to construct the proper statement.
The Group for Corpus Linguistics and Semantics in the Institute of Slavic Studies, Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw is currently working on developing a Russian-Bulgarian-Polish dictionary whose aim is to provide a dictionary base for modern dictionaries (see: Koseska-Toszewa, Satoła-Staśkowiak, Duszkin, 2012).The dictionary will be available in both print and electronic versions.The dictionary in question puts forward the following format of a dictionary entry, which also includes a classifier of politeness.In the vocative form "way children address their grandmothers" Neutral expression of politeness Cf.The form a husband uses to address his wife: Chodź, matka, idziemy.(literally "Come on, mother, let's go!") Neutral expression of politeness.Familiar about own wife 5. -no meaning -5.
Form to address a woman (See: Polishpani/miła pani; Russiaдевушка).майка Седни тук, майка.(literally "Sit here, mum) Form of address more often mentioned in spoken language.Colloquial form of address Cf.: Хайде, майка, да вървим!Form to address a woman both by men and women Marked 5. -no meaning -

Forms of address versus parallel corpora
Parallel corpora have become very useful as a source of previously unexploited linguistic date for contrastive studies.In this area, the Group for Corpus Linguistics and Semantics is currently starting the work on the Project Clarin. 3he very first results of the group's work on paralleling 20 th -century texts, show the effectiveness of this tool in linguistics.We shall now look at one example of such work, namely the forms of address in the relation between a king and a subject in fables.In present-day Polish it is accepted to address a king by Wasza Królewska Mość and in present-day Russian Ваше Величество (Vashe Velichestvo) 4 , e.g. while referring to or addressing the king of Spain.
We mentioned that the category of politeness and the forms of address, which are included in it, should be analysed in the time and space they belong in.Let us take a look at the results of the comparison of the Bulgarian fable titled Цар Безсънко ("The Sleepless Tsar") by Svetoslav Minkov and its translation into Polish by Violetta Koseska from 1982 and into Russian by D. Zabarkina and A.Zabarkin from 1980.

Polish text
Russian The comparison shows that having taken into account the censorship in the USSR, the author of the translation self-censored her work and omitted the expression including the form of address Ваше Императорское Величество "Your Majesty".Instead of them other forms characteristic for these languages were used, CLARIN belongs to the projects included in the ESFRI road map (European Roadmap for Research Infrastructures, European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures).The main aim of the Project is to unify language resources and tools for all European languages and to build one standardised network, which is to become an important tool for scientists of all humanities.
4 They are both parallel to the English expression Your Majesty.
however, they are not typical forms of address in both languages, cf.Всесильный царь / Всемогущий царь.In one expression the appellative Ваше Императорское Величество was replaced by the pronominal form тебе "you", cf.Я прочту тебе.
Another good example may be a comparison of the translations of the novel "Devil and Miss Prym" by Paolo Coelho into Polish and Russian.In the Polish translation the relations between the speakers are clearly delimited through the use of equal forms of address, namely the Polish pan/pani.In the Russian translation the hero addresses the other person with ты/тебе "you" (singular) and she uses the form вы/вас "you" (plural).Sometimes this expression is altogether omitted in Russian.

Polish text
Russian text English translation The above examples indicate that Russian is still undergoing the process of forming, rebuilding and seeking the meanings of the forms of address which were artificially lost at the time of socio-political changes after the Great October Socialist Revolution in 1917.Before the revolution, in the tsarist Russia there had existed a complex system of forms of address, which later became superseded девушка/молодой человек/товарищ and others in the USSR and today's Russia.
The examples presented above lead to a conclusion that the category of forms of address is of a semantic and cultural nature.Therefore, classifiers of forms of address should be introduced in next-generation print and computer dictionaries, including trilingual ones.The pioneering attempt at introducing such classifiers has been undertaken in the aforementioned Russian-Bulgarian-Polish Dictionary (Sosnowski, Koseska, Kisiel; Vol.I in press).One good methodological solution for contrastive research on the semantics of politeness would be to use an intermediary language.This would ensure that the forms and meanings in both languages are equally compared.Taking advantage of the Polish-Bulgarian Contrastive Grammar (Koseska-Toszewa, 2006) it is possible to isolate the most important concepts and then create a small intermediary language by means of which the forms of address in contrasted languages would be described.We find that the lack of classifiers of politeness in print as well as computer dictionaries (esp.bilingual) is a substantial drawback as regards the purposes of translation and foreign language teaching.Developing adequate descriptions of forms of address and their meanings might improve intercultural communication.Furthermore, it is also of great importance that a separate dictionary of polite and impolite expressions be created.The aim of the present research is to introduce the category of forms of address into dictionaries, both print as well as computer ones, which is justified by the socio-linguistic situation in Poland and in Russian-speaking countries.Further research into this matter will require joint linguistic and socio-linguistic studies.