„Wsłuchać się w nieskończoną opowieść o Polsce”. Dyskurs smoleński „Gazety Polskiej”

Abstract

“The never-ending Polish story”: The Smolensk Discourse of Gazeta PolskaThe author analyzes articles published in Gazeta Polska after the plane crash that caused death of President Lech Kaczynski and other senior Polish officials in Smolensk in 2010. The Smolensk discourse in Gazeta Polska is structured with specific rhetoric strategies and anthropological categories. It is based on an antinomy of “everyman” versus “elites”. Furthermore, it brings some light to the importance and meaning of the rituals and symbolic sphere in public life. In reference to the traditions of the Polish nineteenth-century approaches, it affects a reader with consistent interpretations and worldviews. The Smolensk discourse is so persuasive also due to certain literary techniques as well as creating a sense of continuity that replaces the cultural rupture. Cultural rupture, however, is a fundamental category that organizes the Smolensk narration in Gazeta Polska and, to some extent, a Polish conservative discourse in general.