Polilog: Studia Neofilologiczne (Nov 2023)
Special Features of Communication in the People’s Army of Poland on the Example of Selected Memoirs of Soldiers Serving Compulsory Military Service in the Years 1970–1980
Abstract
The article discusses the communication model as exemplified by the Polish People’s Army in the 70s and 80s of the 20th century. The analysis is based on Paul Watzlawick et al.’s classic communication model, and it refers the axioms postulated by the authors to the internal military communication system of superiors with subordinates during the period under study. It indicates the influence of the institution’s hierarchical structure on the communication methods in formal situations and informal interpersonal relations among the recruit service soldiers in their free time. It draws attention to a negative phenomenon of the so-called wave as an effect of the soldiers’ subculture and analyses the soldiers’ verbal and non-verbal linguistic creativity as a reaction to the unique military reality within the researched period.
