The stylistic aspect of Polish wills

Abstract

Testament in the Polish culture is an administrative-legal genre, accomplished in its own style of the genre, based on the official and legal style. In the stylistic aspect it shows authoritarianism, impersonality, templatedness and meticulousness of expression. As an example of the legal discourse it tends to be unambiguous, logical, concrete, and it contains specialist terminology related to dispositions of the estate in contemplation of death. It refers manly to the material sphere of life, yet it implies abundance of various hidden feelings: love, gratitude, attachment, hatred, contempt, or revenge. The most popular and expansive type of the genre is a notarial will executed in the form of a notarial deed. Holographic wills are realized more freely, with use of elements of colloquial style, may include expressive speech acts or take the form of an informal letter. The stylistic form of allographic and oral wills is similar to a report. Notarial testaments are becoming dominant and influence the linguistic shape of all other types of the genre. Lack of legal verbosity in a document, while meeting the requirement concerning appointment of an heir, date and testator’s signature, does not invalidate the legal force of the utterance.

Keywords

• testament
• genre of speech
• genre pattern
• stylistic aspect
• ontological aspect
• values, administrative-legal style
• style of a genre