Style as a practice and a form of collective memory

Abstract

The subject of the article are relations between a language style and collective memory. The style, semiotically and anthropologically presented, is one of the forms of collective memory along with a type of culture text, variety and text genre as well. On the one hand, the style is an expression, evidence of the past. From an individual style of e.g. recognized writers one can interpret their image of reality, including also the past. Thus the style is a means of conveying both individual memory of a particular author and evidence of the past he used to live in and create. Typical styles are the mirrors reflecting conventions of expression appropriate for a given period. Thus, the style stores the image of the past, individual and collective, and is a means of reaching it, a way of expressing and talking about it, including its contemporary nonverbal means. Thus, a functional style has been presented as practice and the form of collective memory: communicative or cultural. A colloquial style is the practice of incorporating, whereas other functional styles are practices of recording. Communicative memory is conveyed by means and values typical for the colloquial style, while cultural memory is practically associated with all functional styles, depending on the contents of memory.