Trwanie a zmiana w języku
Continuity and change in language

Summary/Abstract: The article is a fragment of the dissertation Diachroniczna teoria języka [Diachronic theory of language], which a polemic with the 19th−20th-century (especially structuralist) concept of language. The author believes that apart from the concept of change, a closer look should be given into continuity of many features and processes rooted in historical tradition. Linguistic stability may well last centuries and millennia. As a rule, all that is stable in a language system serves an important role in it and deserves closer description. Two opposing forces clash within language: a tendency for change and, equally strong, a tendency to stabilize signs and forms, maintaining balance in the system and a continuity of communication across generations. Both these tendencies are mutually dependent and necessary. Linguistic variance is not always the driving force of progressive evolution; history of language also knows periods of regression.

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