Rola kontekstu kulturowego w dyskursie akademickim
The Role of Cultural Context in Academic Discourse

Summary/Abstract: In the era of globalization, daily life presents us with cultural variety on the local level and cultural homogeneity on the global one. Contemporary social and cultural phenomena, sometimes coherent, sometimes contradictory (e.g. “extension” and “compression” of space, globalization and glocalization, the heterogeneity and homogeneity of culture, the mixing of the cultures of East and West, etc.) lead both to acculturation as well as the spread of a global Panopticon, creating the origins of a global identity with a multicultural nature. In this process, certain cultural elements mix with one another, others become similar to each other, and still more retain their distinctiveness. In the face of such dynamic changes in society and culture the role that cultural context should play in the analysis of academic discourse needs to be considered. Culture, perceived as a dynamic thing, not restricted to a hegemonous national discourse, should constitute the main element of any model of intercultural rhetoric. The fundamental postulate of intercultural rhetoric is a broadly understood abandonment of homogeneity, i.e. eliminating the clear distinctions between polychronic, high-context thinking, and monochronic, low-context thinking, linear and non-linear writing styles, and also looking anew at the multicultural identity of modern man. This article aims to show that a new approach to the analysis of academic discourse based on interactive communication, in which academics and students from various cultural circles can feel at ease while negotiating the meanings of words, symbols and behaviors, encourages the processes of socialization into the rhetorical conventions of the academic world and improves the conditions for intellectual and academic exchange.

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