The use of language in constructing hybrid identities

Abstract

The paper aims at presenting some aspects regarding the way in which German and Romanian cultural identity is represented in the field of journalistic communication in Romania, as it is reflected in the linguistic constructions employed in pre- and post-revolutionary written press (namely before and after 1989). Generally speaking, the definition of the concept of ” hybrid identity” implies taking into account the specificity of the various historical periods in the coexistence of the ethnic groups considered (in this case, we refer to the communist and post communist period reflected in the written press). For this study, the authors adopt the theoretical viewpoint of cross-cultural pragmatics (Wierzbicka 1991) in assessing the language facts. The investigation is based on selective materials extracted from the German newspapers existing in Romania – “Neuer Weg” (NW) 1948-1992) / “Allgemeine Deutsche Zeitung für Rumänien” (ADZ) (1993-2008), and the Romanian newspapers “Scînteia” (S) (1948-1989) / “Adevărul” (A) (1990-2014). In presenting the linguistic facts that mirror the hybridisation of the linguistic identity of the German community in Romania (Manu Magda 2012) on the level of journalistic language (Dănilă 2016) we take into consideration the two aforementioned periods: the (“early” and “late”)” communist period”, when there prevailed the “marked” forms of the “wooden language”, which is characterised, in general, by the elimination of specific actualisations of linguistic identity and the adoption of Russian clichés; the “post-communist period”, defined by two parallel directions: “re evaluation of linguistic identity” (indicated by convergence towards the core linguistic identity, i.e., the one from Germany), “linguistic globalisation“ (indicated by convergence towards the international linguistic community, dominated by the “imperialism of the English language”; this direction can be noticed in relation to both languages explored – Romanian and German).