The behaviour of concrete under quasi-static loadings for uniaxial compression, tension and planestress conditions is studied. The failure criteria of concrete are discussed as well as the methodsof constitutive parameters identification are elaborated. The attention is focus on an energeticinterpretation of selected failure criteria. The numerical example with concrete damage plasticitymaterial model is shown.

This paper presents the results of magnetic mapping carried out in the area of the metamorphic series of Ariekammen and Skoddefjellet. On the basis of qualitative interpretation of measurements a number of anomalous zones were distinguished, whose position can be correlated with local changes in mineralitation and polymetallic ore content in the Fuglebergsletta area. The SE-NW orientation, skew to the almost meridional run of the layers of slates and marbles making up the metamorphic complex, dominates in the course of the anomalous zones.

The aim of the article is to compare the thought collective and the interpretive community, two surprisingly similar notions formulated independently by Ludwik Fleck and Stanley Fish. In contemporary discourse, both concepts are used as synonims, while an accurate analysis of the contexts of the use of interesting terms proves that the equivalent of the interpretive community is rather thought collective, as well as the thought style, both of these concepts in the deliberations of Fish are subject to contamination. The exact repartition of the notion of interpretive community seems to be important due to the frequency of its use in works in the field of literary interpretation and cognition. The article also presents more general remarks on the functioning and possible origin of twin terms and their role in scientific cognition.

The article confronts key notions framing our understanding of modernity, such as rationality, knowledge, freedom and democracy, opening the space of a critical interpretation undermining the superficial take on modernity as an embodiment of integrity, putting together the noble principles of knowledge and liberty. Drawing on the thought of Max Weber, exploring the symbolism of his metaphor of “iron cage of rationality”, the article emphasizes a paradoxical sense of the experience of modernity. In concluding statements it defies and calls into question a standard reading of democracy, viewed as an embodiment of freedom and rational self-definition.

The Peircean iconic metaphor takes the concept of metaphor beyond linguistic and literary metaphors and does not even limit it to the “conventional metaphor” of Lakoff and Johnson’s cognitive theory. Given Peirce’s short and somewhat ambiguous definition of the metaphorical icon, a closer study of this category of icons is necessary for a better understanding of a concept that surpasses in many respects the earlier definitions of metaphor. It is also necessary to observe metaphors from the perspective of their creator: a perspective that is not usually adopted in other theories of metaphor, since much of the debates consider only the structure of the metaphor and its function with a focus on its interpretation, and do not discuss how the creator of the metaphor reaches or creates a metaphor. The present article aims at filling the mentioned blanks.

For Plato, language was the way to cognize the universe. The philosophy of language, which was primarily initiated by Plato in the Cratylus, still has not received answers to the questions settled by this great Greek thinker. In fact, it just offered various solutions formed in different conceptions and approaches in the ancient, scholastic, modern and postmodern periods. The questions raised by Plato in his dialogue have been continued in various nativistic theories of language, especially in works of Noam Chomsky. Language—as it is seen by Plato, i.e., as uniting our inner world with the outer world, is a significant feature of humankind, is still underinvestigated.

Among the big corpus of the commentaries over the Qur’an, one of the special developments was a genre of gloss (hāšiya). The study addresses main Ottoman glosses written to the Qur’anic commentaries, contextualizing it within the internal dimensions of the content transformations. It is argued that since the glosses were used as the textbooks in the Ottoman medrese, they could be considered as the “mainstream” Ottoman reading of the Qur’an. This reading was not merely one of the practices for approaching the Qur’an, but the kind of tradition with the related authorities and meaningful developments. The research covers these patterns of interpretations applied to the case of Āl ‘Imrān, 3: 7, showing the way of how the philology and theology interacted in the Ottoman tafsīr glosses.

The article is a contribution to the methodology of reading and interpreting Dostoevsky’s famous novels. It owes its genesis to the refl ection upon the evolution of literary theory discourse in XX century and upon transformations in global (mainly Russian and Western) reception and modes of interpreting the oeuvre of the great Russian artist. The aim of the text is to prepare ground for reorienting Polish “dostoevskology” from the dominant reconstructive course onto the more creative, interpretative one. The order of my inquiries presents itself as follows. In the fi rst part of the article I focus on the questions of ideas, the protagonist and narrative techniques in Dostoevsky so that to highlight the specifi city of the writer’s approach to these issues. It will allow me to speak up for the minimum of methodological awareness which implies acknowledgment of the paradigm of polyphony, polysemy and complexity of Dostoevsky’s text. Perhaps it will also become possible to reveal some gaps in the hitherto existing state of research, debunk several stereotypes still functioning in Polish “dostoevskology”, and draw attention to still unrecognized interpretative clues in context of those crucial aspects of Dostoevsky’s work. In the second part I will reconstruct several most popular approaches to Dostoevsky’s text which differ in terms of understanding of what the relation between the reader and the text should comprise of. I will try to determine the benefi ts they can bring but also to sensitize to pitfalls they may entail. In the fi nal, third part of the study I will propose a project of a new interpretative approach which would rise to the challenge of Dostoevsky’s “spirit” as well as the spirit of his text the way it is construed by the most advanced contemporary critical studies and as I have learnt to perceive it.

There are three Latin texts of the Bible. The ancient vetus latina version used by the Christian writers before Jerome, the Vulgate of st. Jerome and the Neo-Vulgate. Our article deals with the formation and the characteristic features of each version and a special impact the Vulgate had on the Christian literature. We focus our presentation on three periods: the golden age of the patristic literature in the IV- V centuries; the transitional period in the VI-VII centuries and the middle ages, mainly XII-XIII centuries. We present the authors of the most important commen- taries, sermons and other works connected with the Bible and approach some problems connected with the interpretation and meaning of Scripture.

This article is devoted to current practices concerning the application of general principles of law in the light of their function in the international legal system. As a means of the application and interpretation of both treaty and customary law, general principles of law perform a crucial function in the system of international law, which is understood as set of interrelated rules and principles – norms. The role played by general principles of law in the international legal order has been discussed by academia for years now. Initially they were used to ensure the completeness of the system of international law. However, at the current stage of development of international law, when many of them have been codified, they are usually invoked by international courts for the interpretation of treaties and customary law and/or the determination of their scope. This means that despite their ongoing codification they do not lose their character as general principles and are still applied by international courts in the process of judicial argumentation and the interpretation of other norms to which they are pertinent. References by international courts to general principles of law perform the allimportant function of maintaining the coherence of the international legal order, which is faced with the twin challenges of fragmentation and the proliferation of international courts.

In this paper I respond to Elżbieta Mikiciuk’s polemic with my article: The Brothers Karamazov: Dostoevsky’s Tainted Hosanna (“Slavia Orientalis” 2017, nr 1; the polemic was published in “Slavia Orientalis” 2017, nr 2). I use this opportunity to look at my article anew and restate my interpretative approach to Dostoevsky’s last novel as well as the line of argumentation I had decided to adopt. The substance of my response relies heavily on the point evoked several times by E. Mikiciuk, concerning my “biased” selection of citations from the novel which generates a “one-dimensional”, “manipulated”, and “false” image of Christianity as a religion that approves of an “economic” idea of God, a God from whom one has to “buy” a right to salvation. Recalling narrations of starets Zosima on the problem of involuntary suffering and death, and meditating on an indefi nite, unpredictable or highly ambiguous nature of such characters as Dymitr and Alyosha Karamazov or Smerdyakov, I emphasize the radical openness and polyphonic nature of Dostoevsky's text which allows for manifold, even contradictory readings and understandings of the same fragments of his complex works. Further, I develop a key thesis that both theological/religious interpretations of Dostoevsky’s oeuvre, as supported by Elżbieta Mikiciuk, and philosophical/ existential ones, as advanced by me, are feasible and valuable as long as they remain anchored in a close reading and do not lay claims to representing the one and only valid approach to his literary universe. The paper ends with a conclusion in which I encourage a mutually inspirational dialogue (the agon, if you will) between these two exegetic strategies. Such a dialogue seems essential for a reinvigoration of Dostoevsky’s literary work, against which one should continuously measure himself in a constant, even painful at times, sense of insuffi ciency of his/her interpretative insight facing a paradoxical, axiologically ambivalent, and strictly polyphonic oeuvre.

This article analyses the capacity of the African Charter on Democracy, Elections and Governance to counteract the democratic governance shortfall. It argues that the tangible impact of the treaty on the states’ practice has been limited by various endogenous and exogenous factors. The former are identified as directly linked to content of the document and refer to the accuracy of the drafting. The latter are rooted outside the text and beyond the character of the Charter and include issues relating to the states’ reluctance to ratify the document, certain constitutional constraints undermining implementation on the national level, and the weak international guarantees of enforcement.

The article offers a discourse-analytic examination of original (English) and interpreted (Polish) versions of several extracts from plenary speeches by three Members of the European Parliament (Janusz Korwin-Mikke, Nigel Farage and Guy Verhofstadt). Controversial statements that have met with adverse reactions of the audience and/or the media are selected for analysis. The author endeavours to assess the degree to which pragmatic equivalence has been achieved by Polish interpreters. Another pertinent question is whether the identifi ed shifts are due to some systemic differences between the pragmatics of the source and target languages or to other factors, such as the constraints typical for simultaneous interpreting or specific, local problems.