Browsing by Author "Wódka, Marek"

Now showing 1 - 6 of 6
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    Anthony D. Smith’s Idea of the Nation. Controversy around Definitions
    (Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Rzeszowskiego, 2019-12-17) Wódka, Marek
    This paper focuses on the category of the nation introduced by Anthony David Smith. The author attempts to answer the following questions: what does actually constitute nation, what is a origin of nation, and how does nation exist. The main point of this paper is an evolution of Smith’s definition of nation, which have been already debated. The analysis presented here aims to show that changes introduced by Smith to a definition of nation actually clarify this definition of nation, while the basic definition of nation remains a consistent and interesting concept for different theories of nation, in particular coming from political sciences. Additionally in this paper, the main concepts of this British scientist and the main research schools studying this subject were presented. This paper mainly focuses on analysis of changes introduced by Montserrat Guibernau, a sociologist from University of Cambridge, and it attempts to explain motivations which drove Smith to introduce changes to his definition. To date, none of scientists exploring the British scientist thoughts have attempted to show the usefulness of the definition of the nation for Christian social science, and so this paper includes recommendations, which could help to further explore research on the definition of nation among scientists interested in this research field. An ethnosymbolic concept of nation, defined by Smith, seems to correspond also to a concept of nation that is characteristic to Polish school of humanism. The author mentions about it, however leaves this problem as a subject of future research.
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    How Does the Catholic Clergy Influence What Poles in the UK Know and Think about Brexit?
    (MDPI, 2022) Wódka, Marek; Fel, Stanisław; Zarzycka, Beata; Kozak, Jarosław
    Religion can determine how people perceive socio-political reality, especially in a cultural context in which religious affiliation is an important part of national identity. This has a special significance in the Polish cultural context, in which Catholicism is considered the national religion, and its institutional dimension plays an important role in the Polish socio-political domain. The purpose of this study is to analyse how religion affects the socio-political attitudes of Poles abroad. This analysis focuses directly on evaluating the influence of the spiritual leaders of Polish community organisations in the UK on the knowledge and opinions of Brexit among Polish post-accession emigrants to the UK. The study was conducted on a sample of 620 Poles living in the UK (62.6% male) using a group-administered questionnaire. The study found that the Polish Catholic clergy did not play an important role in opinion-forming, i.e., in shaping what Polish emigrants to the UK know and think about Brexit. What proved to be the most powerful factor in terms of opinion-making was the British mass media. The influence of the Catholic clergy on the knowledge of—and opinions on—Brexit among Polish emigrants was only evident among elderly people who did not know English very well, and who regularly participated in religious activities.
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    Religijność a tożsamość narodowa polskich migrantów w Wielkiej Brytanii w dobie brexitu
    (Wydawnictwo KUL, 2021) Kozak, Jarosław; Fel, Stanisław; Wódka, Marek
    Religia odgrywa istotną rolę w życiu jednostek, społeczeństw i całych wspólnot narodowych. Posiada ona szczególną siłę oddziaływania tam, gdzie przynależność religijna jest ważną częścią tożsamości narodowej. Celem niniejszego artykułu jest analiza wpływu religijności na postawy tożsamościowe polskich emigrantów. W analizie skupiono się na ocenie wpływu autodeklaracji wiary polskich migrantów poakcesyjnych w Wielkiej Brytanii na ich tożsamość narodową. Badania socjologiczne przeprowadzono za pomocą kwestionariusza ankiety na próbie 620 Polaków tam mieszkających (badania własne przeprowadzone jesienią 2019 r.). Analiza badań ilościowych wykazała, że mimo malejącego wskaźnika autodeklaracji wiary respondentów religia w dalszym ciągu jest silnie powiązana z identyfikacją narodową. Wpływ czynnika religijnego na deklarowaną przynależność narodową kraju pochodzenia najwyraźniej widać pośród głęboko wierzących, tych zaś, którzy deklarowali przynależność narodową także do kraju osiedlenia, charakteryzowała niższa wartość wskaźnika religijności. Religion plays an important role in the life of individuals, societies and entire national communities. It has a particular impact where religious affiliation is an important part of national identity. The aim of this article is to explore the influence of religiosity on the identity attitudes of Poles abroad under conditions of migration. The analysis focuses on assessing the impact of the self-declaration of faith of the Polish post-accession migrants in Great Britain on their national identity. Sociological research was conducted with a questionnaire on a sample of 620 Poles living in the UK. The analysis of quan-titative research has shown that despite the decreasing rate of respondents’ self-declaration of faith, religion is still strongly related to their national identification. The influence of the religious factor on the declared national affiliation to the country of origin is most evident among the firm believers, while those respondents who declare a shared national affiliation – declaring a strong sense of be-longing to the country of settlement – were characterised by a lower value of the religiousness index.
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    Religiosity of Polish Catholics in the UK: Attitude towards Faith, Affiliation, Membership and Religious Practices
    (MDPI, 2020-08-16) Wódka, Marek; Fel, Stanisław; Kozak, Jarosław
    This paper is based on sociological quantitative studies carried out in 2019 on a sample of 620 Polish Catholics living in London, Swindon, or Oxford. Those studies and their findings are limited only to those Catholics who make up the communities around major Polish institutions in the UK, such as Polish parishes, Saturday schools, and community houses. The goal of this paper is to describe selected aspects of Polish migrants’ religiosity in the new social and cultural milieu. What we focus on here is how Poles themselves describe their faith, how they understand and evaluate their membership of parishes or other religious communities, and how they approach religious practices, especially Sunday Mass attendance. We address the following questions: how do the Poles living abroad describe their attitudes towards faith? How many of them are active members of Polish parishes? What do their religious practices and membership of other community organisations look like? How do specific factors affect the results across these areas?
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    To Stay or to Return? The Dilemma Faced by Polish Emigrants to England Following Brexit. Expected Remigration to Poland and the Motivations Behind It
    (ReKUL, 2020-03-17) Fel, Stanisław; Kozak, Jarosław; Wódka, Marek
    Poles represent one of the largest groups of economic immigrants to the UK. The process of the UK’s withdrawal from the European Union, which started with the referendum in June 2016, redefined the prospects of their continued stay. Many Poles have already returned home, while others are still trying to make up their minds about their future. Given the large number of economic immigrants to the UK, their decisions about whether to stay or go will have a serious impact on the British economy and some social and cultural areas. This paper presents the results of our original quantitative sociological study conducted in the autumn of 2019 on a sample of 620 Polish respondents living in three locations in England—London, Oxford and Swindon, which differ in many respects. The study was conducted using a group-administered questionnaire. The primary goal of the survey was to address the question of whether Polish migrants intend to return to Poland, and if so, when. A considerable part of the survey focused on their motivations for returning to Poland, postponing this decision until some unspecified time in the future, or staying in the UK despite uncertainty. We identify some major factors influencing the decisions of respondents with different social and financial situations, and living in a global metropolis, a university city, or a typical working-class town. These are: length of stay in England, financial situation, knowledge of English, ability to assimilate culturally, missing the family, and homesickness.