Names of the stations in the Way of the Cross service (changes in their structure and function in 20th century)

Sieradzka-Mruk, Agnieszka

doi:10.17651/ONOMAST.64.14

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Title: Names of the stations in the Way of the Cross service (changes in their structure and function in 20th century)

Abstract:

The names of stations in the Way of the Cross may be used as titles of pictures and sculptures, eachcorresponding to a particular event in the Passion of Christ, or as titles of meditations. The articlefocuses on the second meaning, but the trends of the development of both kinds of names are similar.The study is based on material consisting of about 200 texts of the service that have been publishedfrom the beginning of the 20th century to the present (2020). The purpose of the article isto describe the changes that have taken place in the 20th century, a period of particularly turbulentchanges in religious discourse. The article deals with the function, syntactic structure and featuresof style, such as the use of archaic or colloquial vocabulary. These properties are considered in connectionwith social and cultural changes. At the beginning of the analyzed period, it was customaryto use relatively long titles, which informed the participant or reader about a particular event usingexpressive and evaluative lexis. Those titles gradually gave way to short, schematic names. Sincethe Second Vatican Council, titles of a new type have appeared. Their purpose is to attract the attentionof the recipient. They are based on a riddle, a contrast, allusions, etc. Therefore, the recipientderives satisfaction from deciphering the puzzle or finding the source of the quote or allusion. Thesephenomena are known from research on the language of press or fiction, but they can also be linkedto current trends in the so-called new evangelization.