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38
Annika Lux
ANALYZING DIFFERENT ATTITUDES TOWARDS "FEMINISM, ABORTION AND THE ROLE OF WOMEN" AMONG GERMAN AND POLISH UNIVERSITY STUDENTS: ASSOCIATION EXPERIMENT
Originally Russian
ethnopsycholinguistics have been investigating the translation of written texts from one language and cultural group to another. Thus, research in this area analyses among other things the perception and understanding of texts written in a foreign language (1). Within the field of
ethnopsycholinguistics, the lacuna model has been developed.
The origins of this term can be found in the Latin language where it is explained as a gap or opening. In the field of medicine it means a bulge on the surface of an organ. Sorokin and Markovina defined lacunae as phenomena of a culture that have no equivalents in another culture regarding both linguistic as well as cultural specifics (2).
The lacuna model had been primarily introduced by J.A. Sorokin and continually established by I. Markovina. It represents a framework "for the systematic characterization, operationalization and classification of cultural differences in communication" Schröder [1995: 10]. In the field of cultural studies, one explores differences between cultures, the specifics of cultures. Hence, it is of great importance to be aware of dangers that might be results of these differences, how to become aware of them and how to deal with them. These differences can be gaps in a text or in a broader sense, gaps in cultural habits, ideas or features. Thus, "lacunae are generally speaking
a term for describing items that exist in one culture, but not in another" Schröder [1995: 12].
Before we proceed to the classification of lacunae, it is important to elaborate on the idea of "culture" and "gap". Culture can be defined as a system of signs or codes using a semiotic definition of this term. Such a code consists of semantic system, has a network of meanings and can be used as a functional substitute term for culture. The border of a culture represents a semiotic means of translation, which enables the exchange of information between cultures and subcultures. In cases, where such cross-cultural transfer of signs is only partly possible or not possible at all, one experiences a lacuna. Lacunae occur if the decoding mechanism of the culture into which the text or cultural specific is going to be translated does not have (or only few) semantic means to identify the elements that accompany the cross-cultural transfer. The semantic meaning potential of the original cultural and the target culture are not congruent. A gap of different semantic degree has emerged. Hence, lacunae can be defined as a cultural invariant, which determines the degree of semantic difference between cultures. As already mentioned, the recipient of the target culture perceives lacunae as something, which does not exist in his/her culture, or it might exist but it receives different meanings.
However, these missing features are not just words that cannot be
translated. Moreover, lacunae also capture cultural specific features. If we consider the term "feminism", it can be translated both into German (Feminismus) and Polish (feminizm), but the cultural connotations in these two cultures are different. Therefore, the semantic degree cannot be reduced to the function of indicating a missing word. Moreover, the meaning of a cultural feature is not static, not fixed, but it might vary over time and it also depends on extra linguistic characteristics. Asking somebody about his or her associations about abortion will result in answers that are influence by the personal and educational background of the person, it may differ asking elderly or young people (3).
Turning to the definition of "gaps", lacunae are linguistically defined as "gaps in the text". However this spectrum of gaps reaches from words that cannot be translated to meanings of cultural specifics that can only be created through the active construction process on behalf of the reader/ actor. Lacunae represent more than signals of specific realities, they are signals of specific processes and stages, which contradict the usual experience of a member of a different culture. Lacunae are gaps of experience, deficits of knowledge and niches (4).
Furthermore, the recipient perceives lacunae as something not understandable, unusual, exotic, foreign, unknown, incorrect, astonishing, unexpected, something that cannot be predicted. Lacunae are fragments that strike the recipient, which require interpretation or which are lying beyond the borders of
his/her attention. According to Sorokin, one important characteristic of a lacuna is its ambivalence, which is attractive through its incomprehensibility and oddity (5).
The next paragraph will represent a classification of lacunae. Sorokin and Markovina have formed a classification of language and cultural lacunae. Due to the restricted framework of this paper, I will concentrate in cultural lacuna. These can be roughly subdivided into four groups (6):
Subjective or national-
psychological lacunae
• Lacunae of communicative activity
• Lacunae related to cultural space
• Text lacunae
Important for this work is the first group, subjective or national-psychological lacunae. By the means of the association experiment that is the base of this paper, I investigated among other things the images of Polish and German women. The different associations of respondents are character lacunae. For female Polish and German respondents, thinking about a "typical Polish and German woman, they are dealing with auto stereotypes and their sense of self-definition. Thinking about their counterpart from the other culture, they are dealing with "the stereotypical reception of the national character of other countries" Schröder [1995: 14]. The latter is also valid for male respondents of both nations. The feature "typical German/ Polish woman" can thus be defined as cultural lacunae.
Furthermore, the same feature can be classified as behavioural-specific lacunae, which are part of the
second group "Lacunae of communicative activity". As "typical German/ Polish woman" concerns also associations about appropriate roles and status of women in society, behaviour and rules of etiquette are closely related. The terms "feminism" and "abortion" can be integrated within the third group, "Lacunae related to cultural space". These terms are symbolic; they reflect a particular way of discussion.
Now we will focus on the overview of work that has been done in that field. Ethnopsycholinguistics has emerged in the seventies, within the frame of the Moscow school of psycholinguistic. The approach of the Moscow school of psycholinguistic, influenced by A.A. Leontjev had focused on the "theory of speech activity", analysing different models of speech generation and perception as models of psychic processes. Apparently, these psychic processes would be the same among all human beings. Questions regarding the cultural importance/ determination of psychic processes had been neglected through out a long period. Out of that neglect, a new discipline emerged, searching for models to integrate the cultural dimension into psychic models and processes and explaining the verbal behaviour of members of different languages and cultures (7).
Researchers have been interested in explanations for the situation where members of different cultures address the same object with different names. One common hypothesis had been to generally state that the differences between natural languages resulted in different ways of addressing or describing one and
the same idea. Yet,
ethnopsycholinguistics drawing its origins both from linguistics and psychology was successful in providing explanations, which could account for the phenomenon of the differences in verbalising the same idea. These explanations pointed towards an origin outside the language sphere. Ethnopsycholinguistic scholars focused on the first stage of generating speech that is the analysis of thoughts. The psychological approach of dealing with the problem of cultural specifics regarding speech generation enables us to analyse non-linguistic thought processes as well as the activity at hand that determines those thought processes.
The framework of cultural historical psychology by Wygotski has established the thesis of isomorphism. It defines the isomorphic nature of the internal mental and the external objective activity. Given this structure, one can analyse the mental activity, which is not accessible to the researcher by analysing the external activity (8).
Having thus established the theoretical background, one can return to the cultural specifics of verbal and nonverbal thinking. Those cultural specifics are determined by the objective activity, as this activity only initiates human thinking. Without the stimulation of the objective activity, human thinking does not even start the internal mental activity.
Why do e.g. Germans if given the task to describe their imagines about "moving to another city" have different imagines as Canadians who had been asked the same? Germans would probably talk about
administrative obligations. Having to go to the municipality to give notice of the change of address, where they would get document with a signature and a stamp stating that they moved out of their apartment/ house. After they had moved, they would be obliged to go to the municipality in their new city along with their document to sign in. If they did not do so within one week they would have to face legal consequences. In Canada there is no such law.
One can easily conclude from that example the fact that differences in statements about one and the same activity in different national cultures depend on the specifics of their culture. These would be characteristics of cultural objects, the activities of producing them and the notional imagines of these objects and activities. Hence, to modify models of speech generation and speech perception it is crucial to detect the external verbal behaviour within similar or same situations.
In order to analyse specifics of national languages and cultures, scholars within the Moscow school of ethnopsycholingistic have worked with association experiments. These experiments can grasp unconscious knowledge, which accompanies processes of speech generation and speech perception. In the context of the first association experiments by Salevskaja, data had first been collected and described, and then the results had been compared and interpreted between members of different cultures.
Nowadays, results of these experiments are taken to explain communicative conflicts, which arise
in cross-cultural exchange. Differences found in mental images of different cultures point to possible "critical incidents" in communication. Scholars classify these differences as differences of cultural specifics of verbal categorization. Furthermore,
associative norms are regarded as a base for further interpretation, as the association experiment is a method of analysing cultural specific linguistic consciousness.
Through the last decade, Russian scholars within ethnopsycholinguistics have focused on cultural specifics of linguistic consciousness. It has been considered as the main reason for communicative conflicts in cross-cultural communication. Searching for new ways of analysis, new concepts to analyse cultural consciousness have emerged. One takes mental images of an identical cultural object of two cultures and compares the results. The theoretical background of such concept focuses on the apprehension that images of the real world are projected into our consciousness in a way that these mental images are accompanied by such causal, temporal, local and emotional relationships which exist between these images in communication and in activities.
It is important to add another theoretical framework to this idea. The theory of culture perception describes social cognition of schema and scripts. "Schemas and scripts guide our attention and affect perception (en coding), memory organization, retrieval and evaluation; events are perceived and interpreted in relation to semantic knowledge structures" Boski et aUs [1999: 133].
This theory states that the mental images we receive throughout our childhood socialization are first of all accompanied by values which the culture we are living in, attaches to these images. Second, our mind puts them in a scheme, where it will be called upon and may be revaluated.
Furthermore, the theory of social identity has established the notion of in-groups and out-groups. According to that theory, events are classified as fitting to our in-group, a classification, which would result then in a more positive evaluation. Or an event is classified as belonging to the out-group attaching it with a more negative evaluation (9).
To conclude, cultural specifics regarding images of the language consciousness can be explained by the cultural specifics of communication and activities that are customary in this very culture (10).
This constitutes the second part of my research project, the actual association experiment. The bases of this association experiment are the four terms "feminism, abortion and typical Polish/German woman". As a part of my programme, I am also doing gender studies. Having studied two years in Canada, I have realized that attitudes towards the role of women, feminism and the issue of abortion are very differently treated and discussed in Canada and Germany. For instance, regarding the position of women in society, in Canada it seems to be more common if a woman wants to pursuit a career, where as in Germany women still have to fight against huge prejudices. The cultural acceptance for emancipation seems to be larger in
Canada than in Germany. Having returned to Germany now, I have noticed an even bigger gap between the Polish culture and the German culture regarding those issues. For the past four years that I have been living at the German Polish border, I also experienced how the mere mentioning of the term "feminism" resulted in very negative reactions from both female and male students. It did not matter if they were Polish or German. I was curious now to analyse these observations on a more scientific level, wanting to investigate the meaning, definitions, images, ideas and associations people have with terms such as feminism. Additionally, I chose "abortion" it is closely connected to the agenda of feminism, as some women's organisations offer counselling in family matters, birth control and abortion, having their roots in representing the interests and rights of women (11).
The following part will be an overview about previous empirical research about feminism and abortion in Germany and Poland.
Following the discussion about feminism in public life, such as media, TV-shows or in private conversations, the most frequent statements are "women taking over", "political over-correctness" and „quota" (12).
In 1996, three German scientific researchers Gerhards, Neidhardt and Rucht explored the public discussion about abortion. For that aim, they had chosen news articles from two national newspapers, Frankfurter Allgemeine and Süddeutsche Zeitung. These articles had been published within the period between 1970 until 1994. Furthermore, Gerhards, Neidhardt and
Rucht had executed interviews with public actors from political parties, religious groups and social movements. This had been partly done using standardized
questionnaires, which allowed a quantitative analysis and partly by means of guided interviews (13). Having analysed their data, the authors concluded the following (14): -Unborn life, human right to live -Female right of self-determination
Conflict between the right to live and the right of self-determination -Morality
Tasks of the state as a moral actor (active or laissez faire)
The situation in Poland has been examined by the means of a survey. Within the framework of this survey, which was conducted in 1996 in Poland by Malgorzata Fuszara, the researcher had asked members of the Polish population to define the term "feminism". Answers had reached from not being able to respond at all over "equal rights, women's struggle, action/ trend" to "liberation, independence" and finally "women's domination over men, boycott of men" [Fuszara 2000: 1074]. Fuszara concluded, the understanding and knowledge of feminism depended mainly on his/ her educational background and age. According to the researcher, elderly persons had little or no idea as well as people with elementary education (15). Another scholar, Agnieszka Jucewicz concluded, "Polish Feminists are depicted as ugly, geeky, man-haters and lesbians" [Jucewicz 2003: 26].
About the situation of the discussion in Poland. In July 1999,
the Polish company RUN, Research and University Network had conducted 10 interviews with medical professionalists in Warsaw, asking about their attitude towards abortion. The statements of the doctors reached from moral observations "Abortion is unethical, immoral, evil. It is a necessary evil, but it should be a possibility" [Duch 2000a: 57 to reservations about the health and right of self- determination of the mother "Justified if a threat to life/health of mother" [Duch 2000a: 56] "woman's right to decide about her pregnancy [Duch 2000a: 67]. The crucial role of the Polish Catholic church was mentioned, "Catholic, dogmatic point of view, which gives subjectivity only to a child" [Duch 2000a: 58] "Church controlling the discussion, being against anti-abortion act is acting contrary to God's commandments" [Duch 2000a: 60] as well as the social situation "Social grounds should be included" [Duch 2000a: 62].
The Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Science had also conducted a survey, covering the period from 1989 until 1998. Polish women and men had been asked about their attitude towards abortion. The most frequent answers had been "it is a woman's private matter", "limitation of women's rights", "each case requires different decisions", "woman's nature to give birth", "homicide, evil" (16).
The images of women in Germyn and in Poland are depicted as following. Certain currents in German society claim a retrieval of traditional roles, where women should be family-oriented, as a retreat into the private sphere is defined as genuinely
feminine. Concepts such as motherhood, caring for the family and fidelity are booming. Other sources blame female careers for the erosion of community bonds and the emerging of individuality processes. Female claims of self-determination and self-realization would undermine societal solidarity (17).
According to Boski et al. several elements are specific of femininity within the Polish culture. First, Catholicism and its two images of women. One image of St. Mary and the second of Eve. Second, historical romantic or respect-commanding images of Polish women, resulting in the myth of "the Polish mother" (18). Jucewicz also investigated the image of Polish women, concluding "Polish Mothers--the traditional women-juggle their two full-time jobs: one at home, one at work, all in the name of Holy Mary, the Father and Big Brother" [Jucewicz 2003: 26].
Having been provided with this overview, one can declare a hypothesis. Within Environmental Research, university students are characterised as having more liberal attitudes and values than elderly people or persons with elementary education. This theory is based on the assumption that university students are more accustomed to ideas of equality, rationality and emancipation, as the atmosphere in universities provides the ground for those approaches. Thus, having analysed the answers of the articles mentioned in the previous chapter, it is to be expected that the associations of the respondents who are all students regarding feminism, abortion and the role and status of women will be more
liberal compared to some statements found in these articles.
The following part will describe the actual project. The association experiment, which represents the base of this paper, had been conducted in July and August 2003. At the European University Viadrina Frankfurt (Oder), Germany, I asked 40 students for participation in accumulating these data. 20 of these participating students had been Poles, 8 of them female and 12 male. 10 German male students and 10 female students constituted the remaining other 50%. The programmes at this university are cultural science, law and economics. The students who had been chosen represented all three programmes roughly equally.
I had approached the students on the campus, introducing myself as a student and asking for their help for my term paper. I did not tell them about the subject of my work, as that would influence their statements. I handed them an empty sheet, asking to write their name, sex, origin and age at the top of the sheet. After that I told them they would be given 4 terms, one after one and they would have to write down their first five associations they had with these terms. So I told them the first term (feminism), they wrote down the five terms, then I gave them the second term (abortion), etc. At the end, I thanked them for their cooperation and told them finally about the subject and aim of this term paper.
Beforehand, I had chosen 4 terms: feminism, abortion, typical German woman and typical Polish woman. I had started off giving these terms I that order, however realizing quickly that putting "feminism" at the beginning of the question series,
heavily influenced the associations of "typical Polish/German woman". For instance, I would give them the term "feminism" first and that would later result in answers for "typical Polish/German woman" such as "emancipated, independent, self-confident" or also "eccentric, bossy". Such statements could have correlated with their trail of thought about the former term "feminism". As a consequence, I changed the order of the terms throughout the whole process of gathering data. Putting "typical Polish/German woman" at the beginning of the questionnaire, more interviewees wrote down associations about the external appearance, such as "blond, make up, chic" instead of "self-confident, bossy". One could argue that changing the order of the terms made it impossible to compare them later, and I am totally aware that the order of the terms at hand had a huge influence on the interviewees. However, having asked so many people, I realized that every order influenced these associations and no matter how I would put the questions, there is always a certain influence by
the researcher that cannot be totally eradicated.
A second features represents the presence of the researcher. I am female and I am German so, and although nobody of my interviewees knew me, my mere presence influenced them, in giving their association about a typical German woman. One time, I wore Birkenstock sandals and men shorts. Additionally, I had just had an accident so my knee was bleeding a little. During an interview, when I had asked a Polish student to write down her associations about a "typical German woman", she looked me up and down and her first association was "does not care about her external appearance. But even during days, when I had been dressed more properly, people took me as an example of a typical German girl, may it had been the way I had approached them, the fact that I have short hair, etc.
In anthropology, one is always aware of the influence the researcher has on the ones s/he wants to observe, but it is no justification to question the validity of these data.
Regarding the evaluation of the data, I counted the answers that had been given most frequently.
Associations of Germans Associations of Poles
FEMINISM
1. Alice Schwarzer (19) 1. Combat / radical
2. Women's movement, (strong) 2. Delusion/ wrong-headedness/
women eccentricity
3. Ideology 3. Liberation/ emancipation
4. Equal rights 4. New kind of gender relations
5. Support moderate form 5. Career/ loneliness
ABORTION
1. § 218 (20) 1. Wrong, evil,
2. Freedom of choice for women 2. Against human right to live, homicide
3. Conflict/ controversy 3. Conflict/ controversy
4. Unborn life 4. Freedom of choice for women
5. Question of responsibility 5. Question of responsibility
TYPICAL GERMAN WOMAN
1. Self-confident 1. Does not care about her external appearance
2. Blond/ blue eyes 2. Direct/ loud
3. Self-reliant/ independent 3. Emancipated/ independent
4. Career 4. Does not want to have kids
5. Does not care much about her 5. Loose relationships with men
external appearance
TYPICAL POLISH WOMAN
1. Chic 1. Chic/ beautiful
2. Skirt 2. Wants to have children
3. Make up 3. Good cook
4. Not very emancipated 4. The Polish mother
5. Polite 5. Good catholic
The current women's movement began in the late sixties, early seventies. It has partly emerged from the student's movement and other groups. In the beginnings, it had been strongly influenced by American feminism. The first phase (19711975) had been determined by the campaign against the abortion law, "paragraph § 218". The next phase focused on self-experiencing groups, which eventually turned into the current phase, where the women's movement is active in measures connected to health, culture and social policy (21).
On different levels of German public life, such as media, TV-showsor in private conversations, one can currently follow a discussion about how women or the women's movement are taking over all positions in society, how they accumulate power and dominate men.
Additionally, feminism would be only concentrating on such minor subjects as eliminating sexist language. Claims for non-discriminating speech styles have resulted in over political correctness, and women are often described as men-killing amazons. Moreover, the introduction of quota to increase the number of women, e.g. in parliament has lead to numerous debates, and resulted in scepticism, resistance and rejection. Feminism is also regarded as a luxury hobby of women who do not know what else to do with so much free time at their hands. Contrarily, news about the women's movement state that it has lost its members has lead women into loneliness and bitterness news about women who are tired and burned out (22). In 1990, Büchner had interviewed eight active female politicians who played an active role in their party "the republicans" which is a German right-
wing party. Having been asked to talk about their images of emancipated women they described them as stubborn, grim, wearing sloppy clothes. They also described them as women's libber (23).
The next paragraph explores the legal situation regarding abortion in Germany. Until 1926, § 218 had been valid, which condemned women with five years in jail. In 1926, a change was added which excluded women whose life was endangered by the pregnancy (24). In the GDR was introduced a system, where women had a legal right to an abortion. Until 1971, the liberalisation of the abortion law had been predominantly a discussion among the elite. In 1971, the discussion in the FRG became heated, as 374 women admitted in the popular newspaper Stern to have gone through an abortion. Among these women had been Alice Schwarzer who is a leading German feminist. This gave the start for the women's movement that fought for the abolition of § 218. They held demonstration and congresses; they collected signatures and were supported by liberal media. The opposition, mainly the Catholic Church started activities against the liberalisation. In 1976, after long periods of changes between the Bundestag and Bundesrat, a new law was passed, allowing women to get an abortion within the first 12 weeks of pregnancy if a medical, eugenic, ethic or social indication can be proved (25). After the German unification, reforms were needed. In 1995, the German parliament passed a new law. According to that law, abortion is legal if the situation meets any of the
three indications, rape, and danger to the health of the mother and finally a statement that the woman has seen a counsellor. This new law is also called "paragraph § 218" (26).
Searching for explanations for the rather negative evaluation of "feminism" among the Polsih participants, one has to go back into Polish history. A crucial influence regarding gender relations was the political situation starting with the partitions in the 18th century and resulting in the fact that Poland ceased to exist as a country on the map until 1918. As a result, institutions such as the Sejm (Polish parliament) or the King could not longer be the platform and the preserver of Polish national identity. This role was given to women, who were supposed to raise faithful and patriotic soldiers who would fight for the independence of Poland. Thus, the family served as a bastion and the mother as the incarnation of Polish tradition and heritage. This period established for the first time a political role of women and the myth of the "Polish mother" (Matka polka) emerged. In this period, thoughts about an own women's agenda were impossible, as Polish men and women had to be united against the external political enemy. Being a part of the community, women had to sacrifice their own ambitions for the sake of the collective identity. Following one's own emancipation, which might have differed from the goals of men would have been considered as betrayal of the Polish nation (27).
Furthermore, within the public sphere, which was dominated by the nobility, republican democratic values of freedom prevailed. However,
freedom was not defined as liberalism, which stands for the freedom of the individual, where this individual is free from any power above him. The Polish tradition of republican freedom declared freedom of the people, not the individual, not freedom from power, but participating in power. Collectivism and a sense of community belonging were and still are central to Polish politics and morality (28).
Through out the period of industrialisation, more women start working in the public sphere, which allows some of the living a life outside the family structures. However, in times of economic recessions women are pushed out of the labour market.
After the WW II, the period of Communism changed the situation of women partly. Communist ideology favoured to a certain extent the women's movement and
emancipation of women. Women received higher education, they were part of the labour force and they made career just as men. Even in higher party ranks, women were represented proportionally, who had no significant tasks, but they should reflect and maintain the progressivism of communism. However, statements and actions regarding these subjects were strictly controlled, and had to reconcile with the party programme (29). In reality, equal rights for all represented one way of maximizing profit - exploitation of the labour force for economic reasons. In times of stagnation, women were the first ones to loose their jobs. The double burden, which accompanied such life as a mother and worker together with
the pathetic state of the economy, made life for women very difficult (30).
This process resulted in the fact, that ideas of equal rights, women's employment, and the destruction of the traditional, family centred model of society had been irrevocably historically connected to communism. After the fall of the iron curtain, women lost doubled. Firstly, emancipation in communism had never resulted in equal rights. Second, communists had carried out any emancipation and that is why emancipation was bad. The break with communism and the return to Christian values can thus be described as a "de-emancipation", which can be observed within the discussion of abortion, which is nowadays stricter, during times of communism it had been legal
(31).
The third important element within the discussion of feminism and femininity in Poland is the influence of the Catholic Church. Catholicism in Poland is more than just a religion. It is a form of existence, philosophy of life, criteria of classification, model of education, a determinant of social roles and a political idea. In opposition to the tradition of the nobility, women are not transferred to marginality but they have been put in the middle. The woman is the great goddess, the black Madonna, the mother of god, etc. She saved Poland from the Swedish invasion, helped against the Bolsheviks. That is why she attains ceremonial respect.
The Church personifies morality and the question is how does the church preserve morality. In times of changes, there is a tension between the ideal and reality, between claims and needs. One can try to preserves norms
through symbolic-ritual reduction or minimize it through efficient action, even if it will result in a reduction of moral amendments. Catholic morality, through severity, is one of the most ritualised forms of morality. Religious morality knows only how to distinguish between god and evil and it has forms to make people conform. There are more and more repressions and laws regarding subjects, which are considered evil such as abortion, artificial insemination and contraception. Another element of the image of a woman are passive virtues such as obedience, piety, modesty and subordination. Having already mentioned the importance of St. Mary as a role model for women, the Catholic Church provides a second image of women that of Eve. She is represented as a whore, as a seductress, she personifies the evil. Between these two images, there is not much space for Polish women in the Catholic Church. Hence, marginal are characteristics as self-determination and the development of one's own personality (32).
To conclude, Man and woman in Polish society can be seen as two opposite models of life. Man as an individual represents the societal, economical, political and cultural macro structure. In opposition, the woman serves in daily life, in education of children and in church. She is passive, sacrifices herself and lives in modesty and obedience. She guarantees tradition. Besides, as "the Polish mother" she represents the religious dimension of the "catholic Polish mother" (matka polka katoliczka). She is idealised as taboo-unapproachable, a reflection of St.
Mary. She personifies central values of the polish society and constitutes their basic norms (33). These different spheres of competence constitute the ongoing division of labour. Men are dominant in public spheres, where they also receive more prestige. Women are bound to the private sphere; they are in the shadow of their husband, where they receive idealised worship. Signs of adoration compensate the exclusion of women from public life. Polish society praises her role and importance as a housewife and mother. Her societal function is restricted to marriage and family. Hence, the political and economic position of women is reverse proportional to the symbolic praises women receive (34).
The following paragraph investigates the status of abortion in the Polish legal system. During communism, abortion had been legalized in 1956. After the fall of the iron curtain, groups originating from the Catholic Church voiced calls for a reform of the abortion law. In 1993, the Sejm passed an Anti-Abortion Act. Three years later, a more liberalized form allowed abortion on social grounds. However, in 1997, a new law was passed, rendering abortion as illegal, except if there is a danger to the health of the mother or the child. Additionally, if the pregnancy is the result of a criminal act, the woman is allowed to have an abortion. This is the version, which is still valid today (35).
This association experiment has proven mental images are closely connected to values that are part of the national culture. Comparing the results of German and Polish participants one can easily recognize the different process of history in these two
countries. German feminism has different roots, different ideas and different obstacles to fight against than its Polish counterpart. Due to the cultural and historical events, the roles of women are different, expectations about their lives, careers and dedications. Analysing these data, one is aware of the more positive associations towards feminism having been made by German interviewees. By means of the cultural perception framework, this is a proof that when we are storing mental images in our mind, we also store the values that our culture attaches to them. Due to cultural specifics, feminism has a rather negative connotation in the Polish culture, a fact that results in
more negative associations. Also ideas about femininity and the status and role about women are more traditional among Poles compared the Germans.
Besides the cultural lacunae which can be drawn from these results, "Alice Schwarzer" and "§ 218" are feature which do not exist in the Polish culture as they had not been part of the cultural process, they are not part of the national memory and knowledge.
Taking into consideration the restricted frame of this paper, one can claim these results to be valid for the whole German and Polish population. Conducting surveys among a different age group or among respondents with different educational background may lead to absolutely different results.
References
1. Panasiuk (2002: 257f.)
2. Panasiuk (2002: 261).
3. Ertelt-Vieth (2000: 145), Panasiuk (2002: 259).
4. Ertelt- Vieth (1999: 132).
5. Panasiuk (2002: 261f.).
6. Schröder (1995: 13f.), Ertelt-Vieth (1999: 133ff.).
7. Tarasov/ Ufimceva (1999: 185ff.).
8. Tarasov/ Ufimceva (1999: 189).
9. Boski et al/s (1999: 134).
10.Tarasov/ Ufimceva (1999: 193).
11.Fuszara (2000: 1073).
12.Baringhorst (1995: 6f.).
13.Gerhards/ Neidhardt/ Rucht (1998: 47ff.).
14.Gerhards/ Neidhardt/ Rucht (1998: 197f.).
15.Fuszara (2000: 1074).
16.Duch (2000b: 113ff.).
17.Baringhorst (1995: 10f.).
18.Boski et al. (1999: 136f.).
19.Alice Schwarzer is one of the leading German feminists. She had
been very active during the abortion campaign during the seventies and she is one of the publishers of the German feminist magazine "Emma". 20.Paragraph in German law which rules all matters concerning abortions. 21.Schenk (1990: 83f.).
22.Baringhorst (1995: 6f.), Baringhorst, Jansen, Ritter (1995: 1).
23.Büchner (1995: 81).
24.Gerhards/ Neidhardt/ Rucht (1998: 13).
25.Gerhards/ Neidhardt/ Rucht (1998: 15ff.).
26.Gerhards/ Neidhardt/ Rucht (1998: 22), Erikson (2003: 1993).
27.Walczewska (1999: 41), Bystydzienski (2001: 502) 28.Sroda (1999: 70).
29.Walczewska (1999: 11).
30.Koschmal (1996: 10ff.).
31. Sroda (1999: 76f.), Bystydzienski (2001: 502).
32.Sroda (1999: 76).
33.Koschmal (1996: 7ff). 35.Nowicka, Tajak (2000: 13).
34.Sroda (1999: 68).
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