Browsing by Author "Biela-Wołońciej, Aleksandra"

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    Selected psychosocial and psycholinguistic aspects of a consumptionist lifestyle
    (Towarzystwo Słowaków w Polsce, Filozofická fakulta Trnavskej univerzity v Trnave, 2017) Kornas-Biela, Dorota; Biela-Wołońciej, Aleksandra
    A consumptionist lifestyle is present and not seldom dominant in most developed countries. It treats reality from a pragmatic, hedonistic point of view. The main activities in life center around the aim to collect goods, provide pleasant experiences and a sense of security. Not only objects and experiences, but also other people are perceived as commodities that may be acquired or traded, whose value lies in the degree of pleasant experiences they provide. Consumption – its amount and type – becomes a part of one’s identity and a way of communicating about oneself. It also functions as a means of satisfying one’s needs of all types, from physiological ones, such as hunger to higher psychological needs like emotional attachment or achievement; even spirituality serves the consuming human being in the center. The psychosocial threats of a consumptionist lifestyle include an immature, narcissistic personality, addictions, an egocentric attitude towards relationships, family and procreation. The language in consumptionist discourse reveals the underlying conceptualizations of the world and the cognitive structures that shape the way one thinks, behaves and speaks. Figurative expressions about food and sex, or about relationships and trade, point to obvious conceptual links between these domains and their corresponding axiological load. Certain linguistic expressions especially strongly stimulate the needs to be satisfied by consumption. As a reaction to consumption- ism and its threats, various intellectual and social trends arise that result in different initiatives aimed to provide an alternative, more sustainable approach to life. The paper presents selected aspects of consumptionism, such as anthropological, psychological, pedagogical, psychospiritual, social and psycholinguistic ones.