Alternative Variants of Phrasematics in Polish Dialects

The article shows 12 dialectal phrasemes appearing in numerous variants concerning phonology (e.g. żarło/zarło), inflection (e.g. oko/oczy), word formation (e.g. woza/wózka) and lexis (most numerous). Euphemisms are interesting types (e.g. diabli/bogowie, gówno/ kompot). The analysis of numerous variants of a given phraseme confirms A.M. Lewicki’s thesis (1976) that it is the semantic and syntactic patterns, rather than particular lexemes that determine the identity of a phraseological expression. For example, the two expressions coś komuś strzeliło do łba and pizło komuś do czepani are regarded as variants of one phrase, although their lexis is different. Examining phraseme variants rather than particular appearances makes understanding of their meaning (eg. Objechał kraki maki versus Uobjechał Krakóf i Makóf) and strange syntax (eg. Święta Barbara po lodzie... versus Jak na świętą Barbarę chodzi gęś po lodzie...) possible