The Polish Background to Malinowski's Work

Author(s): Andrzej K. Paluch

Source: Man, New Series, Vol. 16, No. 2 (Jun., 1981), pp. 276-285
Published by: Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland
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 THE POLISH BACKGROUND TO
MALINOWSKI'S WORK

ANDRZEJ K. PALUCH

Jagiellonian University

The work of Malinowski, who left Poland after having completed a Ph.D. in philosophy, has
been comparatively unknown in his native country until the seventies of this century. However,
his studies at the Jagiellonian University in Cracow were quite important for his future career:
during this period his main philosophical views were shaped and these later determined his
model of functional anthropology; at that time also occurred the change in his scientific interests
from physics to philosophy to social anthropology. He possessed a deep knowledge of
nineteenth-century European philosophy, and this philosophical training may be seen as being
responsible for his two visions of social reality: one illustrated in his fieldwork, another
developed in abstract terms. Both visions are rooted in basic concepts which he advocated as
early as I908 in his PhD dissertation.

The position of Bronistaw Malinowski and his work in the history of Polish
social science is to some extent surprising. Until recently, his influence on
Polish sociology and ethnology was rather mediocre: yet he had been a student
of the Jagiellonian University in Cracow and a member of the Polish Academy
of Sciences, and his personality was formed in the rather unique period of
Polish history at the turn of the century. The Jagiellonian University offered
him a professorship in I922, which he rejected,1 and later in London he taught
students from various Polish universities.2 However, until the second world
war he was like an exhibit of Polish culture to the world. After the war, he was
viewed in Poland as a representative of British social anthropology, which was
seen as serving British imperialism. It has, in fact, been only in the last few
years that his work has been rediscovered in Polish sociology, and that
students of the social sciences in Poland have started to read his works without
emotion or prejudice.
A complete edition of Malinowski's works in Polish has been recently
initiated,3 and his name is now becoming better known outside the narrow
circle of professionals. This seems to be a very characteristic phenomenon of
Polish culture, similar in some ways to the publication in Poland of that
monumental work by Florian Znaniecki and William I. Thomas, The Polish
peasant in Europe and America (the first edition of which was published in
I9I8-20, with the first Polish edition in I976). Certainly the roots of modern
Polish social science are not to be found in the work of Malinowski (in contrast
with the case of Znaniecki, who taught sociology at the University of Poznan
from I920 to I939); the social and cultural conditions of the development of
Polish social science have determined that its main sources lie in quite different
kinds of scientific experiences-a vivid example of the close connexion
Man (N.S.) x6, 276-85

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 ANDRZEJ K. PALUCH 277

between national history and the development of a country's science.

In this context the work of Malinowski, his programme for the new
anthropology, was-at a glance-somewhat irrelevant to the development of
Polish sociology and ethnology. In the nineteenth and beginning of the
twentieth centuries the humanities were to play a special role in Poland's social
history. Sociology, ethnology and other social sciences concentrated on
studies of national identity, national culture, and on the detailed examination
of the role of different social groups in the process of social change which took
place in a country divided between three alien powers. This -was the nation's
main problem and it was also the main problem for the Polish social sciences.
Country-folk were seen as the mainstay of Polishness, and the best achieve-
ments of social studies at that time were connected with 'local ethnology'.
Such was the pressure of the tradition that Malinowski's anthropology and
Polish sociology or ethnology were in opposition to each other. Malinowski
was recognised as one of the leading anthropologists, but his influence on the
development of Polish social science was not especially important. His
empirical studies were far from the mainstream of Polish research and his
theoretical work comparatively unknown. His students in Poland published
reviews of his writings and some comments, but the essence of his new anthro-
pology was not appreciated. One can see hardly any essential influence from
his work in the best Polish achievements of the thirties and forties. In fact,
probably the only person who knew and possessed all his main works was his
old friend Stanistaw Ignacy Witkiewicz, a poet, dramatist, painter and
philosopher, still an inspiring and mysterious source of Polish art.4
The very specific history of Polish social science after the second world war
is visible in the latest reception of Malinowski's work. In the forties there were
some translations of and articles about his work, but in the fifties he was 'a
bourgeois liberal' with 'obscure and reactionary ideas of cosmopolitism, not
free from prejudices towards the Soviet Union' Judenko I958: xxx). At the
same time, however, his A scientific theory of culture, The dynamics of culture
change, and the second impression of The sexual life of savages (the first was in
1939) were published. A few years later Argonauts of the western Pacific was
translated. Later still came some studies on classical functionalism, seen as one
of the main sources of modern sociology, by Waligorski (I973), Sztompka
(I97I; I974) and Paluch (I976). In these works Malinowski was discussed and
criticised as one of the 'founding fathers' of modem sociological and anthropo-
logical theory. Other aspects of his work were still somewhat unknown.
The situation changed at the end of the seventies; Malinowski has been
rediscovered in Polish sociology and his work is in the process of revaluation.
This does not mean a 'rethinking sociology' within Polish social science; it
simply means a deeper knowledge of the discipline's foundations (cf. Flis &
Paluch I98I).5 These studies have led to, among other things, a better
recognition of the consequences of the fact that Malinowski was not only born
in Cracow but also educated there and finally left Cracow a mature man and
scholar. His first works in Polish would seem to be crucial for an explanation
of the origins of his functionalism as well as for the interpretation of some of
his ideas.

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 278 ANDRZEJ K. PALUCH

Malinowski was a pupil of one of the two exclusive Cracow secondary

schools, the King Jan III Sobieski School. In I902 he entered the Jagiellonian
University. At first he studied physics and mathematics, with philosophy
eventually becoming his major subject.6 He completed, to be sure, the full
course of physics, but in the second part of his university studies, the
humanities took up more of his programme. This fact is important. His turn
towards social anthropology after reading Frazer's The golden bough is not so
irrational when one realises that he attended lectures and seminars on
philosophy, psychology, and the history of Polish literature. His doctoral
dissertation in I908 was in philosophy, entitled On the principle of the economy
of thought, written under the supervision of Professor Stefan Pawlicki.
Malinowski's doctoral thesis is an important work for understanding the
philosophical background of his new anthropology. The thesis is typical of
Cracow philosophy at the beginning of the twentieth century. Three professors
taught philosophy at the Jagiellonian University: Maurycy Straszewski,
Stefan Pawlicki and Wiadyslaw Heinrich, and they formed Malinowski's idea
of science. The philosophical ideas alive in Cracow at that time were different
from those which had opened new horizons in European thought in the first
years of the twentieth century (Flis I98I). If one can describe the philosophy of
the second part of the nineteenth century as scientism, minimalism, nominal-
ism, empiricism, naturalism and positivism, then the beginning of the
twentieth century brought Logische Untersuchungen by Husserl, La science et
l'hipothe'se by Poincare, Filosofia dello spirito by Croce, Logik der reinen
Erkenntnis by Cohen, Humanism by Schiller, and L'evolution creatrice by
Bergson. Surely it was one of the most varied and interesting periods in
European philosophy.
The teachers of Malinowski, however, opted for a rather different course.
Straszewski worked on the history of philosophy, epistemology and the
cultural history of the Ancient East; Pawlicki was mainly an historian of
philosophy; Heinrich was interested in psychology and the philosophy of
science. All of them were adherents to the 'second positivism' of Ernst Mach
and Richard Avenarius. The most original was Heinrich, the most systematic
Straszewski, but of these three Cracow philosophers Pawlicki was of special
importance in the first years of Malinowski's scientific career. He was a very
original man, a member of the modernistic Bohemia of Cracow and a rector of
the University; a Catholic priest who did not mention Thomas Aquinas at all
in his Metaphysics; a philosopher who advocated positivist ideas; a professor
who in I905-6 (the last year of Malinowski's university studies) gave lectures
on social policy, on the philosophy of Aristotle, on metaphysics, and on the
history of modern socialism (probably the first university lecture in the world
on the foundations of Marxism). He was a true master for his students.
Pawlicki recommended books for Malinowski to read, and transmitted quite a
thorough knowledge of nineteenth century philosophy. Letters from Malin-
owski to Pawlicki show how important Pawlicki's teaching was in the
formation of Malinowski's views.7
The influence of positivist philosophy is clearly revealed in Malinowski's
doctoral thesis. Its title, On the principle of the economy of thought, had a familiar

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 ANDRZEJ K. PALUCH 279

ring in Cracow at that time. This principle is one of the fundamental theses of
positivist epistemology and has two versions: the psychological one of
Avenarius and the methodological one of Mach. Malinowski tries to answer
the question, to what extent this principle contributes to the destruction of
metaphysical philosophy, as these particular philosophers had intended.
Malinowski is not able to accept the principle of the economy of thought in
Avenarius's version and he prefers-with some reservation-Mach's view,
which treats this principle as a methodological one. The function and genesis
of science cannot, as Avenarius had wanted, be explained just by psycho-
logical laws. These must be taken within the framework of the relationship
man-world, and this relationship is defined by human biological needs.
Malinowski's standpoint thus rises from and refers to positivism in its late
nineteenth-century form. The influence of Mach especially is easily identifiable
in all his works, from the doctoral thesis to A scientific theory of culture. Two
highly important questions in his anthropology come from this positivist
heritage: (i) an emphasis on functional explanations and (2) a notion of culture
as an instrumental whole. They are used first in the doctoral thesis to organise
the discussion and argument. Malinowski considers practical application to be
the criterion which differentiates science from 'religious inspiration'. Practical
utility 'is the decisive criterion of the value of the strictly scientific investigation',
and the last instance of verification of scientific statements is the activity of
man confronted with the external world. In this context the main problem of
Malinowski's doctoral thesis, the principle of the economy of thought, 'is
completely accurate because it manifests the role played by the functions of the
human brain with regard to the mastering of the external world' (Malinowski
I908).
Malinowski's standpoint, however, cannot be classified simply as a
positivist point of view. The positivist spectacles, which he undoubtedly wore
in his work, were not very strong.8 The philosophical sources of his new
vision of science were varied, and this let him create a new and original social
anthropology. It also led to some contradictions and difficulties.
One of the most important features of Mach's and Avenarius's positivism is
the principle of 'pure experiment', 'pure description' containing no unverifiable
utterances that cannot be transformed into sentences describing reality.
Contrary to what is frequently said, Malinowski was not an adherent of such
radical empiricism. His standpoint here apparently varies from that of Mach.
He stresses, however, the importance of field studies and mastery in the
descriptions of reality, which should reveal 'pure' facts in their objective
relations with a cultural system. This view results from a partial acceptance of
Mach's postulate, the adoption of some postulates of 'pure experiment'. In his
first published Polish article, Totemizm i egzogamia (Totemism and exogamy),
Malinowski wrote: 'The final aim of all scientific investigations are facts, the
study of links and relations between them, and, what follows, the capability of
a precise and comprehensive description and presentation in every aspect.
. . .In sociological sciences the interesting but not precise discussion of the
origins of various social institutions and beliefs, should finally be replaced by a
less tempting but more precise search for sociological laws. The direction in

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 280 ANDRZEJ K. PALUCH

which one must seek these laws and the form of sociological method can be
defined only in the course of specific research. Methodological reasoning
which lacks a basis in fact misses the point, as does uncritical collecting of facts
which often leads to the formulation of insignificant theories' (Malinowski
19II: 52).

In this quotation, similar to many other programmatic utterances,

Malinowski is not being completely explicit. It can be assumed, however, that
he was conscious that 'pure description'-taking no account of epistemo-
logical and methodological controversies related to it-is a postulate which
cannot be realised in authentic scientific activity. What is more, the same
postulate is embedded in a definite philosophical context. Perception of the
external world by any human being is determined by his cultural system, with
all its values and meanings. In the same way a scientific report of reality is
determined by a theoretical system which provides the bases for the con-
struction of this report. In the work quoted previously, Malinowski also
writes: 'The fewer hypothetical assumptions and postulates included in a given
description of facts, the greater the value of this description, but because every
precise description of facts requires precise concepts, and these can be taken
only from a theory, every description and classification therefore has neces-
sarily to be based on a theoretical foundation' (I9II: 35-36). Malinowski
expresses the same viewpoint somewhat later, after the period of field studies
which were a specific test of his methodological programme (cf. Malinowski
1948: 237 or Malinowski I935, 1: 322). Here he emphasises the point that one
of the main methodological postulates which organised his investigations was
the principle, 'collect pure facts', and the separation of facts from interpret-
ation. Complete lack of interpretation is not possible, however, even at the
stage of observation, to say nothing of subsequent description. Facts have to
be classified, phenomena arranged in orders of interrelations, essential things
and phenomena have to be separated from the inessential ones. All this is
necessary to perceive general laws 'in the infinite variety of facts'. If these
steps-different from the requirements of 'pure description'-are not under-
taken, then the resulting picture of reality comprises only 'small details which
lack inner connection'. They become a 'pure collection of facts' and not an
authentic scientific empirical work.
In these statements, Malinowski diverges from the positivist programme of
experimental philosophy and scientific investigations. The influence of another
tradition of philosophical thinking is revealed here, that of the Neo-Kantianism
propagated by the Marburg school. Undoubtedly, Malinowski knew this philo-
sophy, having read Lange (cf. his Ph.D. thesis). It is difficult to state whether he
also knew Cohen's works. Similarly to Lange and the Neo-Kantianists,
Malinowski assumes that the investigator has to apply a priori forms of
cognition because they make the study of the reality possible. Therefore
concepts determine experience-description of the facts of necessity has to be
settled in a proper theoretical context. This modification becomes still clearer
in the essentialist vision of reality, which entails stressing the essence of
phenomena, their interrelations, as well as their arrangement and hierarchy. In
this respect also, Malinowski represents a standpoint opposed to the pro-

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 ANDRZEJ K. PALUCH 28I

gramme of positivist philosophy. Positivism in Mach's version was only a

starting point in Malinowski's vision of modern social anthropology. Un-
doubtedly, the empiricism characteristic of Malinowski rises from the positivist
trend in science and philosophy. In confrontation with reality, ho'wever,
especially with a social and cultural one, the positivist programme could not be
defended, and therefore Malinowski received it critically.
It seems then that when Malinowski started his activity in the field of
anthropology, he already possessed formulated views which helped him
answer questions connected with the philosophical foundations of science and
the general methodology of scientific research. He had been inspired in this
direction by his teachers at the Jagiellonian University. This judgement is
supported by his doctoral dissertation and earliest publications. In these he
included many general reflections which delineate the framework of his
functional anthropology. They refer to elementary questions, formulated as
follows: science means the investigation of relations between elements of a
given system. Culture as 'the integral whole' (later Malinowski frequently
defines the subject of his investigations in this way) is nothing more than a
system of this kind. The main instrument which makes it possible to grasp the
relations between elements of a system is the concept of function, which-as
Malinowski states in his doctoral thesis-has to be applied in all scientific
investigations referring to reality. The final result of scientific activity is
prediction. It enables human beings to influence reality according to their
needs and biological organisation. The confrontation of man with his
surroundings alone is the basis for science, and practical activity plays a key
role in the development of science. Science is but a 'form of collective life'.
From this point of view, science does not differ essentially from other types of
human activity based on experience and the practical study of reality. This
experience, generalised inductively, places man in a favourable situation as
regards the entirety of his life conditions.
The period of studies in Cracow thus seems especially important for
Malinowski's future career. First, during this period his main philosophical
attitude was shaped, and was to determine his model of functional anthro-
pology. Second, at that time also his scientific interests gradually changed
from physics and mathematics towards philosophy and the humanities,
ethnology and social anthropology. Third, in this period Malinowski's
creative personality was shaped, both in its better and its worse manifestations,
the result of his being brought up in the very specific and unique atmosphere
of Polish modernism.9

In current general opinion Malinowski is viewed as a brilliant empiricist and

field-worker and a rather uninteresting and uninspiring theoretician. Such an
opinion is not especially deep and is in fact impossible to defend. It could have
been a question of personality, of a scientific temperament more at home with
empirical research than with systematic, logical and abstract discourse.
However, this was not the case with Malinowski. He had had, at least in

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 282 ANDRZEJ K. PALUCH

Cracow, very good logical training and had learned to work at the level of
theory. Today's evaluation is therefore puzzling.
Malinowski not only conducted excellent fieldwork and was able afterwards
to popularise the results in a brilliant way, but the success of his work in the
Trobriands was derived from his using a new model of anthropological
research, involving new methods of study and the reformulation of older
techniques of social investigation. There cannot be any really good empirical
work without clear methodological decisions and a firm basis in theory.
Furthermore, Malinowski's fieldwork was not only good but original. Yet it is
difficult not to agree that his theoretical works, at least from today's point of
view, do not have the same high value as his empirical studies.
To some degree Malinowski's style of practising science is responsible for
such an opinion. His unrestricted treatment of his own statements on the level
of theory can irritate a cool and systematic mind. But this should not be any
real obstacle in deep analytical work. In my opinion, the case of Malinowski is
above all an illustration of certain general features of social science, primarily
here of the relationship between Malinowski's anthropology and the philo-
sophical background to his functionalism.
There were three genetic sources of Malinowski's functional anthropology.
One was his general vision of science, formed mainly during his Cracow
university studies. Second was his knowledge of anthropological tradition and
the search for a new model of anthropology, connected with his anthro-
pological studies in London. Third was his own field research experience, the
period of his work on the Trobriands. But throughout all his work the 'big
questions' remained the same. They were constructed from the opposition of
positivism versus humanism, specifically, naturalist versus humanist visions of
social reality. This opposition is visible in Malinowski's work. In his so-called
general theory of culture, 'biological needs' form the crucial notion, while in
the empirical work the same role is played by 'the native point of view'. When
he develops the general theory of culture on the basis of biological imperatives,
characteristic of human species, this vision appears very naturalistic and
utilitarian, ruled by a very narrow biological determinism. Contrary to that,
when Malinowski analyses concrete social reality, such attributes of human
kind as thought, emotion, tradition, all of them expressed in the context of
changing social situations, play a decisive role. The general conception of
culture is, however, the same on both levels. It can be described by four
slogans: 'culture is a whole'; 'it is an integral system'; 'it has a functional
character'; 'it is an instrumental apparatus'. They do not, however, always
mean exactly the same.
All the above slogans, except the first one, have differing meanings in his
empirical and theoretical works. Thus, the second slogan on the empirical
level means: (i) all human behaviour has its dysfunctions, but there are social
mechanisms which integrate the cultural system. At a theoretical level it
means: (2) all human behaviour helps to keep the cultural system an integral
whole. The difference and its consequences are enormous. The third slogan
means: (i) any element of culture is interrelated with any other and with the
whole system; (2) any element of culture is related to human needs. And the

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 ANDRZEJ K. PALUCH 283

fourth slogan means: (i) culture is an apparatus which makes possible the
process of adaptation of individuals to their social and natural milieu, which in
fact determines social continuity; (2) culture is an apparatus which makes
possible the satisfaction of human needs.
Naturally, the first series of interpretations is much more sophisticated;
they can be and were used as analytical tools in explanations of the social
world. They were the keys which once opened the doors of modem
anthropology. The second set of interpretations created a simplified version of
society. It is not, and it could not be, true that Malinowski was a poor
theoretician; it is however true that having accepted and adopted some
promising assumptions in his research, he did not elaborate them, but swept
on to the naturalist perspective. His positivist bias bore fruits which-as his
pupils and critics, from Raymond Firth to Edmund Leach, noticed very
quickly-were on the level of not specially deep and sensitive common-sense
knowledge. As a result, we have in Malinowski's output two visions of
cultural reality: one illustrated by him in his fieldwork; another developed by
him in abstract terms, and which fails to be satisfactory.
Probably two lessons can be drawn from this trip to the genesis of
Malinowski's anthropology. (i) Modern anthropology-if Malinowski's
functionalism does mean the beginning of modern anthropology-begins not
in the field but in the theory. Malinowski is the best example of it. The a priori
concepts of man, society and culture are the real sources of the new
anthropology proposed by him. His extremely successful fieldwork was
possible because of his clear methodological, as well as theoretical, decisions.
(2) Modern anthropology begins in the philosophy of man and culture at the
turn of the nineteenth century. Malinowski again gives evidence of this.
Anthropology cannot be free from philosophical assumptions, consequences,
even prejudices. Malinowski's failure in the theoretical works can be explained
by the fact that he tried to develop a theory of culture on the foundations of
that 'second positivism' which was to be negated by the magnificent develop-
ment of philosophy in the first decade of the twentieth century.

NOTES

1 The idea to found a Chair of Ethnology was developed in the jagiellonian University after the
first world war. It was accepted by the authorities in I92I and the Dean of the Faculty of
Philosophy invited Malinowski to be the first professor of ethnology in Cracow. Malinowski
rejected the proposition, stressing that, although he was moved by and deeply appreciated the
offer, he had a lot of fieldwork material to work on and was thinking of another trip to do new
fieldwork. For these reasons he was not able to accept the proposition which would involve him
too much in teaching and other tasks. (Cf. Malinowski's letter to the Dean of the Faculty of
Philosophy dated February I922, The Jagiellonian University Archives.)
2 Among them were: Kazimierz Dobrowolski, a professor of ethnology and sociology, who
subsequently held the Chair of Ethnology and Sociology, Jagiellonian University; Feliks Gross,
professor of sociology, University of New York; Jerzy Kurytowicz, professor of linguistics,
Chair of General Linguistics and Indo-European Languages, Jagiellonian University; J6zef
ObrVbski, social affairs officer of the United Nations and a professor of social anthropology, Long
Island University; Maria Ossowska, professor of moral philosophy, University of Warsaw;
Stanistaw Ossowski, Chair of Sociology, University of Warsaw; Andrzej Walig6rski, professor
of social anthropology, Jagiellonian University.
3 The first three volumes will be published by Panistwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe (The Polish

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 284 ANDRZEJ K. PALUCH

Scientific Publishers) in I980: volume I, Wierzenia pierwotne iformy ustroju spolecznego ('Primitive
beliefi and forms of social structure'), the only book written by Malinowski in Polish and
published in I9I5, and 0 zasadzie ekonomii my.lenia ('On the principle of the economy of
thought'), Malinowski's doctoral thesis, as yet unpublished; volume II, Argonauts of the Western
Pacific; volume III, Crime and custom in savage society, and The sexual ifWe of savages in north-western
Melanesia. The other volumes will be published by I990.
4 In one of his letters to Malinowski, Witkiewicz asked him not to answer the letter but only to
return an enclosed list of his (Malinowski's) works, checking off items already sent to Witkiewicz
and those which he was going to send.
5 These kinds of studies constitute-to be exact-the history of social science. It has, however,
a deeper sense besides simply the writing of the history of a discipline. Classics are often a source
of inspiration to further research, but, above all, a study of them is the only way to develop
theoretical self-consciousness, to understand both external and internal conditions of scientific
questions.
6 Contrary to what is sometimes purported, he did not take up any full course of chemistry. In
the first two years of his university studies he was recognised as a student of physics, and later as a
student of philosophy.
7 These are three excerpts from Malinowski's letters: 'At the moment I am working on the
history of philosophy. I am reading about Aristotle in Piat's book whith you, Father, have
recommended and lent to me. I am looking over Zeller as well. At the same time I am waiting for
you, Father, to clarify some doubtful points for me. Nowhere can I find these arguments clarified
clearly.' 'For the time being I am engaged in causality, reading Lange's Kausal Problem and Mach's
latest book which I would like to discuss in detail with you.' 'I am waiting with great impatience
for the moment when you, Father, will be with us again and will be able to calm all my
philosophical doubts and worries.' (Letters are published in Flis and Paluch 1980.)
8 In this context, two standpoints should be noticed because of the method of argument: that of
Leach (1957) and that of Jarvie (I964). Leach, and others after him, argues that Malinowski's
functionalism rises from pragmatism. Jarvie interprets Malinowski as a deviation from positivism.
Both use the same kind of argument, looking for convergences and similarities, analogies and
parallels found in the work of Malinowski and in certain philosophical programmes. This leads to
obvious misunderstandings. Leach refers to empiricism, biological determinants of culture, the
instrumental sense of human activity-but exactly the same assumptions are also very charac-
teristic of the 'second positivism'; what is more, they link together a number of different trends of
philosophical thought. Leach, using the method of immanent criticism, quite rightly points out
the limitations of Malinowski's theory of culture. He fails, however, to recognise the real sources
of it, his external criticism not being convincing. Jarvie's intuition allows him to recognise
positivism as a philosophical background to Malinowski's functionalism. However, according to
Jarvie, Malinowski also accepted the metaphysical idea of culture as a whole, of social integration,
the absolutist vision of truth; and all these are to prove that another source of Malinowski's
philosophical inspiration was in Hegelian thought. However, is this not an abuse of the notion of
'metaphysics'? Why is Hegel cited, and not anybody else? A sceptical reader does not find any
answer.
9 This last point is especially relevant in the context ofMalinowski's Diary (I967). The discussion
which ensued following its publication seems to be somewhat misplaced when one realises that it
was written by a man who did not intend to publish it and who had been brought up in Cracow,
specifically in Zakopane, at the turn of the nineteenth century. In the English translation of
Malinowski's diary there are some blatant errors (the most spectacular one: Polish 'nigrowie' and its
inflexional forms 'nigrom', 'nigrach', 'nigrami', etc., does not mean 'niggers', and has a neutral con-
notation); besides, the style and quite often the content of this very special daily record sound more
understandable when compared with some mannerisms of that Zakopane panopticon. There were
very controversial-in one way or another-individuals in the streets of Zakopane at that time, to
mention only: J. Grzegorzewski, S. Przybyszewski, and Malinowski's closest friend S. I.
Witkiewicz, and Malinowski used to spend his summer holidays among them.

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