Jerzy Wełna’s contribution to linguistic studies

Artykuł opisuje badania prof. Jerzego Wełny podczas jest działalności naukowej.

Jerzy Wełna, a noted authority in the field of English historical studies, has tied his career to the Institute of English Studies, University of Warsaw. In 1974, he defended his PhD dissertation entitled Linguistic Analysis of Borrowings in Old English, written under the supervision of the late Jacek Fisiak (Adam Mickiewicz University). In 1986, he received the title of Doctor of Letters (habilitation) in English Linguistics based on the book A Critical Survey of a Historical Phonology of English Vowels (with special reference to K. Luick’s Historische Grammatik der englischen Sprache). He was granted the title of Professor of Humanities by the President of Poland in 2000. Jerzy Wełna’s earliest work was much influenced by the late Alfred Reszkiewicz (Jagiellonian University, University of Warsaw), who kindled Wełna’s love for (historical) linguistics when he was still a student of English philology. Other important figures in Wełna’s career were Margaret Schlauch (a former Head of the English Department) and Jacek Fisiak, first a supervisor of his PhD dissertation and then his life-long friend. Jerzy Wełna has published five books, sixty-eight scientific articles and fifteen book reviews, all devoted to the study of the English language, mostly the changes it has undergone from the period of Old English till present times. His work on the history of English has gained international recognition as shown by the innumerable citations by scholars such as Minkova, Hickey, Dance, Ringe, Anderson, Mańczak, Fisiak, Molencki, Krygier, Pons-Sanz, Steponavičius, Kharlamenko, and many others. Although his publications give priority to English historical phonology and morphology, many important works deal with other areas including studies on (i) spelling alterations, (ii) language contact, (iii) the rivalry between lexical items, and (iv) gender change. It is also noteworthy that before Wełna fully committed himself to historical studies, he had been involved in contrastive English-Polish studies to which he devoted his earliest contributions. Apart from being a diligent researcher, Professor Wełna has also served as a mentor for generations of students and PhD candidates, 17 of whom successfully defended their dissertations. For many years now his monograph A Brief Outline of the History of English has served as basic reading material for the students at the Institute of English Studies. He has also reviewed innumerable PhD dissertations and Doctor of Letters theses (habilitations), and has served on promotion committees of various scholars. One can safely conclude that he fathered a new generation of historical linguists in Poland. The present paper offers an evaluative survey of Jerzy Wełna’s contribution to the study of English linguistics. The first part (section 2) is devoted to the area of his primary concern, i.e. historical phonology and morphology, whereas the second (section 3) concentrates on the studies addressing problems from other linguistic areas. These sections have been written, respectively, by Anna Wojtyś (phonology and morphology) and Marta Sylwanowicz (other areas), Professor Wełna’s students from their second-year obligatory course in the history of English (BA studies) till the achievement of their doctoral degrees.