There is nothing more important for students of Polish than being able to say that they are foreigners. Jestem cudzoziemcem? Obcokrajowcem? Learners of Polish usually get confused by those two words. Meanwhile, they both mean the same thing, which is a person from foreign land (cudzy – foreign, alien) or a foreign country (obcokrajowiec). Interestingly, the word obcokrajowiec has only one form, masculine , so we say on/ona jest obcokrajowcem. The noun cudzoziemiec, on the other hand, has a feminine form as well, so we say on jest cudzoziemcem/ona jest cudzoziemką. Additionally, we can form an adjective from the latter: cudzoziemski, e.g. Legia Cudzoziemska (Foreign Legion), cudzoziemski mąż (foreign husband), cudzoziemskie zwyczaje (foreign customs), which is not possible with the noun obcokrajowiec.
NOT IN POLAND, WHERE THEN? ZA GRANICĄ OR ZA GRANICĘ?
When you take a closer look at that phenomenon, you’ll notice that bookshops have two different sections: literatura obca (i.e. books written by foreign authours, BUT translated into Polish) and literatura zagraniczna (i.e. books in their original language, e.g. written in English). But... another word has come up, which is quite difficult to use not only for foreigners, but also for native speakers of Polish. Zagraniczna literatura, zagraniczny kapitał, zagraniczny korespondent, Ministerstwo Spraw Zagranicznych (Ministry of Foreign Affairs) etc., are quite common adjectives formed from the noun zagranica, which means the land outside the territory of a particular country. There are two forms in the Polish language: zza granicy and z zagranicy. The space is in a different place, so it would seem that the difference is merely cosmetic, but... that’s not the case. If we say that Maciek wrócił zza granicy it’s his stay behind the border that we literally have in mind (e.g. Maciek works for the Polish border guard and therefore he often crosses the border). We have to admit, however, that a context like that is rather unusual in contrast to the sentence Maciek wrócił z zagranicy, in which case Maciek has returned from outside Poland (from abroad), e.g. he’s been on holiday in Spain, or on a business trip in the UK. Remember that when we’re going away, leaving Poland, we say Jadę/Wyjeżdżam/Wybieram się za granicę (I’m going abroad), so we use the accusative form. While when we are there, in which case we are referring to a state, we should use the construction Jestem/Mieszkam/Pracuję/Spędzam wakacje za granicą (I am/live/work/ I’m spending my holiday abroad), i.e. we need the instrumental form.
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