Typographie und ihr Einfluss auf den Leseprozess: Mikrotypographische Fehler in den Oberschlesischen Nachrichten

The first edition of “Wiadomości Górnośląskie” appeared on March 20, 1990 in the form of a Polish-German supplement to “Trybuna Opolska”. This was a starting point of the published up till now German minority newspaper – “Wochenblat.pl”. Due to that, we may treat “Wiadomości Górnośląskie” as one of the oldest press publications of the German minority in Poland after 1989. When we focus on the German texts published in “WG”, we may come across many lexical and grammatical mistakes, which make it difficult for the reader to understand the text. It is not only the mistakes that disrupt the reception of the text. This article, by means of describing the relation and the influence the typography and the reading process have on one another, indicates that micro-typographic mistakes may have a negative impact on the clarity of the text. Only when the text is properly set, can the reader focus on its message. Wrongly set words, incorrect punctuation or spaces draw the reader’s attention and cause reading difficulties. They force the reader to analyze the structure of the text and therefore draw them away from focusing on the message. The article, using particular examples taken from the corpus of ten first editions of the “Wiadomości Górnośląskie”, shows that violation of the ortotypographic rules may disturb the clarity of the text. At the same time, it is being stated that typography has an important influence as far as the clarity of the text is concerned.