Gatunkiem

Gatunkiem is the instrumental singular form of the Polish noun gatunek, which in biology means a species and in the humanities can denote a genre or type. The word is widely used in scientific texts to refer to the basic unit of biological classification, where a species groups together individuals that can interbreed and share common characteristics. In arts and media, gatunek functions as a label for a category or form, such as gatunek literacki (literary genre) or gatunek muzyczny (musical genre).

In Polish grammar, gatunkiem appears when the noun gatunek is required to be in the instrumental case. This occurs in constructions with certain verbs and prepositions that govern the instrumental, as well as in fixed expressions. The exact syntactic role of gatunkiem depends on the sentence and the surrounding elements, but the form itself signals a grammatical case change rather than a new lexical meaning.

The term gatunek has an etymological lineage in Slavic languages, rooted in a common notion of kind, type, or category. In biology it is contrasted with other taxonomic levels such as genus (rodzaj) and family (rodzina), while in culture and media it serves to distinguish distinct forms of expression or art.

Overall, gatunkiem functions as the instrumental form of a versatile noun used across disciplines to denote either a biological species or a type/genre, depending on context.