Polish Jews after the 1967-68 Campaign against Antizionism - Dr Anna Zawadzka

During this talk, Anna Zawadzka will present preliminary results of the study: "Jews in Poland in the aftermath of the 1967-68 antisemitic campaign: biographical experience, identity changes and community dynamics." The project is based on biographical interviews, archival research, analysis of press sources as well as memoirs and autobiographical literature. It will be a starting point for Zawadzka to consider the specific dispute that researchers of Jewish biographies, as well as of cultural representations of Jewish life in Poland, have among themselves: The dispute over definitions and boundaries of Jewish subjectivity. To what extent is individual, collective, and institutional Jewish life in Poland to this day limited, modelled and perhaps even determined by antisemitism? Is it possible to conduct research in the field of Jewish Studies while abstracting from or neglecting antisemitism? What are the perils of this? I will reflect on these questions, using materials collected during the above-mentioned research. Dr. Anna Zawadzka is a sociologist and assistant professor at the Institute of Slavic Studies of he Polish Academy of Sciences. In her research, she is particularly interested in the intersection of anti-communism and antisemitism, and those aspects of the historical politics of post-communist countries that relate to the Holocaust. She will soon publish a book titled More than a stereotype: ‘Jewish Bolshevism’ as a Pattern of Polish Culture, in which she takes a critical look at predominant methods of research on antisemitism in Poland. She is editor-in-chief of an open access bilingual (PL-ENG) academic journal Studia Litteraria et Historica (https://ispan.waw.pl/journals/index.p....