Remembering Polishness: Articulating and maintaining

identity through turbulent times

Danielle Drozdzewski

BEnvSc (Hons) /BA

A thesis presented to the University of New South Wales in fulfilment of the thesis

requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Geography

Sydney, Australia

2008

i ABSTRACT

This thesis details the maintenance of Polish identities through acts of memory: the (re)production, transmission and reception of Polish cultural practices. The (re)productions and transmissions of Polish identity formations, and the acts of remembrance, are multifarious by nature, and I have examined them in two distinctly different settings – in public spheres in Poland, and in the private realms of Australian Polish diaspora. In this thesis, these research settings have been conceptualised as the conduits through which Polish identities are maintained. Polish identity is theorised using a constructivist approach; Polish identities are therefore positioned historically and geographically. Their performances are fluid: they move through time and across spaces.

The active maintenance of Polish identity developed as a result of foreign occupations. The partitioning of Poland by the Austro-Hungarian, Prussian and Russian Empires lasted 123 years. From 1795 to 1918 the Polish nation was expunged. Following a brief period of independence between World War I (WWI) and World War II (WWII), Poland was again occupied by Nazi and Soviet regimes during WWII (1939-1945). The Soviet occupation continued after WWII with the Soviet-supported Polish government that lasted until 1989. Under occupation – particularly during WWII – Poland suffered events that have been indelibly imprinted within Polish cultural memory. The macabre nature of this era included the incursion of hegemonic regimes on political and everyday social life, as well as the atrocities for which it is well known. An important outcome of these occupations has been the division of discourses of Polishness, and their remembrances, into distinctly public and private spheres.

These periods of foreign occupation brought various attempts to suppress and eliminate Polishness: the cultures and identifications of Polish people. Suppression particularly occurred in public spheres through the prohibition of the Polish language, and by investing the public memory landscape with ideologies that represented the new regimes. By repressing public commemorations of Polish cultural narratives, a new history was written at the expense of the Polish experience. There have been two primary responses to these repressions of Polishness. These responses initially developed during the partitioned

ii period to ensure that Polish language and cultural practices were maintained. First, a narrative and tradition of resistance emerged in reaction to the Russian, Prussian and Austrian partitions. It was enacted through military participation in insurrections and through the production of patriotic Romantic Era cultural artefacts, both of which strengthened linkages to the Polish Catholic faith. Second, Polish cultural practices and language were safeguarded in the private spheres of home. It was in private settings, in Poland and within the diaspora in Australia, that memories and experiences of occupation were passed on and through generations. In Poland, such narratives were often maintained in resistance to those imposed by foreign occupiers and because of the inability to commemorate events of Poland’s macabre past in public. In Australia, identity maintenance has occurred to resist the dissolution of Polishness in a diasporic and multicultural environment.

This thesis demonstrates the utility of studying cultural memories as a means of understanding how identity maintenance can occur in the face of adversities, such as the multiple foreign occupations that occurred in Poland, and in diaspora. Moreover, it exemplifies the diverse paths of identity maintenance in different contexts. This thesis shows that despite the distinctive character of both Polish public and private spheres, Polish identities have been informed, shaped and maintained through culturally-enacted memory (re)production. This process is exhibited in the present – in Poland and through the diaspora – and it occurred despite the repressive aims of various foreign occupiers.

iii

ORIGINALITY STATEMENT

I hereby declare that this submission is my own work and to the best of my knowledge it contains no materials previously published or written by another person, or substantial proportions of material which have been accepted for the award of any other degree or diploma at the University of New South Wales or any other educational institution, except where due acknowledgement is made in the thesis. Any contribution made to the research by others, with whom I have worked at University of New South Wales or elsewhere, is explicitly acknowledged in the thesis. I also declare that the intellectual content of this thesis is the product of my own work, except to the extent that assistance from others in the project’s design and conception or in style, presentation and linguistic expression is acknowledged.

Signed ……………………………………………......

Date ……………………………………………......

iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

There have been numerous people who have helped, inspired and encouraged me throughout this thesis. My supervisors Dr Wendy Shaw and Prof. Ian Burnley have provided continual support and insights. I would like to thank them for their constant encouragement and belief in this research. Ian, the breadth of your historical and migration knowledge leaves me in constant awe. Wendy, thank you for always inspiring me to expand the analyses. I would also like to thank A/Prof. Chris Gibson and A/Prof. Kevin Dunn for their earlier guidance in this thesis. These academics and friends have been invaluable mentors.

This research would not have been possible without the help of the interview participants and research informants, in Australia and Poland. I feel privileged to have heard their memories and experiences and to have learnt more about my family’s heritage from these first hand accounts. Several other people helped me develop this research. In Poland, Dr Annamaria Orla-Bukowska and Dr Alison Stenning gave their time freely and helped me position the research aims in the Polish landscape. Thank you to my Polish language teachers, and my flatmates in Poland, Ulrike and Adrian, who supported and advised me. In Australia, the staffs of many Polish cultural institutions, especially the Holy Family Retirement Village in Marayong and the Randwick Polish Language School, were all always forthcoming with information and helpful in introducing potential research contacts.

To my family and friends who have been there for me throughout the duration, thank you. I would like to especially thank a group of friends and PhD colleagues, Ed, Daniel, Natascha, Karin and Therese, thanks for making this a memorable journey. To Mum, who was always encouraged me to explore my heritage, thank you for always being there to check my translations, provide support and an insider’s view. This thesis would not have been possible without the support, love and understanding of my husband William. I am looking forward to fulfilling the wistful plans we made for our post-PhD life.

v TABLE OF CONTENTS

TITLE PAGE i

ABSTRACT ii

ORIGINALITY STATEMENT iv

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS v

LIST OF FIGURES xi

LIST OF TABLES xiii

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS xiv

CHAPTER 1 – A JOURNEY OF REMEMBERING POLISHNESS 1

1.1 Situating cultural memory within identity discourse 4

1.2 Encounters with Polishness 7

1.3 Thesis outline 8

CHAPTER 2 – REMEMBRANCES OF IDENTITY: CONTEXTS AND ARTICULATIONS 12

2.1 Theoretical frameworks of cultural memory 13

2.2 Locating identity in memory discourse 17

2.3 Conceptual settings of cultural memory 18

2.4 Public sphere articulations of cultural memory 21

2.4.1 Symbols of national identity 22 2.4.2 Public remembrances 25 2.4.3 Uneven articulations of power at sites of memory 26 2.4.4 Forgetting and Resistance 28

2.5 Diasporic Settings 30

2.5.1 Remembrances and (re)creations of home 32 2.5.2 Polonia 33

vi 2.5.2.1 The Polish diaspora in Australia 34

2.6 Towards a geography of cultural memory 37

CHAPTER 3 – METHODOLOGY 39

3.1 Introduction 39

3.2 My Polishness – a continuum of experiences 39

3.2.1 Learning Polish 41 3.2.2 Reflexivity: listening to stories and positioning my Polishness 42

3.3 Selecting field locations 44

3.4 Data Methods 45

3.4.1 Capturing memorialisation in the landscape 46 3.4.2 Visual methodologies: photographic images and historical maps 47 3.4.3 Participant Observation 48 3.4.4 Interviewing 50 3.4.4.1 Interviewing in Poland: Public Memory Institutes 50 3.4.4.2 Interviewing in Australia: narrating experiences and memories 51

3.5 Data generation in the two field settings 52

3.5.1 In the field in Kraków, Poland 52 3.5.1.1 Planty 53 3.5.1.2 Katy Cross 54 3.5.1.3 Paszów 57 3.5.2 In the field and interviewing in Sydney, Australia 58 3.5.2.1 A snapshot of Polish diaspora in Australia 58 3.5.2.2 Participant recruitment 64 3.5.2.3 Negotiating ethics and cultural sensitivity in the interview process 68 3.5.2.4 The interview process: the interview schedule and themes 68 3.5.2.5 The interview process: location and duration 69 3.5.2.6 The interview process: encountering trauma 70

3.6 Data Analysis 71

3.7 Conclusion 73

vii CHAPTER 4 – CHARTING THE (RE)CONSTRUCTION OF POLISH CULTURAL IDENTITY THROUGH TURBULENT TIMES 75

4.1 Pre-partitioned Poland 76

4.1.1 Polish Origins 76 4.1.2 Jagiellonian Poland and the Commonwealth of Nations 78 4.1.3 Sarmatianism in collective Polish cultural memory 80

4.2 Partitioned Poland: developing a history of resistance and struggle for autonomy 81

4.2.1 Forging resistance in the absence of a Polish State (1): Uprisings and Polish Legions 84 4.2.2 Forging resistance in the absence of a Polish State (2): The Catholic Church and the clergy 85 4.2.3 Contextualising the establishment of a history of emigration: The November Uprising (1830-1831) and the Great Emigration 87 4.2.4 The pen is mightier than the sword: Romantic Era literature and the Polish language as forms of resistance and cultural maintenance 89 4.2.5 The legacies of partitioned Poland (1): Polish Romantic Messianism 91 4.2.6 The legacies of partitioned Poland (2): factoring emigration and resistance into constructions of Polish identity. 94

4.3 The Second Republic 95

4.4 Poland’s macabre past: World War Two (WWII) 97

4.5 Changing hegemonies of power: Okres Komunizmu (the Communist Period) 101

4.5.1 Maintaining sites of resistance in a ‘non-religious’ state: the church, the Pontiff and the clergy 104

4.6 Niepodlego (Independence) 107

4.7 Moving forward: (re)producing and (re)negotiating Polish cultural memory 108

CHAPTER 5 – MAINTAINING POLISHNESS: IMAGINATIONS AND (RE)FORMATIONS OF THE POLISH LANGUAGE 111

5.1 Introduction 111

Part 1 Public Re-imaginations: (Re)productions and Transmissions of Polishness through Language and Symbolism 113

5.2 Remembrances of the Polish language: Commemorating the Romantics 113

viii 5.2.1 Commemorations and representations of the Romantics in the Planty 115 5.2.1.1 The commemoration of Adam Mickiewicz (1798-1855) 117 5.2.1.2 The commemoration of Juliusz Sowacki (1809-1849) 120 5.2.1.3 The commemoration of other ‘Romantics’ in the Planty 122 5.2.2 Hidden nationalistic messages in subjugated public settings 126 5.2.3 Symbolic representations of private sphere identity maintenance in the public 129 Part 2 Imagining and Re-imagining into Diaspora 131

5.3 Diasporic Journeys of Polish Language Maintenance 131

5.3.1 Situating private sphere cultural memories: ‘forces’ of emigration 132 5.3.2 Journeys of language for post-WWII Migrants 136 5.3.3 Journeying further: second and third generations 144 5.3.4 Journeys departing from behind the Curtain: the Polish diaspora’s second wave 152

5.4 Conclusion 159

CHAPTER 6 – HISTORIES OF THE MACABRE IN PUBLIC AND PRIVATE SETTINGS 164

6.1 Introduction 164

Part 1 The Macabre in Polish Public Places 167

6.2 Addressing the demands on memory from national and non-national publics 170

6.2.1 The Committee for Safeguarding Monuments of Struggle and Martyrdom (ROPWiM) 173 6.2.2 The Institute of National Remembrance (The IPN) 175 6.2.3 The International Auschwitz Council (IAC) 179 6.2.4 Macabre places: Dis(re)membering at Paszów 182

Part 2 Diasporic Negotiations of Macabre Pasts 192

6.3 The family as the context of cultural dissemination 193

6.4 Reflecting and deflecting the macabre: Narratives and narrations 195

6.4.1 Narratives of pride through participation 197 6.4.2 How lucky they were? Narratives of luck 199

ix 6.4.3 Narrations of the macabre 201 6.4.3.1 Keeping it together: composure in narrating 202 6.4.3.2 Ventures into the traumatic 205

6.5 (Dis)continuities: Generational (re)production and transmission of macabre histories 208

6.6 Conclusion 215

CHAPTER 7 – SHIFTING HEGEMONIES AND THE MAINTENANCE OF CULTURAL MEMORIES 218

7.1 Semiotic memory markers in the public sphere 220

7.1.1 Changes to the streetscape by shifting hegemonies 221 7.1.2 Broader memory markers: Commemorative rituals in the calendar and streetscape 227 7.1.3 Other forums of propaganda 230

7.2 Public suppression, private maintenance 233

7.2.1 Hegemonic (re)configurations of historical narratives 235 7.2.2 Remembrances of Katy in the home 238 7.2.3 Memorialisation after the okres komunizmu 242 7.2.3.1 The Katy Cross 243 7.2.3.2 The shift of ‘memory-work’ in diaspora 245

7.3 Conclusion 250

CHAPTER 8 – CONCLUSIONS 252

8.1 Thesis Summary 256

8.2 Theoretical contributions: Exploring cultural memories to study identity 260

8.3 Fading contexts: Continuing the narrative of resistance and struggle? 263

BIBLIOGRAPHY 267

APPENDICES 290

x LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 3.1 Aerial view of Planty, Kraków ...... 55

Figure 3.2 Map of Planty, Kraków ...... 56

Figure 3.3 Poland-born arrivals to Australia 1980 to 1995...... 61

Figure 3.4 Poland-born migration to Australia, 1921-2006...... 63

Figure 3.5 Age and Sex Distribution of Poland Born Population, 2006...... 63

Figure 4.1 Piast Poland (966-1370) ...... 77

Figure 4.2 The Jagiellonian Realm (c.1500)...... 79

Figure 4.3 Partitioned Poland, 1795-1918 ...... 83

Figure 4.4 The Second Republic, 1921-1939 ...... 96

Figure 4.5 Poland's borders post 1945 ...... 100

Figure 4.6 Black Madonna Our Lady of Czstochowa...... 106

Figure 5.1 Grayna and Litawor (1823), Planty, Kraków ...... 118

Figure 5.2 Lilla Weneda (1839), Planty, Kraków...... 121

Figure 5.3 Józef Bohan Zaleski, Planty, Kraków...... 123

Figure 5.4 Artur Grottger Monument and Paintings...... 125

Figure 5.5 Jamrozik’s adaptation of Martin’s typology of Refugees Settlers...... 134

Figure 5.6 Forms of Initial Displacement in Acute Refugee Situations ...... 135

Figure 6.1 Example of a memorial plaque on an otherwise ordinary residential building in Warsaw’s Old Town...... 169

Figure 6.2 Memorials to Gestapo Headquarters placed side be side on the outer wall of ul. Pomorska, 2, Kraków ...... 169

Figure 6.3 View of the former quarry at Paszów looking towards ul. H. Kamienskiego183

Figure 6.4 View of open space behind the main Socialist-era monument...... 184

xi

Figure 6.5 Front of the Socialist-era monument facing ul. H. Kamienskiego ...... 185

Figure 6.6 Rear of Socialist-era monument, with the Polish inscription ...... 186

Figure 6.7 Monument to Hungarian Victims ...... 187

Figure 6.8 Monument to Jewish victims...... 187

Figure 6.9 The view from the Socialist-era monument...... 189

Figure 6.10 Information plaque with English translation at Paszów ...... 190

Figure 7.1 Respondents' knowledge of the Katy massacre...... 240

Figure 7.2 Katy Cross, Kraków...... 244

xii LIST OF TABLES

Table 3.1 Location and description of monuments studied in Kraków ...... 47

Table 3.2 Monuments in the Planty ...... 56

Table 3.3 Five generational groups of interview participants...... 64

Table 3.4 Generational breakdown of interview participants ...... 65

Table 5.1 Planty monuments depicting Romantic Era personalities...... 116

Table 7.1 Street names changes in Kraków City Centre...... 223

Table 7.2 Explanation of Street Names...... 224

Table 7.3 Explanation of Town Square Names ...... 225

xiii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

Abbreviation Meaning

DP Displaced Person

IAC International Auschwitz Council

IPN Instytut Pamici Narodowej (Institute of National Remembrance)

ROPWiM Rada Ochrony Pamici Walk i Mczestwa (The Committee for Safeguarding Monuments of Struggle and Martyrdom)

WWI World War I

WWII World War II

xiv Chapter 1 – A journey of remembering Polishness

A unique set of historical and contemporary era circumstances positions the continuing survival of Polish identity as remarkable. A telling fact is that Poland has only had autonomy for 40 of the last 213 years. In the longest period of subjugation, from 1795 to 1918, Poland ceased to exist as a nation for 123 years, partitioned and occupied by the Russian, Austrian and Prussian empires. In the 20th Century, Nazi Germany and the former Soviet Union besieged and subjugated Poland from the beginning of WWII until 1989. Throughout these periods of foreign occupation, the Polish nation and people suffered. Most notoriously, this suffering included the deaths of millions of Poles during World War II (WWII). Entire cities were obliterated and historical and cultural artefacts destroyed and pillaged. The human impact of foreign occupation during the World Wars and other conflicts also included the forced dislocation and dispersal of vast numbers of Poles. Large cohorts of Poles also chose to emigratei. Those who survived the torment of these periods suffered a prolonged assault on the basic practices, routines and rituals of their everyday lives, indeed on their very identities. Publicly, they were unable to commemorate those lost in the struggle for autonomy. However, the memories of the dead and the events and places connected with them have remained.

Polish suffering has been momentous over the centuries, but it is not merely a matter of history. Its reverberations persist, echoing resoundingly into the present. While Poland has been autonomous for the last 20 years, the impact of a history of occupation continues to be evident in contemporary era constructions of Polish identity. The Polish news and other media still report, virtually on a daily basis, stories relating to WWII and the okres komunizmuii, especially issues concerning Polish identity, history and commemoration. Indeed, through their history, Poles have developed a mindset of resistance and struggle to the continued assaults on their identity. Further, Poles enacted this resistance in numerous ways: armed struggles and uprisings; the expression and commemoration of national sentiment through cultural artefacts; and, the safeguarding of Polish cultural practices within the home.

1 Poles have (re)producediii and transmittediv cultural memories through time and across different settings – in public spheres and in the private realmv. Cultural memories are informed by experiences, events and stories that are culturally specific. Cultural memories are also persistent, remaining in the aftermath of events of mass destruction, such as WWII. They can stand in defiant opposition to the dominant ideologies of hegemonic regimes. They can be personally and collectively remembered. Cultural memories may relate to an individual’s own past, the past of families or friends, or alternatively to a collectively remembered defining event or story in a nation’s history. Cultural memories are multifarious and must be considered within their contexts. Halbwachs ([1926] 1992: 22) has argued, remembering always takes place in social frameworks ‘located in specific group context[s]’. We remember events, people and places, from our present day positionalities in certain social groups, including the family. So as Halbwachs ([1926] 1992) has posited, the context of these social frameworks influences both what we remember and how we remember it. In this thesis, I argue that cultural memories – personally and collectively remembered – have been (re)produced and transmitted largely because of their importance to maintaining a sense of identity.

In public spheres, articulations of cultural memories provide poignant and everyday reminders of Polish identity. In the private realm, Polish memories are transferred through generations of the familyvi, particularly in the home. The continued (re)production and transmission of cultural memories have ensured the ongoing maintenance of Polish language and identity through prolonged periods of foreign occupation as well as in diaspora. In this thesis, different settings are used to examine the (re)productions and transmissions of cultural memories to maintain various interpretations of Polish identity. These conceptual settings – the case study locations of this thesis – have acted as the conduits through which Polish identity has been maintained. I have conceptualised ‘identity maintenance’ as the multiple and fluid processes employed to practice, preserve and safeguard Polishness. An integral part of discursively analysing identity maintenance has been the recognition that Polishness is also informed and shaped by the various articulations of cultural memory.

The overall aim of this thesis is: 2 To theorise the (re)productions and transmissions of cultural memories as methods of identity maintenance.

This key aim is supported by four specific aims:

To identify and explicate historically embedded narratives of resistance to foreign occupations and cultural suppressions, within Polish cultural memories;

To analyse how and why cultural memories have been operationalised to maintain (and shape) Polish identity, within Poland and Australia;

To assess how Polishness has been imagined and re-imagined through the use of language and symbolism to inform Polish identity; and,

To examine how Poland’s shifting hegemonies of power, specifically its history of ‘macabre’ (violent) events, have informed the methods of identity maintenance.

In exploring these aims, I have also (de)constructedvii the multiple and complex layers that comprise Polish identity. I approached this (de)construction by drawing on Hall’s (1990; 1996: 4) contention that layers of identity are ‘never singular’ and are ‘increasingly fragmented and fractured’. Additionally, I show that to understand the layers of Polish identity they need to be historically situated. I have sought to highlight how, in the pursuit of perpetuating Polish identity, (re)productions of cultural memories provide examples of historical and contemporary era acts of resistance to cultural suppression across different settings.

To execute these aims I examined five Polish sites in two spheres: public and private. At three of these sites in Kraków, Poland, Polish identity takes the form of monuments in the everyday landscape. In the fourth, I analysed public memory discourse as a forum for interactive discussion about Polish collective memory. This public discussion has been

3 facilitated in part by three Polish memory institutes. In contrast, the fifth site, the diasporic home, is a distinctly private sphere for identity maintenance. Clearly, most Poles first encountered Polish cultural practices in the home. These encounters are characterised by their everydayness, yet they are also a means of resistance to the repression of Polish identity as well as a method of safeguarding it. As a private setting, the Polish home operates across time because narratives are passed through generations. The Polish home also exists across national boundaries. For example, the Polish diaspora interviewed in this thesis have had at least two experiences of home: home in their ‘homeland’, and their diasporic home in Australia.

This introductory chapter has several objectives. First, in providing a brief historical outline, I have introduced and contextualised the Polish narrative of struggle to maintain identity under foreign rule. Second, I have listed the aims of this thesis. Third, it details how this thesis has been thematically conceptualised within geographical discourse and positioned within the study of cultural memory. Fourth, it considers my personal positionality and provides a summary of events that prompted me to undertake this research thesis. Finally, it outlines the subsequent chapters and the thematic discussions of the thesis that follow.

1.1 Situating cultural memory within identity discourse

In this thesis, a transdisciplinary body of literature, from anthropology, sociology, history, comparative literature, cultural studies and geography, has informed how I have theorised cultural memory. In these studies, cultural memories have been discussed within either public or private frameworks. Other focuses have been the politics of memory and hegemonic control over the production of cultural memories. In this thesis, I have sought to build on these multidisciplinary discussions of cultural memory as foundations for thinking about the multiple material and immaterial forms of memory. I have situated this thesis, however, within cultural geography and used a constructivist approach in my analysis. As such, I have drawn from the geographical literatures on identities that have been informed by the cultural turn. I have sought to highlight the link between constructions of Polishness, as an identity, and the historical events that have informed its

4 maintenance through time. By unpacking these constructions of Polish identity, I have detailed the various articulations of cultural memories through time and across different settings, always acknowledging their fluidity and multiplicity.

Integral to the analysis of Polish identities in this thesis has been the recognition that Polish identities are ‘always plural, and in process’ (Brah, 1996: 197). This plurality is both a result of and a reaction to the sustained and multiple efforts of different foreign occupiers to repress Polishness with each occupation. Thus, methods of identity maintenance that engage cultural memories have had to adapt to the changing circumstances of different forms of cultural domination. The historically embedded narrative of resistance and struggle against foreign occupation, which developed as a response to prolonged foreign incursions, is reflected in contemporary era constructions of Polish identities. Yet, differences in the types of identity maintenance are also evident in the two distinct waves of Polish diaspora in Australia. In Australia, there were two main waves of Polish migrants, those who arrived after WWII and those after the okres komunizmu. These two groups experienced different processes of dislocation from the homeland, as well as contrasting political circumstances upon arrival in Australia. By studying these two distinct groups of Polish migrants, this thesis attempts to expose the heterogeneity and malleability of the various methods of identity maintenance employed within this one ‘ethno-cultural group’ viii in diaspora. Furthermore, by contextualising how cultural memories are used to maintain identity, I have directed attention towards how the past experiences of the homeland factor into diasporic (re)negotiations of identity.

In both Poland and Australia, Polish identity maintenance operates across two distinct settings – public and private spheres. In public settings in Poland, I have examined (re)productions and transmissions of cultural memories in the everyday landscape through observations and readings of commemorative monuments, the changing streetscape, the site of a former concentration camp and through public memory discourse. The politics of memory in Poland includes a responsibility to commemorate the Polish and non-Polish victims of WWII, of multiple nationalities and religions. Within this commemoration, all those who died in Poland must be remembered. The different forms and interpretations of commemoration have become part of a wider and sometimes contested narrative relating 5 to the Polish memory of WWII. Another complication in the portrayal of Polish cultural memories has been the influence of a sustained presence of foreign powers in the landscape. These foreign regimes have sought to endow the public sphere with their own versions of history, as alternative narratives of the past. These regimes attempted to further their legitimacy, and have dominated aspects of Polish public memory discourse. The presence of foreign regimes has created contested memory landscapes (Ashplant et al., 2000; Boyarin, 1994; Hodgkin and Radstone, 2003; Koonz, 1994). Therefore, this thesis acknowledges a convolution of power relations in the everyday public landscape (Hayden, 1995; Jackson, 1989; Pile and Thrift, 1995) as well as in the memory landscape (Johnson, 2002; Osborne, 1998, 2001). Moreover, I have sought to address the influences of foreign regimes through an examination of how memories have been repressed, (re)produced and resisted in the Polish public sphere. For example, during the okres komunizmu the Polish practice and indeed right to commemorate the macabre events of WWII were repressed by the Soviet controlled Polish government. This repression was, however, resisted as memories continued to be (re)produced in private spheres.

I have analysed the Polish home as a site of private cultural memory safeguarding and transferral. Within the context of the home, I have explored the cultural memories of Polish migrants, from their deep pasts before emigration, and more recently as diaspora in Australia. These cultural memories, (re)produced and transmitted by Polish migrants, are contingent upon the contexts of migration and the experiences in Poland before emigration. The different eras of migration have influenced how Polish identity has been maintained within the different migrant cohorts and generations of Polish diaspora in Australia. However, this thesis does not seek to provide a metanarrative of Polish identity maintenance. Nor does it seek to prioritise the cultural memories of any one historical or contemporary era group of Poles, either in Poland or in diaspora. Rather I have employed a mixed methodology to explore the range of narratives of cultural memories (re)produced within public and private spheres through time and across geographical spaces. This thesis has explored how such memories have been used to maintain a sense of Polish identity in Poland and in Australia.

6 There is, however, a limit to the scope of the narratives of Polish identity maintenance detailed in this thesis. This thesis is concerned with the identity narratives of non-Jewish Poles, who are overwhelmingly Catholic in religion and tradition. I am cognisant of the macabre catastrophes that befell Poland’s Jewish population, which formed nearly 10 per cent of Poland’s pre-war population (Davies, 2005b). I have endeavoured to be respectful to the suffering and devastation experienced by the millions of Jewish victims of multiple nationalities, as well as the Romany, homosexuals and ‘anti-socials’ who suffered or whose lives came to an end in Poland during WWII. Notwithstanding this, my analyses of the cultural memories of WWII have focused on the impact of the war within Polish territory, but specifically on the memories of non-Jewish Poles. This approach is also partially grounded in the historical positioning and significance of the Catholic Church within the wider narrative of acts of resistance against the dissolution of Polish identity. Similarly, I have not used the term “Holocaust” in the discussion of this thesis (in Chapters 5, 6, 7 and 8). This decision was made because my core examination of WWII memory has been from a Polish Catholic perspective, within which I have been personally embedded.

1.2 Encounters with Polishness

Informing my personal and professional positionality within this thesis and within the Australian Polish diaspora are several experiences with Polishness. These experiences have provided an ongoing impetus for this research. I identify as a third generation Australian Pole. An integral part of my positionality is my Polish heritage: all of my grandparents were born in Poland, but my identity is also based on quite recent encounters with Polishness. My heritage is, however, contextualised by personal diasporic experiences, of not being taught Polish as a child, having limited contact with diasporic community organisations and with Poles outside my family, and the performance of diasporically hybridised Polish traditions in the family home. Thus, my encounters with Polishness are influenced by and positioned within a particular and personal set of experiences. A pivotal episode in the expansion of this experiential narrative was my Honours thesis in 2002, which focused on the multiple constructions of identity and place by Polish migrants and their children in Sydney, Australia (Drozdzewski, 2007). This

7 research prompted me to think about how Polish migrants such as my grandparents negotiate(d) the multiple demands on identity (re)construction following migration, from a geographical perspective. While there has undoubtedly been a personal motivation for undertaking this thesis, I am also continually compelled by an interest in the settlement processes and contexts through which migrants (re)produce their diasporic identities.

Two trips to Poland in 2003 and 2005 further spurred my interest to uncover more about (my) Polish heritage. During the first trip (prior to the commencement of this thesis), I was confronted by the prevalence of memorialisation in the everyday landscape. I felt connected to the narratives depicted in these monuments, especially those memorialising WWII, which had prompted my grandparents’ migration and continue to be the subject of many of their cultural memories. My experiences in the memory landscape in Poland reinforced the inherent complexities of interpreting and maintaining Polish identity, especially considering past macabre events and foreign occupations. The experience stimulated further questions – for example, how could an Australian of Polish heritage, with limited knowledge of Polishness, feel connected to places and people in Poland, and to events that occurred 60 years ago? In this thesis, I have attempted to unravel the various intricacies that contribute to answering such questions, and in essence to understand how Polish identity is maintained, in various manifestations, across time and in multiple spaces. This thesis’ contribution to knowledge lies in exposing the utility of the study of cultural memories – such as those narratives passed to me by my grandparents – in maintaining identity, despite disruptive and destructive events such as WWII, foreign occupation and emigration.

1.3 Thesis outline

This thesis is divided into eight chapters. Following this introductory chapter is a literature review (Chapter 2) that includes a discussion of this thesis’ various theoretical influences. In that chapter, I also detail how cultural memory and identity have been theorised in this thesis. In Chapter 3, I explain the methodologies employed to generate data and I outline how the methodological approach was informed by the need to recognise that identity maintenance occurs in multiple settings and through time.

8 In Chapters 4 to 7, I explain how Polish identity has been shaped, informed and maintained in response to foreign occupations. These chapters comprise the main thematic discussion of this thesis, where I narrate a story of struggle and resistance to maintain Polishness. This story is situated in different settings in Poland and Australia. These settings expose the many pathways travelled by Poles to maintain identity. In Chapter 4, I provide an outline of Polish history to situate the discussion chapters. I trace the historical development of the need to maintain Polishness. I chart a Polish history of struggle and resistance to foreign occupation and explain how this narrative burgeoned because of the social and political circumstances occurring in Poland in the 18th and 19th centuries. Furthermore, I trace how, due to subsequent foreign incursions in the 20th Century, this narrative has remained contemporarily relevant.

From Chapter 5 onwards I focus on how Polish identity maintenance has been operationalised in the different settings and case studies of this thesis. Chapter 5 has two key objectives. First, it traces how the Polish language and symbolism have been used – through literature, art and narrative – as a means of maintaining identity and resisting cultural suppression during foreign occupation and in diaspora. I detail how imagery has been used in public monuments to transmit narratives of struggle and resistance. I also explain why the Polish language – as used by the Romantic Era émigrés – has been commemorated through this imagery in the public landscape. Second, the chapter details how different groups of Poles and Polish migrants in diaspora have variously operationalised identity maintenance. I show how this narrative has been communicated through the creation of distinct Polish speaking spaces.

Chapter 6 traces how and why cultural memories of macabre experiences in Poland during WWII are (re)produced and transmitted. WWII is positioned in this thesis as a defining event of foreign aggression and occupation in Polish history, an unforgettable part of Poland’s past. The memories of the macabre experiences during WWII propel Polish narratives of suffering and struggle against foreign occupation into contemporary public and private spheres. Articulations of Poland’s past exemplify that narratives of WWII, despite and because of their traumatic content, continue to be fundamental to contemporary era constructions of Polish identity. I trace the factors complicating 9 remembrances of WWII in both public and private settings and identify the various methods employed to overcome these barriers to remembering.

Chapter 7 details how Polish identity was maintained during another foreign occupation: the Soviet regime of the okres komunizmu. The chapter details the different techniques employed during the okres komunizmu by the Soviet hegemony to suppress Polish identity. It then outlines how these attempts at suppression were resisted through the protection of Polish memories and identity in the home. In Chapter 7 I have shown how Soviet dominance not only prompted the active safeguarding of Polish identity, but also informed and shaped identity and the methods employed to maintain it.

Chapter 8 – the concluding chapter – draws together the key findings of how cultural memory has been variously utilised to maintain Polish identity. I also evaluate the utility of examining the (re)productions and transmissions of cultural memories as a means of studying identity maintenance.

In Chapter 2, I summarise the relevant academic literature and detail the theoretical considerations that have influenced the discussion of identity maintenance in this thesis.

i The different forces that prompted Polish migration are discussed in Section 5.3.1 ‘Situating private sphere cultural memories: ‘forces’ of emigration’, p 133. ii Throughout this thesis, I have utilised the Polish term ‘okres komunizmu’ to refer to the period (1945- 1989) of the Soviet instigation and control of a communist government in Poland. I chose to employ a Polish term because this is how it was commonly referred to in the research interviews with Polish migrants and is a recognised way of describing this period using everyday Polish. iii In this thesis I have used the term ‘(re)production’ to emphasis that cultural memories are both produced and reproduced and that these processes are fluid and multiple. iv The term ‘transmission’ in this thesis means the dissemination and transferral of cultural memories between and within generations of Poles in Poland and the Polish diaspora in Australia. v The case studies in this thesis have been conceptualised in two settings – public and private. I have adopted these two categories for practical rather than theoretical reasons. The public settings were located in Poland and the private settings in Australia; together they comprised the two locations and stages my fieldwork. While the (re)productions and transmissions of cultural memories in this thesis are discussed within these distinct settings, it has not been my intention to demarcate the operations of these settings entirely from each other. For example, articulations of memory in one sphere can, and have influenced how memory is taken up in the other. vi The context of the family in this thesis is taken to mean the traditional nuclear family structure of the immediate family and extended family, including grandparents, aunts and uncles. This is discussed in more detail in Chapter 6, Section 6.3 vii I have used the term ‘(de)construction’ to refer to the use of a post-structuralist analysis of the complex and diverse layers that comprise identity. 10 viii By ‘ethno-cultural group’ I mean multicultural groups that are not only comprise of first generation migrants but also other generational cohorts. Ethno-cultural groups are distinguished in multicultural societies by their unique cultural practices and traditions.

11 Chapter 2 – Remembrances of identity: contexts and articulations

This thesis is concerned with how Polish identity is maintained through the (re)production of cultural memories in different settings and through turbulent times. The main consideration of this thesis is to show how and why cultural memories have been variously articulated, in this case in the specific historical context of Poland and Australia. For the purposes of this thesis, cultural memories have been conceptualised as the means by which Polish identities are maintained. This maintenance has been analysed in two spheres: public and private. These spheres have provided the stages upon which Polish cultural memories have been (re)produced and transmitted.

The study of cultural memory in human geographical research has emerged via several trajectories. Accordingly, this thesis considers the outcomes of the cultural turn in human geography in the 1980s, which promoted the broadening of the scope of inter-disciplinary geographical inquiry (Cosgrove, 1989, 1992; Cosgrove and Jackson, 1987; Jackson, 1980, 1989). The theoretical concerns of this thesis have been informed by and intersect at the nexus of several sub-disciplinary fields including identity studies, multiculturalism and post-socialist geographies. In contrast to the previous conceptions in geography of identity as spatially delimited, static, superorganic and fixed, studies of identity informed by the cultural turn now recognise a multiplicity of interpretations of ‘identity’, as well as the influences of time and social, political and spatial contexts on constructions of identity (Bondi, 1993; Duncan, 1980; Hall, 1990; Mitchell, 1995; Pile and Keith, 1993; Soja and Hooper, 1993).

One part of charting Polish identity maintenance in this thesis has been understanding how Polish migrants (re)constructi their identities in diaspora, and specifically within Australia’s multicultural society. Previous research on multiculturalism in the social sciences in Australia has focused on the development and acceptance (or not) of immigrants into Australian society (Jakubowicz, 1981; Jayasuriya, 1999; Jupp, 1997; Lopez, 2000; Smolicz, 1994). In this thesis, I have remained cognisant of how the

12 historical development of multiculturalism in Australian society may have affected the identity maintenance of Polish migrants. Yet I have also sought to expand existing migration analyses to include the role of pre-migration conditions on diasporic identity maintenance. Therefore, I have also situated this thesis within post-Socialist geographies, which concern the (re)negotiation of national identities in post-Socialist States (Hann, 1998; Light, 2001; Stenning, 2003; Tschuggnall and Welzer, 2002; Young and Light, 2001; Zeigler, 2002).

This chapter has two main objectives. First, I identify the literatures that have influenced my conceptualisation of ‘cultural memory’ and ‘identity’. Second, I review existing geographical literatures that focus on (re)producing cultural memories in public and private settings. In these geographical studies the predominant focus has been on public articulations of cultural memories, particularly on the use of monuments, memorials and museums and their symbolic representations of collective identities. Geographers studying cultural memory have also concentrated on the influence of changing hegemonies on cultural memories in public spheres.

In this thesis, I have investigated the Polish diaspora in Australia, mostly in Sydney, through focusing on memory (re)productions and transmissions in the private realm. Within the Polish diaspora, I have focused on the home as a distinctly private setting where identity maintenance has occurred. In this chapter, I critically reflect on how diaspora has been theorised in geographical and other literatures. I detail previous research on global Polish diaspora and then focus specifically on the Polish diaspora in Australia.

2.1 Theoretical frameworks of cultural memory

In this section, I trace how cultural memory has been theorised within academic discourses. I then discuss how these discourses have influenced my conceptualisation of cultural memories detailed in this thesis. I have engaged with cultural memory as a heuristic device for considering how identity is maintained in a diversity of contexts and through time.

13 The majority of literature on cultural memory is transdisciplinary, but emanates primarily from psychology, anthropology, history, sociology, comparative literature, philosophy, and cultural studies. However, despite the diversity of academic disciplines engaging with the studies of cultural memory, there is not an abundance of literature on memory. Brockmeier (2002: 5) has suggested that the paucity of memory studies relates to the predominance of positivist critiques in the disciplines of literature and arts in the 20th Century, which criticised the inability of memory research to provide objective, measurable and predictive results. In reaction to such strong positivism Brockmeier (2002: 8) has sought to couch studies of cultural memory within a post-positivist paradigm. This:

localise[s] memory in culture and, as a consequence, understand[s] remembering as a cultural practice – be it under the name of social, collective or historical remembering.

Memory is now recognised to be (part of) culture and therefore somewhat relatively conceived. McDowell (2004) has surmised that a post-positivist framework also destabilises the notion of authenticity in both personal and common histories, and this has signalled a movement towards envisioning cultural memories as complex, multiple, fluid and contextually embedded. Drawing on this concept of fluidity, Assmann (1995) and Connerton (1989) have both urged for a recognition that studies of cultural memory link the past to present. Both authors have sought for recognition that memories are parts of ongoing processes of knowledge (re)construction through time. Halbwachs ([1926] 1992) has argued that an intrinsic part of the process of remembering is uncovering linkages about the past, in the present. A group’s or individual’s present day circumstance(s) can affect how the past is remembered. Furthermore, he stated that individuals cannot ‘think about events of one’s past without discoursing upon them’ (Halbwachs, [1926] 1992: 53). Thus, Halbwachs affirmed that when we remember, we recall the contexts that position the memory in addition and as part of the process of remembering a specific person, event or place.

14 Halbwachs’ key contribution to the study of memory, his thesis ‘Les cadres sociaux de la mémoire’ ([1926] 1992) (The Social Frameworks of Memory), has been crucial to the conceptualisation of the processes of remembering in this thesis. According to Misztal (2003: 51), Halbwachs’ fundamental contribution to the study of memory was the establishment of a ‘connection between a social group and collective memory’. While it is individuals who remember, their membership to social groups collectivises their remembrances. When an individual remembers s/he draws on the contextual background and knowledge of groups to remember and conceptualise the past according to the social framework of that group’s own set of circumstances. Additionally, Brockmeier (2002: 24) has argued that frameworks of memory ‘are defined by a culture’ because we always carry these memories of culture with us. Far from a simple process, remembering involves the reconstruction of how we experienced events collectively and culturally – as social interactions – rather than a simple recreation of the events itself (Schacter, 1996).

Halbwachs asserted that individual memories could only be contiguous in time when they are part of the totality of thoughts common to a group (Halbwachs, [1926] 1992). Moreover, Halbwachs asserted that ‘every group develops a memory of its own past that highlights its unique identity’ (Misztal, 2003: 51). These collective groups’ memories form palimpsests, which envision how the past is remembered and factored into ongoing (re)conceptualisations of the group identity, in the present. ‘The past is a social construction mainly, if not wholly, shaped by the concerns of the present’ (Halbwachs, [1926] 1992: 25).

As the social frameworks of memory, these ‘groups’ can be multiple in character; we can belong to numerous groups that socially mediate how we remember different situations (Misztal, 2003). In other words, groups of people situated in distinct contexts may remember the same event differently. The differences in recollection occur because people with diverse pasts and histories remember events with reference to their own specific relationships to them (Wood, 1999). The group influence in memory recall can also change through time, and memories and their meanings can shift and modify in accordance with the different places in which people are positioned in time and space (Eyerman, 2004; Habermas, 1996; Koshar, 2000; Summerfield, 1998). 15 Following Halbwachs, Nora (1989) has argued that memories are representative of the ways that communities act out their different relationships with the past. Nora (1989; 1992) catalogued ‘lieux de memoire’ (sites of memoryii) throughout France, a process which Hutton (2000) has referred to as the spatialisation of Halbwachs’ social frameworks of memory. Nora was particularly concerned with national memory and how these sites of memory become ‘landmarks of a remembered geography and history’ and ‘form the intersection between official and vernacular cultures’ (Johnson, 2002: 294).

In this thesis, I argue that the social frameworks of memory occupy different contextual arenas. I focus on the spheres of the public and the private. In public spheres, individuals form part of collective groups, informed by publicly portrayed and performed cultural memories. These memories have been articulated through monuments, memorials, commemorative rituals and street names, which celebrate Polish identity. In this thesis, diaspora has been identified as the setting of private memory ((re)production and transmission). Migrants have been influenced by the maintenance of memories and images of the homeland. In this thesis, the examination of how identity is maintained through memory is predicated on the purposeful and incidental (re)production and transmission of cultural memories to maintain a groups’ collective identity through time and across distinct spaces. It is with this affirmation – that memory can inform how identity is maintained – that my conceptualisation of cultural memory departs from Halbwachs’. Halbwachs believed that ‘collective identity precedes memory’ and that ‘social identity determines the content of collective memory’ (Misztal, 2003: 52). Following Misztal (2003), I argue that in assuming that memory is always determined by identity, the function of collective remembering (in supporting and maintaining identity) is undervalued. Memories both inform and are informed by identities. It is the fluidity of this process and the multiplicity of the interactions between memory and identity, which provides the richness of memory narratives. Moreover, Halbwachs paid little attention to the social positioning and the wider, everyday contexts through which individuals remember. For example, Becker (2005) has commented on the puzzling absence in Halbwach’s original thesis, ‘Les cadres sociaux de la mémoire’ (1926), of any reference to the then recent events of World War I (WWI), and how it impacted on the social

16 frameworks of remembering for many at that time. In this thesis, I consider not only how collective remembrance aids in the maintenance of identity, but also how external forces such as foreign occupation provide an impetus to remember (not just as an event to remember).

2.2 Locating identity in memory discourse

A key concern of this thesis is the maintenance of Polish identity. A fundamental part of discerning how and why identity maintenance occurs is understanding identity itself. In this thesis, analyses of Polish identities have been informed by constructivist understandings of identity drawn from the cultural turn in geography (Cosgrove, 1989; Cosgrove and Jackson, 1987; Hall, 1990; Jackson, 1980, 1989; Ley, 1987). The cultural turn exposed new ways of thinking about an array of geographical processes (Shaw, 2001). Of specific concern to this thesis is the way in which the cultural turn prompted changes in ways of thinking about identity. These changes have meant that conceptualisations of identity now include articulations that are discursive and are constructed over time and through different settings. Identities are ‘never complete, always in process’, rather than ‘accomplished fact[s]’ (Hall, 1997: 51). Furthermore, since the cultural turn, identity has been conceived of as ‘fractured, overlapping, and sometimes unstable condensation[s] of various social influences’ (Martin, 2005: 99) not as monolithic and superorganic (cf. Sauer, [1925 ] 1969).

I have drawn on the constructivist understandings of identity of Hall and du Gay (1996), which problematise notions of ‘fixed identities’ (Habermas, 1996), as a framework for thinking about Polish identity in this thesis. Different groups – people living in Poland, Polish migrants and persons with Polish heritage – comprehend Polish identity in different ways. Conceptions of Polish identity occur in different social frameworks and are influenced by specific sets of personal and collective experiences. In addition, I contend that constructions of identity are also historically embedded within wider conceptions of national identity. Polish identities can be interpreted as national in the sense that nations utilise identity (and cultural memory) to forge ‘a sense of a shared past’, present and future (Cooke, 2000: 449). Polish identity is also cultural identity, in that many cultural

17 practices, traditions and customs have influenced how Polish people distinguish themselves and continue constructing their identity. These cultural and national characteristics of Polish identity (and other identities) need not be conceptualised separately – they occur simultaneously. Neither cultural nor national interpretations of Polish identity are more important or should be prioritised over one another. Because I have sought to recognise that identities are multiply interpreted, I have opted to utilise the collective term ‘Polish identity’ throughout this thesis, to encapsulate both discourses of cultural and national identity. Furthermore, by using the term Polish identity, in this broader sense, I have sought to thicken narratives of Polish identity as I explored the layers of memory that contribute to its maintenance in the different places across global spaces.

2.3 Conceptual settings of cultural memory

Discourses of place and space are at the intersection of debates concerning the constructions of identity. In this thesis, I trace how constructions of Polish identities are enacted in different settings – in places and across different spaces – in public places in Poland and in private settings in Australia. These research settings, in Poland and Australia, act as forums and mechanisms through which cultural memories can be (re)produced and transmitted to maintain Polish identity. Fortier (2005: 184) has argued that it is memory, not territory that is ‘the principal ground for identity formation in diaspora cultures’. I have sought to expand on this contention by analysing the mechanisms by which cultural memory is (re)produced and transmitted in the research settings. While cultural memories serve this common role of identity maintenance, the private and public spheres of memory articulations in the settings studied in this thesis are markedly different. By exploring two distinct settings, I have sought to expose the efficacy of using a mixed methods approach in understanding how Polish identity has been variously constructed, performed and experienced in different places.

Although, I am not directly concerned with the spatiality of the study settings as ‘places’ and ‘spaces’, analyses of space and place have informed how I have conceived and contextualised the research settings. Throughout this analysis I have been cognisant that a

18 multiplicity of other social, cultural and political processes occurred concurrently to the (re)production of cultural memories, at the research settings. The maintenance of identity as operationalised through the research settings could not be viewed in isolation of social, cultural and political processes in and around those settings. Within geographical discourse, debates about space, like identity, have benefited from a constructivist approach. While space may appear to be ‘self-explanatory’ concept it remains ‘diffuse, ill defined and inchoate’ (Hubbard, 2005: 41). Interpreting space has been ‘fundamental to the geographical imagination’ (Hubbard, 2005: 41). Research occurring after the cultural turn in geography has critiqued positivistic and quantitative notions of space that focused on delimiting it into fixed, absolute and measurable arenas (Crang and Thrift, 2000; Jackson, 1989). Conceptions of space are now recognised as being both produced and consumed as well as contextualised by cultural, social, political and economic relations (Hubbard et al., 2002). Space persists as innately elusive because on the one hand it is familiar and everyday in character – ‘we live in space’ (de Certeau, 1984; Tuan, 1977: 3) – but on the other it is also sacred and revered, such as at war cemeteries and places of worship (Jackson and Henrie, 1983; Waitt, 2003).

Place, like space, has also been variously conceptualised within geographic discourse. Early humanistic approaches to place considered the propensity for symbolic and experiential attachment by individuals to different places (Relph, 1976; Tuan, 1977). Readings of place after the cultural turn built on the recognition of the multiple processes that operate with place, such as place attachment. Subsequent literature drew attention to the weakness of normative and popular conceptions of place, and especially to those that did not engage with the possibility of multiple interpretations of the utility of place (Creswell, 1996). In this vein, Schein (1997: 676) has contended that understandings of place, ‘should be processual and reflexive, open to the challenge of new information and alternative interpretations’.

Debates about place have also centred on how places reflect historical cultural identity and collective memory. Hayden (1995) and Jacobs (1999) have shown that urban places comprise of many historical layers of identity politics, which factor into how places are conceived of in the present and how attachments to place by different groups of people are 19 diverse and fluid through time. Koonz (1994) has argued that memory is used to (re)create places based on specifically chosen events of a national past. These (re)creations can be purposeful constructions (re)productions of memory, which create ‘places of familiarity and comfort’ and serve to remind people of their homeland (Drozdzewski, 2007: 855).

Recent geographical discourse has considered the (re)productions of memory through space and places (Nagel, 2002; Nogue and Vicente, 2004; Sargin, 2004). Azaryahu (1996), Light et al. (2002) and Hebbert (2005) have detailed how the everyday streetscape is utilised as a site for memory (re)production and transmission, and in particular how hegemonic power plays a dominant role in the portrayal of memory in the streetscape. Fortier (2000) has focused on an Italian migrant community in London and how they have used memory to (re)create places reminiscent of the homeland. Others have studied the urban landscape as it relates to memory and space and suggested that cultural memory is manifest in everyday places. For example, Crang and Travlou (2001) have unpacked the layers of collective memory of the city, whereas Hayden (1995: 227-228) has suggested that ‘historic urban landscapes help to nurture ordinary citizens’ collective memory’. Furthermore, Johnson (1995; 2002) has discussed memorial and commemorative space as representative of national and cultural memory.

It would seem, as Hubbard (2005: 46) has suggested, that there is a ‘continuing preoccupation with the representation’ of spaces and places in geographic literature. This thesis seeks to continue and contribute to these debates by focusing on how memory is articulated in the Polish and Australian research settings. In the sections that follow, I review geographic contributions to articulations of memory in public and private spheres. These nascent geographical studies of memory (re)production and transmission show a growing recognition of the utility of memory research in wider studies of identity constructions based on place and space.

20 2.4 Public sphere articulations of cultural memory

Straeheli and Mitchell (2007) have sought to clarify debates about ‘the public’ as it is expressed within academic discourse, and by people using public space. In a review of geographical literature, they found that definitions of ‘the public’ most commonly referred to physical aspects, such as parks and streets, or meeting places (Straeheli and Mitchell, 2007). There are parallels in the geographical literature on memory, which concern how memory is articulated in public settings. A great proportion of geographical literature has focused on the material constructions of memory, such as monuments and streetscapes.

Within this focus on the public materiality of memory, geographers have analysed narratives of monuments and war memorials to uncover the purposeful maintenance of a common narrative of memory. Such common narratives, linking people, communities and time, have become apparent. For example, Osborne (2001:51) has argued that public monuments can act as ‘consensus builders’, which become ‘focal points for identifying with a visual condensation of an imagined national chronicle’. By examining the layers of meaning within public sites of memory, geographers have unearthed the processes of (re)producing memory in the public.

A pioneer of this approach in geography, Harvey (1979) sought to (re)create a narrative of the monument of the Sacra Coeur Basilica in Paris, France. He contextualised the actions of the Paris commune, which effected the erection, symbolism and location of the monument. According to Harvey, contemporary interpretations of the monument founded without an understanding of the historical contexts of the monument’s narrative are likely to obscure the ‘principles of those who struggled for and against the “embellishment” of that spot’ (Harvey, 1979: 381). In contrast to Harvey’s focus on the historical narratives of memory as associated with the history of class struggle, Lowenthal’s (1985) ‘The Past is a Foreign Country’ discussed memory in the landscape. He was primarily concerned with the concept of the past and the way in which societies and nations understand, form and interpret the past through interpretations of the landscape. These two earlier studies underpin much of the contemporary geographical discourse on memory, by demonstrating examples of the interpretations and (re)productions of the past.

21 Analyses of monuments as material manifestations reveal interpretations that are largely dependent on social and political contexts. Monuments are not static entities, as Hay et al. (2004:212) have noted, the ‘social meaning of monuments and places are not fixed…they are open to change and reinterpretations’. Till (1999:254) has affirmed that ‘social narratives about the past are always changing’ and supports her claim with an examination of the changing nature of meanings attributed to Berlin’s Neue Wache monument. In Till’s (1999) example, changing political and governmental regimes –shifts from German Monarchy, to the Wiedmer Period, to National Socialism, to Soviet Socialism, to post- Soviet capitalism – corresponded with changes in the way that national narratives of the past were (re)interpreted and portrayed to the public at the Neue Wache monument. Forest et al. (2004: 373-374) have also contended that monuments and places of memory should be comprehended as sets of ongoing processes ‘through which understandings of political community and social identity are negotiated’. Thus, public monuments should not be conceived merely as a ‘material backdrop’ from which a story is told (Johnson, 1994; 1995; 2002:293), but as integral parts of the story of remembering and commemoration. Public monuments become palimpsests of memory that are inscribed with many layers of meaning (Auster, 1997). However, reading the palimpsest may not always be straightforward because interpretations may differ. Nonetheless, an instrumental part of a discursive examination of cultural memory has been to expose a ‘shared historical consciousness’ and a narrative of a collective past (Azaryahu, 2003: 2; Cole, 2002; Light et al., 2002; Weissberg, 1999; Wood, 1999). Communicating a shared ‘national identity’ involves depicting a common sense of community, struggle and distinctiveness, but also a collective identity based around nationally recognised traditions.

2.4.1 Symbols of national identity

Monuments commemorating battlesites and heroic figures are common beacons of national identity in publicly articulated memory. They link historic events of significance to present day representations and celebrations of national identity. The intent of using symbolism to depict national identity can be to act as a referent to individual or national identity (Osborne, 2001), and to make a statement about a community or national response (or lack thereof) to a defining event in a nation’s history (Winter, 1995). An integral part

22 of using national symbolism is the linking past to present in the (re)production of a shared national narrative. Renan (1882) has argued that elements of sacrifice and suffering were essential to the continuance of collectively remembered and articulated national narratives. Moreover, both Hobsbawm (1992) and Anderson (1991) have argued that an essential part of the development of the principles of collective national identities was the willingness of citizens to die for the nation, for a common cause.

After WWI, war memorials came to symbolise the commonality of the national sacrifice of all those who died, regardless of class and military rank (Heffernan, 1995). Mosse (1990) and Till (1999) have also contended that the iconography of war memorials in the early 20th Century signalled a movement towards the commemoration of ordinary soldiers, rather than merely venerating the ruling elite and high ranking officers. Tombs of unknown soldiers and cenotaphs are symbolic of this progression. Equally, the placement of these monuments in ‘ordinary’ landscapes where everyday audiences pass-by, has contributed to the memorialisation of the ordinary and everyday contributions to the war effort. Winter (1995:94) has argued that war memorials represent sites of ‘symbolic exchange’, where the memorial or monument is symbolic and illustrative of the ‘degree of indebtedness to the fallen which can never fully be discharged’.

These sites of symbolic exchange often commemorate significant events, such as war, through nationally recognised monuments and rituals. For example, there is an inherent symbolism in the nature of war commemoration in Britain because, with the exception of the Abbey Tomb in Westminster, London, all tombs are empty (Heffernan, 1995). Anderson (1991:9) has asserted that ‘public ceremonial reverence accord[s] these monuments precisely because they are either deliberately empty or no one knows who lies inside them’ (original emphasis). Furthermore, Mosse (1990:96) has argued that cenotaphs are ‘a catafalque symbol of the fallen and the victory’. Such war memorials symbolise the nation’s response, such as solemn acknowledgment of the contributions of those who died at war even though the symbolic tombs are (often) empty. Hershkovtiz (1993: 397) has argued that the resonance of such memorialisation in national memory lies in the integration of the ‘symbolism and iconography of [a] place’. Certain places, such as the WWI cemetery of Villers-Bretonneux, France, become associated not only with the 23 material form of the monument, but also with the symbolism that the monument represents to each passer-by.

The placement of symbolic sites of national identity in the everyday landscapeiii has been important to hegemonic forces that have attempted to forge national and political ideologies in public places. Atkinson and Cosgrove (1998:32) contended that through the 19th Century national and imperial identities were cemented in the urban landscape in Italy through the strategic planning and placement of large public monuments in ‘key metropolitan locations’. As such, the portrayal of the ‘national past’ in monuments and memorials has become synonymous with the symbolic transmission of national identity. Monuments can act as ‘focal points’ and historical anchors through which concepts of national identity have been linked with the events of a collective past. Most importantly, the meanings associated with these monuments have been passed down through contemporary generations (Cooke, 2000; Foote et al. 2000). War memorials exemplify this point. Johnson (1995:54) and Till (1999) have argued that war memorials enable an awareness of the ways in which ‘national cultures conceive of their pasts and mourn the large-scale destruction of life.’ This awareness, however, is codified within specific normative ritual practices of commemoration. Johnson (2002) affirmed that performative commemoration aims to create stable sites of remembrance, most successfully achieved through the founding of symbolic dates and events. Examples include, Anzac Day in Australia and Remembrance Day and Armistice Day celebrated by the Allied countries of WWI. These days of ritual commemoration routinely involve marching or parading to a central monument or war memorial. The ritual performance of these accepted norms of memorialisation accord with what Nora has termed ‘commemorative vigilance’ (Nora, 1996). Most importantly, ritual commemoration highlights the influence of power in performance, and the goal of the creation of newly defined spaces that accord with official and accepted narratives of memory. Implicit within these performances of national identity are narratives of the past, which as Said (2000:177) has stated ‘are shaped in accordance with a certain notion of what we [the public] or, for that matter, they [the hegemony] really are’ (original emphasis).

24 2.4.2 Public remembrances

Public remembrances of war have been used to forge collective notions of identity that coalesce around the commonality of a nation’s struggle. In academic disciplines other than geography, research has focused on the cultural memories of WWII, however, Cooke (2000) and Cole and Smith (1995) have argued that among geographers (primarily Anglophone geographers) there is a noticeable absence of studies pertaining to ‘the Holocaust’. Exceptions are Charlesworth (2004), Charlesworth and Addis’ (2002) and Charlesworth et al. (2006), who have studied the memory landscapes of WWII and specifically the former concentration camps of Paszów and Auschwitz in Poland. Cole and Smith’s (1995) critiques pertain to the failure to distinguish adequately between victims and perpetrators, as well as a general avoidance of dealing with the Holocaust due to the ethical implications of such studies. They have argued that,

What we require are studies of the Holocaust which refuse to enter into the closed categories of much of its writing, and yet also refuse to enter the moral oblivion of studies where the agent is obliterated by structure, and the murder of six million becomes an irrelevance (Cole and Smith, 1995:313).

I believe that there is similar deficiency in geographical discourses relating to the mnemonic sites of World War II, more generally. As I mentioned in Chapter 1, by moving the focus away from the implications of the Holocaust I do not intended to downplay its significance. Rather, by shifting the focus I hope to gain new insights and understandings of the memory discourses of the huge numbers of non-Jewish people (and Polish) who suffered during WWII and its aftermath. The memories of WWII are still vivid for the victims, the survivors and their families, as well as the many who were forced to migrate; their voices should also be heard.

The studies of WWI, on the other hand, have featured strongly in geographical literatures on public memory (re)productions. Heffernan (1995) has focused on the politics of remembrance of war in Britain after WWI. He has identified that war remembrance

25 changed after WWI due to several determining factors: the increase of British casualties; the distant location of the war front; the increased cost of repatriating bodies from France to England; and the increasing incidence of ordinary citizens enlisting in armies (Heffernan, 1995). Heffernan (1995) has contended that there were important outcomes of these changes. One outcome was that all war dead were remembered at purposely constructed symbolic sites of commemoration. These sites were located either in the homeland – such as the cenotaph at Whitechapel, in London – or at foreign cemeteries, which have became ‘sacred landscapes of remembrance’ in the national psyche (Heffernan, 1995: 313). Another outcome was that there was also ‘more emphasis on the equality of their common sacrifice’ of ordinary soldiers (Heffernan, 1995: 312).

Gough (2004) has also examined the commemoration of WWI battle sites, focusing on the (re)construction of a battlefield in Newfoundland, as a memorial to the Canadian soldiers killed at the Somme, France. Through his analysis of the many competing ‘historical claims over this compressed patch of land’, Gough (2004: 252) also drew attention to the multivocal nature of the demands on memory and to different types of material public commemoration. In his chapter on ‘War memorials and the mourning process’ of WWI, Winter (1995: 78) has acknowledged the multifarious nature and contextuality of war memory and commemoration whereby ‘different cultural norms and religious traditions yield different meaning’. Winter (1995: 79) has sought to focus on war memorials as ‘carriers of political ideas’, thus drawing attention to the influence of uneven hegemonies of power in the commemorative process and memory landscape.

2.4.3 Uneven articulations of power at sites of memory

Underlying memorialisation at sites of memory are the intentions of hegemonic powers that ultimately decide what is memorialised and how. Said (2000:179) has argued that for pragmatic reasons memory should not always be considered as genuine and reliable, but also as ‘rather useful’. Memory has been used as a tool by those in power, to decide what is represented materially, how it is portrayed and to control the continued public discussion. As Said (2000) has suggested ‘they’ decide what ‘we’ remember. Williams and Smith (1983) focused on the politicisation of spaces through remembering ‘historic

26 territory’. Geographers have commented on the politics of memory, and paid particular attention to the role of governance in the use, commemoration and appropriation of material articulations of memory by hegemonic regimes. ‘The tangible objects of memory are both [the] medium and [the] outcome of an ideological hegemony’ (Hay et al. 2004:206). Drawing on Kong and Law (2002:1505), Hay et al. (2004) have reminded us, that hegemonic regimes do not necessarily impose control by overt oppression. Rather, they aim to create a sense of naturalness and normality that is both rationalised and achieved by creating an atmosphere of consensus around selectively chosen events that represent a collective national past. Thus, dominant groups aim to create norms of memory so they become ubiquitous and unquestioned narratives of a nation’s past. These types of memory narratives reinforce the hegemony and solidify their power (Hay et al. 2004; Johnson, 1995). Thus, the centrality of collective memory in the public sphere is an imperative part of not only a nation’s collective memory, but also of its dominant ideology of the political identity (Hoelscher and Alderman, 2004). Places of commemoration therefore are also places of politics and contestation between competing ideas and struggles for representation – they are representative of a politics of memory.

Geographers have engaged in discussions concerning the (re)production of public memory discourses in post-war and post-totalitarian states (Argenbright, 1999; Augustins, 2004; Azaryahu, 1997, 2003; Bialasiewicz and Minca, 2005; Farmer, 1995; Foote et al., 2000; Forest and Johnson, 2002; Forest et al., 2004; Light, 2001; Light et al., 2002; Nagel, 2002; Stangl, 2003; Stenning, 2000, 2001, 2003; Till, 1999). These studies have uncovered how memory narratives have been (re)defined following a return to autonomy in post- Soviet States. They have also sought to address how post-Soviet States have (re)created discourses of national identity and (re)made places of remembrance. These new discourses of identity are drawn from previously suppressed, or under-represented, personal experiences that were repressed during the occupation. Because of the Soviet influence on public memory, (re)negotiations of WWII memory – and its macabre narratives – have only recently been possible.

Hershkovitz (1993) has asserted that the key aim of any new political regime is the creation of new discourses of identity that accord with a regime’s political vision. For 27 example, after WWII the Soviet influenced governments of Eastern Europe were quick to employ and manipulate public memory to shore up support for their new regimes. These governments used narratives of Soviet victories of WWII as examples of the triumph of workers over Nazism and Capitalismiv (Charlesworth, 2004; Cole, 1999; Judt, 1992; Koonz, 1994). Material outcomes in the memory landscape commonly included the renaming of streetsv and town squares and the erection of large monuments to commemorate Soviet personalities. During the Soviet period of control in Eastern Europe the ruling elite had the power to make decisions pertaining to the memorial landscape, and they alone had the resources to enact them (Forest and Johnson, 2002). In trying to prohibit public discussion and erase the memory of events, people and places that did not accord with their ideologies, they established a fear of recrimination. For example, for those who engaged in open public debate about official versions of history, the threat of exile in Siberia was real (Till, 1999).

Geographers have also analysed the memory landscape of former concentration camps previously administered by Nazi and then Soviet authorities. This process has involved a reconsideration of the categories of victim and perpetrator (Till, 1999). For example, the concentration camp of Buchenwald in the former German Democratic Republic (GDR) was utilised as a Soviet detention camp for Nazis (and other Germans) following its liberation by the Red Army at the end of WWII (Azaryahu, 2003; Farmer, 1995). With the unification of East and West Germany came a need to rewrite the nation’s collective past, which also involved a clearer understanding of how the former Nazi concentration camp sites were incorporated into the new national narrative. As Azaryahu (2003), Charlesworth (2004) and Till (1999) have noted, this involved answering the crucial questions of who should be commemorated, what the terms of commemoration should be and whether the previously acknowledged categories of perpetrator and victim should be forgotten through death.

2.4.4 Forgetting and Resistance

Gillis (1994) and Anderson (1991) have pointed out that the establishment of narratives of national identity are as much about forgetting as they are about remembering. Similarly

28 Esbenshade (1995:87) has argued that ‘to forget’ is not simply the opposite of ‘to remember’; instead forgetting is a process of selectively ‘remembering otherwise’. The influence of uneven power relations and a politics of memory have meant that events deemed unsuitable for public commemoration are often selectively forgotten. Sargin (2004:660) has termed the articulation of this process in public spheres an ‘architecture of organised forgetting’. New political regimes in particular may seek to remove the memory of certain events from the publicly recognised narratives of the past, if they jeopardise the legitimacy of their regime. In his review of Hodgkin and Radstone’s (2003) ‘Contested Pasts: the politics of memory’, Stephen Legg (2004) argued that a key way to erase memories is through the (re)construction of the memory landscapevi. Gough (2004: 238) has noted that ‘commemorative space lose [their] its potency to reinvigorate memory’ without the continual re-inscription of a monuments narrative by the public. Dwyer (2004:423) suggested that ‘forgetting is intrinsic to the act of commemoration’, primarily because it draws attention away from the event being forgotten towards that event being remembered.

Osborne (1998) has posited ‘vernacular memory’ comprises multiple and fluid individual interpretations of identity and memory, which resist officially created norms. Resistance of course is common. For example in the countries of the former Soviet Union, the refusal to accept a purported ‘official’ version of national history played an instrumental role in the continuance of alternative histories (Koonz, 1994:269). The inscription of alternative meanings onto public forms of memorialisation has meant that monuments have also been viewed as sites of resistance and contestation (Cooke, 2000). Yet, Jackson (1989: 61) has argued that resistance ‘may also be discerned in less tangible ways’, including linguistic forms adopted by different groups to ‘mark out’ distinct spaces for themselves. Further, Jackson’s (1989: 161) characterisation of linguistic communities as comprise of ‘shared belief systems, myths and ideologies’ and a common language, suggests that the continuation of cultural practices and speaking the native language are themselves forms of resistance. Thus, part of the protocol of resistance to a publicly purported hegemony is the safeguarding of alternative histories in non-public settings. In this vein, Forest et al.

29 (2004) have detailed how the domination of discourses of national identity and memory by groups in power should not be assumed to be without reaction.

In the next section, I detail how the diasporic setting has proffered a viable alternative site for resistance to officially remembered histories. I begin this section by contextualising the private setting. In this section, I have focused on the nature of diaspora and in particular on research on the Polish diaspora.

2.5 Diasporic Settings

As noted earlier in this chapter, I have explored how Polish identity has been maintained in two conceptual settings: public and private spheres. In the preceding section, I reviewed how memory within public settings has been examined in geographic literatures. Accordingly, I explained how the public setting has acted as a conduit for the materialisation and continuation of memory, through monuments and the practice of commemorative rituals. The public realm is also a setting where a politics of memory is complexly layered with public discourses of various kinds. Public sites of memory are situated within their political, social and historical contexts. In this section, I shift the focus away from the public sphere to the geographical literatures on cultural memory in private settings. While I have analysed the home as the key private site for identity maintenance, I have positioned this analysis within the wider conceptual sphere of diaspora. My concern here is with the diasporic experiences of Polish identity maintenance in Australia.

The diasporic experience encompasses an assemblage of encounters and movements that involve the transnational networks of immigrants and refugees, personal and collective histories of separation and exile, multi-locationality and multiple sites of belonging (Brah, 1996; Fortier, 2005; Safran, 1991; Tölölian, 1991). The term diaspora was first used to describe the dispersion of peoples of Greek and Armenian origin, but particularly to denote the dispersion of Jews after the Babylonian exile during the 6th Century BCE. An implicit connotation of diaspora is the notion of dispersion from a central location – a home (Brah, 1996). This notion of dispersal has remained central to how diaspora has

30 been theorised within the social sciences, and therefore within this thesis. Dispersal conjures negative images of dislocation and displacement (Fortier, 2005; Gilroy, 1994). Brah (1996: 193) has contended that the term diaspora ‘invokes the imagery of traumas of separation and dislocation’. But, Fortier (2005) has cautioned against only associating diaspora with dispersal from the homeland. This view risks an overly unfavourable and simplified perception of homelands as undesirable places that were left behind (Ahmed et al., 2003; Fortier, 2005). As Clifford (1994: 304) has argued, diasporas actually ‘connect multiple communities of a dispersed population’. Dispersal can be a characteristic that bonds otherwise diverse communities who have shared similar migratory pathways. Arising from diverse migrations and dispersal experiences, diasporas are held together by the individual and collective memories of shared experiences of the homeland (Brah, 1996).

Safran’s (1991: 83-84) categorisation of diaspora attests to an array of diasporic encounters. Integral components in his criteria included dispersal from the homeland, maintaining a memory of the homeland, maintaining a prospect of eventual return, belief in the restoration of the homeland, belief that acceptance in the host country may not be possible, and continued relationship with the homeland. Safran’s (1991) categorisation recognises the multiple characteristics of diasporas and provides a framework within which to think about the diversity of diasporic experiences. In this thesis, I agree with those that argue that the experiences of diasporic groups should not be restricted by assigning overly positivistic ‘diaspora criteria’. As Clifford (1994) has argued, even the historically defined Jewish diaspora does not satisfy all of Safran’s criteria. Rather than imposing a positivist schematic of diaspora on Polish migrants, I have sought to adopt Fortier’s (2005: 182) understanding of diaspora, as a:

rich heuristic device to think about questions of belonging, continuity and community in the context of dispersal and transitional networks of connection.

Diasporic groups are varied and traverse different networks of ‘economic processes, state policies and institutional practices’ (Brah, 1996: 182). According to Brah (1996: 183) ‘far

31 from [being] fixed or pre-given’, diasporic identities comprise of a confluence of narratives that are ‘differently imagined under different historical circumstances’ both within and between waves of diasporas. Diasporas are signifiers of ‘political struggles [that] define the local’ (Clifford, 1994: 308). These struggles are historically contextualised as national narratives of displacement. Further, such struggles are often important remembrances of (the experience of) leaving a former homeland. They become part of the history of migration and identities in the new homeland.

2.5.1 Remembrances and (re)creations of home

Remembering the homeland is central to the diasporic imagination. Memories aid the (re)creation of spaces of belonging, especially in the home, where images of the homeland – of past events, people and places – have been invested into diasporic settings (Fortier, 2005). Tolia-Kelly (2004) has examined the home as a site where material artefacts link remembrances of the homeland to the (re)created diasporic home. She documented how religious iconography, paintings and furniture had been strategically positioned in the home to (re)create a sense of belonging and to uphold memories of the homeland. Tolia- Kelly found the home to be conceptual tool for investigating how culture forms part of the process of making the home, specifically in a new homeland.

Tuan (1977: 144) has described the home as an ‘intimate place’ where both material (re)creations of memory (such as those which Tolia-Kelly references) converge with non- material personal remembrances of place. The home can invoke personal remembrances because it is a private, intimate and everyday space:

Memory weaves her strongest enchantments, holding us at her mercy with some trifle, some echo, a tone of voice…This surely is the meaning of home – a place where every day is multiplied by all the days before it (Stark, 1948, cited in Tuan, 1977: 144).

Stark’s description (above) of home is a place of familiarity. As O’Connor (2005) noted such familiarity stems both from emotional disposition, and from language. These are

32 familiar ‘sounds, colours, smells and shapes’ in and of the home, which are mutually reinforced by the intimacy akin with sharing the same language and ancestral background (O'Connor, 2005: 45). The home is a place where explanations and background information are inscribed into the fabric of the place. Brah (1996: 192) has contended that home is ‘a mythic place of desire’, ‘a place of no return’ and the ‘lived experiences of a locality’. The home has multiple meanings and in diaspora is a site where multiple identities intersect. The experiential memories of the ancestral home are evident in the images of a nation’s social memory, ‘imagined and lived’ (Tolia-Kelly, 2004: 317). The meanings attached to home do change over time. Home is often ‘a place created through a family history’ (Tolia-Kelly, 2004: 324). For a first generation of migrants, remembrances of home often include memories of the homeland as it was left behind, as a place where experiences of disruption and displacement began (Brah, 1996). For subsequent diasporic generations, constructions of home may be different and attachments to the homeland lessened particularly if visitation has not been possible. The home is a space where cultural identifications are played out in response to different attachments to it and its diasporic environment (Tolia-Kelly, 2004). Brah (1996) has suggested that such constructions of home are also expressions of personal and political struggles with belonging – to the former homeland and to the new diasporic home – and are mediated by the different circumstances occurring at different times and places. In this thesis, I recognise the diasporic Polish home as both a location for the continuance of identity – through material and non-material links to culture – and as a site where issues of belonging and struggle are played out.

2.5.2 Polonia

Davies (2005b) has stated that almost one third of people who identify as Polish, live outside of Poland. The vast majority of this diaspora have fit into two categories as political or economic migrants, or refugees. In the late 18th Century, Polish diasporic communities resulted from the partitioning of Poland and its subsequent occupation by Russia, Austria and Prussia (1975 to 1918) (as discussed in Chapter 4, Section 4.2). Davies (2005b) has detailed the movements of Polish emigrants from the beginning of the partitions, in 1793 until 1939. One hundred and ninety-five thousand Poles settled

33 permanently in Brazil, 450 000 emigrated to France, 250 000 to Canada, 1.5 million left for the United States of America, and 2 million migrated to Germanyvii.

While the Polish diaspora is commonly referred to as ‘Polonia’ – Poles living outside of Poland – the term is most frequently used with respect to Americans of Polish descent. Today the United States of America has the largest group of Polonia, estimated at six and a half million people (Davies, 2005b). However, Kwiatkowski (2007) has contended that the majority of American Polonia comprise of third and fourth generation Polish Americans who have few cultural links to Poland. Unlike other English speaking countries with large populations of Polonia (such as Canada, Australia and the United Kingdom) American Polonia is characterised by a large percentage of people born in the United States (93.8 percent) (Kwiatkowski, 2007). American Polonia was founded before WWI, with initial diasporic communities established from the mass migration of ‘displaced peasants and labourers’ who primarily emigrated from Galiciaviii in the late 19th Century (Jacobson, 1995: 32). Thus, while America retains the largest group of Polonia it is characterised by greater generational distanceix from Poland (Kwiatkowski, 2007). On the other hand, in countries such as Australia the bulk of Polish diaspora has formed relatively recently, from WWII migration onwards. Furthermore, Australian Polonia is still strongly characterised by two main cohorts that migrated under very different political, social and economic contexts.

2.5.2.1 The Polish diaspora in Australia

Several authors have detailed the early migrations that established the Polish diasporic communities in Australia (Jamrozik, 1983; Jupp, 2001; Kaluski, 1985; Paszkowski, 2001; Sussex and Zubrzycki, 1985). Polish migration to Australia has its origins in a small contingent of political refugees, Polish nobility and army officers who settled during the 19th Century, primarily in South Australia (Kaluski, 1985; Paszkowski, 2001) . Zubrzycki (1979) has detailed the migration of a small group of Poles from rural Poland in the late 19th Century, which was motivated by economic rather than political circumstances. The group of 31 Poles from the village of Dbrowka Wielka in Prussian Poland settled the new township of Sevenhill in South Australia, in 1844. They were followed by another 65

34 families from Polish villages nearby. These families established the township of Polish Hill River in South Australia in 1856.

Continuing instability in Poland throughout the 20th Century meant that Polish emigration to Australia continued to be stimulated by political and economic impetuses. Such political and economic motivations were evident in recent waves of migration after WWII, and after the okres komunizmu (discussed in more detail in Chapter 3, Section 3.5.2.1). Thus far, most research on the Polish diaspora in Australia has tended to focus on the processes of settlement, adjustment and cultural maintenance in Australia rather than the reasons for migration. Kwiatkowski (2007) has argued that studies that have focused on the Polish community in Australia have tended to centre on the WWII cohort of migration, with little attention paid to the second largest group of post-okres komunizmu migrants. Most of the research was published in the early 1980s, before the completions of the okres komunizmu wave of migration (For instance: Jamrozik, 1984; Kaluski, 1985; Smolicz and Secombe, 1985; Sussex and Zubrzycki, 1985). Moreover, while these studies do acknowledge some of the inherent differences between the two waves of Polish migration, they have tended to focus on the unfavourable political, social and assimilationist climate experienced by the post-WWII cohort of migrants in Australia. For example, Jamrozik’s (1984) study on Polish settlement from 1947 to 1984 focused on the social, economic and political factors that influenced the Polish community in Australia. These factors included the ‘early assimilationist policies’ of the Australian government, the socio-economic characteristics of the immigrant cohorts and the efforts of the Polish diaspora to maintain language and cultural heritage (Jamrozik, 1984: i). Such themes were also adopted by Kaulski (1985) in The Poles in Australia. Writing at the advent of multicultural policy in Australia, Kaluski (1985) acknowledged that a new way of thinking about the importance of cultural heritage had emerged in Australia. Kaluski focused on how the Polish diaspora maintained cultural identity through community, culture, sport, religion and politics.

In their research on the maintenance of Polish culture in diaspora, Smolicz and Secombe (1985) outlined what they considered to be the ‘core values’ of Polish culture. They defined these core values as cultural characteristics that provide a ‘indispensable link between the group’s cultural and social systems’ (Smolicz and Secombe, 1985: 109). The 35 maintenance of the Polish language and cultural traditions, such as folkloric dancing, were discussed as integral elements to maintaining Polish identity in Australia. Polish language maintenance and the transmission of Polish culture were also key themes in Sussex and Zubrzycki’s Polish People and Culture in Australia (1985). Overall, these aforementioned studies focused on Polish migration, Polish community life and the development of cultural infrastructure aimed at maintaining tangible linkages to the Poland they left behind.

More recent literature on Polish diaspora in Australia has not only studied the post-okres komunizmu wave of Polish migrants, but has also sought to distinguish the different social and economic characteristics of this wave compared to the post-WWII cohort (Drozd, 2001; Jamrozik, 2001; Kwiatkowski, 2007). As yet, however, Drozd’s (2001) research on the settlement pathways of the post-okres komunizmu migrants in Melbourne remains the only study to focus solely on this cohort of migration. Unlike research on the WWII cohort of migration, Drozd (2001) detailed how conditions in Poland during the 1980s factored (or did not factor) into migration decisions. This focus departs from that of earlier studies, which were chiefly concerned with the migrants’ circumstances after migration. Drozd (2001) has also discussed how the post-okres komunizmu group utilised (or did not) the existing cultural infrastructure of Polish clubs, schools and dancing groups. In an attempt to fill a gap in knowledge about the second generation children of the post-okres komunizmu migrants, Kwiatkowski’s (2007) recent doctoral thesis focused on how this generational group constructed ideas about Polishness and landscape from return journeys to Poland. More general conclusions about the constructions of identity and place by this cohort of second generation children of post-okres komunizmu migrants were not, however, drawn (Kwiatkowski, 2007).

Previous studies on Polish diaspora in Australia have not considered both of the waves of Polish migrations, or subsequent generational cohorts. Moreover, third generation post- WWII migrants have also been absent from literature on Polish diaspora, in Australia. In this thesis, I have sought to fill in the knowledge gaps on how different groups within the Polish diaspora construct and maintain diasporic identities, particularly as they were influenced by the specific migration and settlement experiences. 36 2.6 Towards a geography of cultural memory

This chapter has detailed the various theoretical influences of this thesis. The diversity of issues addressed points to the different and complex pathways of identity maintenance. Positioning this thesis within human geography has facilitated a recognition of the diversity of interpretations of Polish identity, through time and across different conceptual settings. Such recognition was in itself a key consequence of the cultural turn in human geography. Another outcome of the cultural turn has been the increasing incorporation of knowledge from transdisciplinary fields into more geographical understandings of identity. In theorising cultural memory for this thesis, I have drawn on literatures from other disciplines, including psychology, sociology, history and anthropology. These literatures have opened up new ways of thinking about how the study of cultural memory can be applied to geographical studies of identity. Most crucial to the study of cultural memory in this thesis has been a consideration of the theoretical implications of Halbwachs ([1926] 1992) ‘social frameworks of memory’. Halbwachs’ ([1926] 1992) assertion that remembering is always influenced by our positionality in the social groups that we are part of, holds particular pertinency for considerations of how cultural memories are (re)produced and transferred in family groups of the Polish diaspora.

An objective of this thesis has been also to contribute to the emerging body of geographic literature that has increasingly aligned the study cultural memory with the construction and maintenance of identity. In this undertaking I have sought to widen the lens through which geographers approach studies of cultural memory by focusing on the maintenance of one kind of identity formation in different locations, and temporal settings. Despite the growing body of literature within geography on articulations of cultural memory, these studies have primarily engaged a post-Socialist perspective, and have remained concerned with material memory markers in public places. Similarly, studies on the Polish diaspora in Australia have largely not included all waves of migration and/or generational cohorts. In the next chapter, I have outlined how I have used an adaptive, qualitative and mixed methodology, to better understand the identity formation within Polish diaspora in Australia and in the public sphere in Poland.

37 i By (re)constructed I mean that Polish migrants were both constructing and reconstructing identities in diaspora. In employing this term I have attempted to move beyond the structuralist assumption that identity (re)constructions following migration are not based (at least partially) on prior constructions of identity. ii For Nora, these sites of memory included: archives, museums, cathedrals, palaces, cemeteries, memorials, commemoration, rituals, commemorative monuments, emblems and symbols. iii In this thesis I have on Winchester et al’s (2003:35) definition of the ‘everyday landscape’ to mean ‘landscapes of everyday life’, which take the form of ‘ordinary landscapes in our daily routines, such as street names, shopping centres’, parks and public squares. iv As a result, post-WWII narratives of Nazism and National Socialism differed significantly between East and West Germany (Koonz, 1994). v In post-war East Germany, it was common that street names were the only remaining pre-war element in the landscape, and as such, Koshar (2000) contended that they acted as sites of communist resistance. vi Legg (2004) explains this process of forgetting using Boym’s (2001) example of Stalin’s attempt to destroy the memory of Tsarist Russia by demolishing the cathedral built by Alexander I in Moscow. Yet, Stalin’s ‘Palace of the Soviets’ was never rebuilt, and after site lay as swimming pool through the Soviet period, the cathedral was eventually rebuilt post-communism. This illustrates a cyclical nature to the process of forgetting as inscribed by each successive regime or government. vii However, he has also contended that due to the changing population these figures are likely to also include Jewish, Ukrainian, Lithuanian and German emigrants (Davies, 2005b). viii Galicia was a large province controlled by Austria during the partitioning of Poland (1795-1918). ix If the earliest Polish migrations to America, occurring in the late 19th Century are taken into consideration, American Polonia has up to eight generations.

38 Chapter 3 – Methodology

3.1 Introduction

This chapter discusses the methodological considerations and tools employed in this thesis in five sections. First, I outline the continuum of my experiences of Polishness including an exploration of my positionality vis-à-vis the thesis research. Second, I outline the selection of field locations, both in Kraków, Poland and greater metropolitan Sydney, Australia. Third, I discuss the methodological tools used to generate data in both field locations, including in-depth interviews, landscape analysis, study of historical maps and participant observation. Fourth, I focus on the collection of data in the field, which comprise of five sites. Four main study sites in Kraków were chosen to investigate the research aims and complement other historical data collected in Poland; in Sydney, I interviewed the two vintages and three generational groups of Polish Australia diaspora. Finally, I explain how the data was analysed.

A key aim of this thesis has been to analyse the role of cultural memories in the maintenance of Polish identity. In Chapter 2 I outlined that identities are not fixed or static, but fluid, multiple and situational. Furthermore, these identities are performed in numerous ways – cultural memory being just one such expression. Because of the multiplicity of narratives available to discourses of Polish identity and the diverse ways through which they are articulated, the methodologies for this thesis needed to be flexible and encompass a range of methods and data sources (Minichiello et al., 1995). Understanding how identity discourses were inherently flexible became the foundation for how I thought about my own Polish identity.

3.2 My Polishness – a continuum of experiences

Throughout my doctoral candidature, I have come to think of my identity within the Australian Polish diaspora as part of a continuum of Polish experiences, and as a learning and creative process, amongst other things. I am a third generation Australian of Polish descent. All four of my grandparents arrived separately in Australia in the 1950s after

39 WWII. Three of my four grandparents arrived with their immediate and extended families, while the fourth arrived singly. My parents grew up in Polish speaking households and family networks, and were part of local Polish cultural community groups. They participated in Polish dancing associations, Polish Saturday school, Polish scouts and generally socialised with other children of post-WWII Polish migrants. It is not surprising that in my parents’ generation only one member, my uncle, married a non-Pole. Despite my large extended Polish family, I was not taught to speak Polish as a child. My grandparents now remind me frequently that this was because I did not want to learn or listen to them speaking to me in Polish. However, I believe that this was a conscious act by my parents’ to save me (and my brothers and sister) from the Polish cultural submersion that they had experienced as children. They also saw little use for the Polish language where we lived on the Central Coast of New South Wales (NSW), at that time a predominately ‘white’ Anglo-Celtic region away from established Polish communities in cities such as Sydney, and Newcastle. ‘Ethnic diversity’ at my primary school consisted of one boy of Chinese heritage, one Vietnamese girl, four Italian families and us. Thus, my childhood exposure to Polish culture was mostly through visits to grandparents and relatives living away from the Central Coast, and with special traditions associated with Christmas and Easter. However, these visits and a relatively strict adherence to the Christmas and Easter traditions waned as my siblings and I grew older. Over time, my family adapted traditional winter-styled Polish cuisine to suit very hot Australian Christmas Days. Our identities were somewhat hybridised to fit into our varied socio- cultural context. As the next generation, we introduced non-Polish people to the family and took on part-time jobs and different social lives to our parents and grandparents.

England (1994: 82) has posited ‘research is a process not just a product’, and part of this process involves ‘reflecting on and learning from past experiences’. The research narrative in this thesis charts one recent part of this process, which includes my own evolving ways of thinking about my identity, as well as my researcher role in both field locations, in Australia and in Poland. The research process has certainly involved learning from past experiences, particularly as I reread the methods chapter of my Honours Thesis, which also involved research with Polish migrants. At that stage, in 2002, I had only a

40 rudimentary knowledge of the Polish language and I deeply lamented this limitation. At the time I imagined that if I had better language skills (and a wider knowledge of the Polish history more generally) the research process would be significantly different. I had thought it would be easier to communicate and that I would be able to negotiate particular insider/outsider boundaries with less difficulty. So after three years of Polish language schools, including a six month fieldwork period in Poland, I was somewhat surprised that my vastly improved language skills did not ease the process considerably.

3.2.1 Learning Polish

For the purposes of research for this thesis, I endeavoured to learn the Polish language. I started at the beginning of my candidature in 2004 with a correspondence course at Macquarie University (News South Wales, Australia) and followed with a one-semester exchange in early 2005 at Jagiellonian University, in Kraków, Poland. During this period I also conducted fieldwork in Kraków (as detailed later in this chapter, Section 3.5.1). While in Poland, my conversational language skills developed and I attempted to maintain this proficiency back in Australia in 2006 by attending a Polish Saturday school (for adults). However, while I retained a conversational ability in Polish, my language capacity is far from ideal for academic research. Learning a new language as an adult presented a significant and sometimes frustrating challenge – my ability to understand conversations but contribute only partially to the content has been one such frustration. Nonetheless, as Watson (2004: 62) has contended,

Knowledge of a language – particularly of the metaphors that embody some of these multiple meanings and understandings – will not therefore provide access to a particular ‘out there’ reality, but it may be a first stage towards unpacking some of these differences, meanings and experiences.

By continuing to learn Polish I traversed the boundaries of ‘insider’ Polishness and occupied a ‘between’ space, a middling area flanked by my new knowledge and the superior language capabilities of most research participants (cf. England, 1994). Twyman

41 et al. (1999) have noted that research involving language translation and interpretation is susceptible to difficulties with representation and uneven power differentials between researcher and researched. In recognition of this, I attempted to mediate potential power differentials – particularly those that tipped my way in the Australian English speaking context – through learning Polish and through gaining a more detailed understanding of Polish cultural history. Consequently, I very rarely needed to interrupt the flow of the interviews to ask for translations from Polish to English, particularly when participants referred to place names and traditional customs. While all but three interviews were conducted primarily in English, my capability to follow the level of conversation when participants moved between English and Polish meant that the interview process was not hampered. Paradoxically, while I felt that I had overcome the language barriers that I had encountered in previous research, I quickly realised that I had exposed another unchartered challenge and part of the research journey – the reality of my experiences as a third generation Australian Pole.

3.2.2 Reflexivity: listening to stories and positioning my Polishness

A pivotal point in the continuum of my Polish experiences occurred during my Honours research in 2002 when I drew on understandings of my situated knowledge of Polishness. My interest in migrant experiences and the necessary negotiation(s) with ethno-cultural identities that Polish migrants face(d) in multicultural Australian society grew from this earlier research. Influencing my position in this instance were my own family’s experiences during WWII, and of migrant camps in rural Australia where they again endured familial dislocation, difficulties in learning English, and problems ‘fitting in’. I then met other Polish relatives for the first time, who I knew little about on a long visit to Poland, in 2003. This experience furthered my interest in the experiences of my grandparents, the events that prompted their migration, and my own cultural heritage.

It was my grandmothers who mostly talked about their lives during WWII and after migration to Australia. Their childhood reflections in wartime Poland were informed by 50 years of adult knowledge and were told to me and with an often implicit, sometimes explicit, narrative of mistrust of ‘Germans’ and ‘Russians’. Tonkin (1992) has reminded

42 us that oral representations of the past not only involve assessing the social context of the narrator, but also that of the audience and the potential for influencing the content and direction of the story. This is where I feel that my positionality became ‘tricky’ and I could identify with Gibson-Graham’s (1994: 219) declaration: ‘I am a unique ensemble of contradictory and shifting subjectivities’. The multitude of feminist authors quoted by Rose (1997) also tell us that our positionality within research is not straightforward. Because the stories I heard involved my family members, I feel an authority over their content through an implicit closeness to their narratives, and to those of Polish involvement in WWII more generally. They form part of what I know ‘without conscious awareness of that knowledge’ (Birdsall, 1996: 620). Despite this proximity, another facet of my positionality – being a middle class ‘white’ Australian researcher – endowed certain privileges. Thus, I knew to question the reliability of these accounts and their social construction. In this arena, Andrews et al. (2006) have detailed the methodological implications of researching oral histories with older generations. They argue that ‘narrator reliability’, selectivity, forgetting and shifting interpretations can all influence how people construct narratives (Andrews et al., 2006: 156). Indeed, while discussing my family’s migration with my mother, I discovered that I had heard two differing accounts of the family’s journey across Poland to a German labour camp.

Baxter and Eyles (1997: 513) have contended that while participants may (re)produce only partial narratives of their experiences, these stories must be interpreted as ‘multiple and flexible’. Thus, the reliability (or not) of these narratives is only part of the picture because these stories are one fragment of a personal history. In my case a range of narratives of experiences foreground the knowledge I bring to the research process. McCormack (2004:220) has contended that reconstructions of fragmented personal narratives occur in stages during the research process: by the participant when they are telling a story, by the researcher when they (re)construct a transcript and by the reader ‘who reads and reacts to the experience’. Thus, a key to this part of my positionality was to realise that my situated knowledge – my Polish heritage and grandparents’ stories – were not a means to an end, or an all-encompassing Polish narrative. Nor would this

43 research leave me in a ‘possession of perfect self-knowledge’ of Polishness (Rose, 1997; Sidaway, 2000: 261).

Rose (1997: 306) has also acknowledged the use of reflexivity ‘as a strategy for situating knowledges’. She has also drawn attention to the ‘anxieties and ambivalences’ associated with being reflexive (Rose, 1997: 306). In this thesis, I sought, as a third-generation Australian Pole, to reflect further on my grandparents’ stories. Although those stories have given me insider knowledge, I have felt somewhat removed and dislocated (both experientially and longitudinally) from the events that prompted my grandparents’ migration. My experiences of dislocation occurred during my trips to Poland in 2003 and 2005. In Poland, I was a foreigner, and felt disempowered by language difficulties, not to mention generational distance. Nevertheless, I still felt a level of understanding while visiting WWII related memorials, monuments and museums. Memorialisation in the everyday Polish landscape prompted me to consider how commemoration performs the function of maintaining and informing cultural memories and national identities in the public forum. Upon returning to Australia, I began to consider another aspect of cultural memories related to Polishness, this time in diaspora, where I clearly belonged. I began to think more about the memories passed down in private, through generations of migrant families, and how these memories have informed Polish identity. My different encounters with Polishness, in Poland and in Australia, in public and in private, prompted me to consider workable field locations that would draw attention to the various interpretations of cultural memory, their (re)production and their transmission in distinctly different settings.

3.3 Selecting field locations

This thesis assesses the dissemination strategies and methods used by those who identify as Polish in two spatial locations and research settings – within the private sphere of families in the Polish Australian diaspora, and in the public sphere in Kraków. I researched ‘in a variety of contexts, situations and settings’ (Brannen, 1992: 12), and used quantitative and qualitative methodologies with the aim of generating multiple data sets. This approach sought to draw on the histories, and cultural and social process occurring in

44 both field locations. Thus, while both locations were in themselves significant to the research, they do not operate as sites of memory (re)production and transmission in isolation. They cannot be divorced from their historical and geographical contexts.

Prior to the commencement of fieldwork the necessary ethics approval was sought. I obtained ethical clearance from the Faculty of the Built Environment, University of New South Walesi. The conditions of this approval stipulated that potential participants needed to formally consent to the interview, be informed of their rights to anonymity, be offered a copy of the completed transcript and have the right to withdraw consent at any stage of the research process. The original recordings and transcripts of the interviews will be kept for a minimum of 7 years in a secure location. The ethics approval also specified that photographs taken in public spaces should not identify persons without their signed consent.

In Australia, I carried out in-depth interviews with different migrant vintages and generations from the Polish diaspora, focusing on the (re)production and transmission of cultural memories in the private realms of the home. One interview was held on the Central Coast, one in Newcastle, and the remaining 59 took place in Sydney. To understand the public portrayal of cultural memory in the Polish landscape, I conducted a six-month period of fieldwork in Kraków, Poland, from February to July, 2005. In the next Section 3.4, I explore the methods used to gather data at the study sites and briefly introduce the study sites in Section 3.4. However, in Section 3.5 I detail the rationale for selection of the case study sites and data generated at these locations.

3.4 Data Methods

While I focused on the maintenance of Polish memory through the (re)production and transmission of Polish cultural memories, the methods employed varied depending on the field location and type of research analysis. In Poland, data methods focused on discursive readings of the contemporary memory landscape, the collection of historical data sources and maps, participant observation and interviewing. In Australia, the main methodology employed was semi-structured interviews. I also used other data methods:

45 participant observation, language school attendance and other secondary data sources. In some instances, I used the same methods in both field settings – interviewing methods and participant observation – yet the different nature of the field locations meant that the process of applying these methods needed to be context specific. As England (1994: 81) has contended, the field is ‘constantly changing’ and thus flexible methodologies are necessary to contend with unreliability and unpredictability.

3.4.1 Capturing memorialisation in the landscape

Kraków was the chosen study location because unlike many other Polish cities its built environment emerged relatively unscathed after WWII. The city’s memorial landscape and monuments, including the medieval market place and the King’s castle Wawel, remained largely intact. I therefore enrolled in a Polish Language and Culture Course at Jagiellonian University in Kraków. To explore memorialisation in the vernacular landscapeii, three study sites were chosen after consideration of the three main areas of enquiry of this thesis: Polish language maintenance, macabre histories and changing hegemonies of power (Table 3.1). Furthermore, these sites were chosen on the basis that their monuments would potentially render details about the different influences on the (re)production and transmission of Polish cultural memories.

At the study sites listed in Table 3.1, I sought to deconstruct the historical and cultural narratives of the monuments utilising a post-structuralist framework. My time in the field was informed by cultural geography literature on the multiple interpretations and methods of reading the landscape (Crang, 1998). The Kraków memory landscape had not experienced mass destruction of cultural artefacts during WWII so I viewed the landscape as a potential palimpsest ‘where earlier inscriptions were never fully erased’ (Hayden, 1995: 227-228; Schama, 1995). These study sites provided intact inscriptions of memories in the landscape. These inscriptions could potentially be read to uncover the collective memories of ‘ordinary citizens’ (cf. Geertz, 1973). Yet, to understand the processes of re-inscription occurring through the monuments at the study sites, I needed to understand more about the objects as depicted as well as building a thorough historical analysis of each place. I took photographs, gathered maps, and conducted interviews with

46 Polish memory institutes. I also engaged in participant observation at the study sites by observing how contemporary audiences used these places. In combination, these data methods enabled me to (re)construct the multiple layers of narratives set down, over time that are part of Kraków’s memory landscape (Rose, 2000, 2001; Schwartz, 1996).

Table 3.1 Location and description of monuments studied in Kraków

Study Site Location Monuments in research sites commemorating specific people, places and events Planty – the green belt surrounding Colonel Narcyz Wiatr Kraków’s Old Town. Micha Baucki Florian Straszewski Monument to the victims of communist provocations Bohdan Zaleski Jadwiga and Jagieo Lilla Weneda (Juliusz Sowacki) Artur Grottger Mikoaj Kopernik Grayna (Adam Mickiewicz) Tadeusz Boy-eleski Paszów – former concentration camp in Soviet-era monument to the martyrs of Hitler’s genocide. the suburb of Podgórze. Monument to the Jewish victims of Paszów. Monument to the Hungarian Jewish victims of Paszów. Monument to the Polish victims of Paszów. Katy Cross – at the intersection of Katy Cross and name plaque. ul.Grodzka and ul. w. Idziego, near the Wawel castle.

3.4.2 Visual methodologies: photographic images and historical maps

The use of visual methodologies in this thesis was integral to establishing a palimpsest of Polish cultural memory. The use of visuality as a geographical method, particularly the use of archival and historical photographs, has received considerable attention in recent academic debates (Driver, 2003; Rose, 2003). Indeed, geography has been historically and variously advocated as a ‘visual discipline’ (Rose, 2003: 213). In this thesis, two specific visual methods were employed: examination of photographs of the monuments in the three study sites, and the use of historical maps of Kraków. All the photographs in this thesis were taken on location in the field in 2005. In employing this methodology, I was aware that the ‘visualities deployed by the production of geographical thought are never neutral’ (Mitchell, 2005). The photographs are therefore subjective representations of the

47 monuments, and the subsequent analyses are my interpretations of these articulations of memory.

Memorialisation is influenced by the social relations that operate within and on the vernacular landscape, including the mandates of hegemonic power (Mitchell, 2005; Rose, 2003). The contemporary memory landscape is both the outcome of and medium for an ongoing set of processes that (re)negotiate and changes the cultural meanings of those places – the landscape works, performs and has effects (Augustins, 2004; Hayden, 1995; Koshar, 2000; Light et al., 2002). In my endeavour to unpack narratives of cultural memories at these study sites and to understand how cultural memories have been (re)negotiated and altered in the landscape, I obtained five historical maps from the Jagiellonian University Library. After consultation with the librarian responsible for the mapping catalogue at Jagiellonian University Library, the maps were chosen because they documented the changes to street and place names from 1934 to 1996 (Appendix A). Street names are part of a town’s memory landscape and were changed at times of differing power regimes. Such changes are emblematic of specific historical moments in Polish history, and are part of the changing face of Polish identity in the public sphere. Poland has experienced four different regimes of power (including monarchist, democratic, totalitarian and Socialist) within the last century, and each of these changes was signposted in the contemporary streetscapes. The earliest map is a pre WWII publication from 1934 followed by a German publication printed during occupation in 1943. The third was published during the okres komunizmu in 1964 and the map published in 1985 shows a transition period. Finally, the 1996 publication depicts a (re)badged autonomously governed Polish streetscape. While undertaking research in the three study sites, I actively participated in the everyday locations for the purposes of observation of the social and cultural processes occurring around and within these study sites.

3.4.3 Participant Observation

Participant observation was crucial in understanding how I was positioned as a researcher, both in Poland and in Australia and how my positionality morphed in different settings.

48 For example, at the Polish language schools I attended, I was a beginner, a foreigner, and then became a recently returned third generation Pole. Kearns (2000) has described two main functions of participant observation as providing complementary evidence and facilitating contextual understanding. Participant observation also includes obtaining knowledge that is beyond that framed by answers to specific questions (Bennet, 2000). One of the chief aims of participant observation in this thesis was to draw from time in the field in Poland, and to gain a greater understanding of the everyday contexts of the research. Thus while readings of the landscape and visual methodologies were also data generation methods, as Rose (2001: 37) has contended ‘visual images do not exist in a vacuum…they are produced and interpreted through particular social practices’. While in Poland, I was able to observe the everyday memory landscape and tacitly participate in Polish cultural traditions such as Easter, International Women’s Day, May Day and the feast of Corpus Christi. Understanding and participating in these important events in the Polish calendar became a crucial part of my positionality in the interviews held in Australia. Having experienced these events first hand and having lived in Poland (for several months) helped my insider standing and increased my integrity as an Australian- Polish researcher.

Kearns (2000: 108) has argued that ‘participant observation is concerned with developing understanding through being a part of the spontaneity of everyday interactions’. While I was in Poland Pope John Paul II died on the 2nd April 2005. Born just outside Kraków, and the former Archbishop of the Kraków diocese, the late Pontiff played a pivotal role in Polish narratives of cultural survival and national identity (as discussed in Chapter 2, Section 2.3.3). I witnessed the outpouring of national grief evident on people faces and behaviour, and demarcated in the city by a plethora of memorial markers in the everyday landscape. It was a significant time for Poland and for Poles, and a monumental time to observe identity and cultural memory-making in Poland. Gardner and Lehmann (2002: 17) have argued that taking a positive view of such unexpected events can enable ‘deeper learning’ and further developments in researcher reflexivity. The extraordinary week that followed the Pope’s death prompted me to reflect on the role of religion and the figure of the Pope in Polish cultural memory and identity. The city effectively closed down, with

49 only essential shops remaining open. At my home, my flatmates and I swiftly and respectfully modified our behaviour – we did not play music or hold social events – as advised by grieving neighbours. During the mourning period, Polish and Vatican flags hung from most apartment and shop windows. Hundreds of offertory candles illuminated the three main monuments dedicated to the Pope in Kraków. Approximately one million mourners attended the funeral mass in the Boiii. It was the first time in many years that I had attended Mass in Polish, and as I looked around the candlelit field, I could not help but be overwhelmed by the evident significance and importance of the Polish Pope to Polish people. The remains of candles and flowers provided lasting reminders of the Mass and the subsequent procession from the Bo to the Pontiff’s former apartment on the boundary of the Old Town. In addition to my experience as a ‘researcher-participant’, I catalogued this event with a photographic diary and collected newspaper articles relating to the Pope’s death from the main daily newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza.

3.4.4 Interviewing

While in Poland, and also in Australia I conducted semi-structured and in-depth interviews. ‘In-depth’ interviews are those that are ‘directed towards understanding informants’ perspectives on their lives, experiences, or situations as expressed in their own words’ (Minichiello et al., 1990: 18). Therefore, I employed semi-structured interviews to allow participants to articulate their responses without a strict interview schedule. Semi- structured interviewing afforded participants the opportunity to add information where they deemed necessary. Therefore, the process of narration of cultural memories was just as important as the content of the responses (Pulvirenti, 1997).

3.4.4.1 Interviewing in Poland: Public Memory Institutes

In Poland, I conducted semi-structured interviews with representatives of two of the three public memory institutes with the particular purpose of ascertaining how Polish cultural memories are (re)negotiated using the public as a forum for interactive discussion. The first of these institutes was Instytut Pamici Narodowej (the Institute of National Remembrance, the IPN). Established in 1999, the IPN has three main departments: a

50 Departmental Commission for the Prosecution of Crimes against the Polish nation, a public archive largely containing documents held by secret service police during the okres komunizmu, and a public education office. I interviewed the secretary to the President of the IPN. The interview was held both in Polish and English with a translator present.

I also interviewed a founding member of the Midzynarodwa Rada Owicimska (the International Auschwitz Council, the IAC). The council consists of Jewish and non- Jewish, Poles and non-Poles, and acts as an advisory board to the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum, which is responsible for decisions pertaining to commemoration at Auschwitz. The Council provides discussion on the commemoration of WWII at Auschwitz and contributes to popular discourses through the electronic and print media.

There is one other public memory institute, Rada Ochrony Pamici Walk i Mczestwa (Committee for Safeguarding Monuments of Struggle and Martyrdom). The main function of this institute is the establishment and maintenance of memorials, monuments and war cemeteries. Each region in Poland has an office responsible for memorialisation. Despite obtaining confirmation of an interview with the chairperson of this committee, I was unable to schedule the interview because of unresolvable difficulties with the bureaucratic process. Instead I sourced information from the quarterly academic journal; Przeszo i Pamic (The Past and Remembering) produced by the committee, and from their website address. In conducting the two interviews but failing to secure the third, I was very aware of my positional as a foreign researcher and an outsider.

3.4.4.2 Interviewing in Australia: narrating experiences and memories

On returning ‘home’ to Australia, interviewing became the main methodology employed. These interviews were in-depth and semi-structured and partially utilised a snowballing method to recruit participants from different migrant vintages and generational cohorts of the Australian Polish diaspora (as discussed in this chapter, Section 3.5.2.2.). The interviewing method was employed to elicit responses about the participants’ life experiences and memories, and those of their parents and/or grandparents where relevant. As such, in these interviews the process of narration often reflected the process of

51 storytelling. McCormack (2004: 223) found that through the process of story telling participants would add and expand on information and often provide ‘more than description’ to the narrative. In many cases, such stories revealed valuable details and data as well as building rapport during the interview process.

3.5 Data generation in the two field settings

The data generated for this thesis in the two field settings utilised a range of data methods, or mixed-methods format (as detailed in Chapter 3, Section 3.4) to uncover the process of (re)production and transmission of cultural memories in two distinct realms. The data generation focused on the gathering of knowledge about the construction and contextualisation of cultural memories at these sites, and not on the study sites themselves. Because the two field settings were chosen to represent distinctly different spatial characteristics, the data sources collected in each field setting varied according to the method applied and the relevant context.

3.5.1 In the field in Kraków, Poland

The first stage of data generation in Poland involved my participation at a Polish language school to improve my Polish language skills and familiarise myself with common cultural customs and traditions (that I had not practiced in Australia). I attended the Institute of Ethnic Studies and Diaspora, and completed a Polish Language and Culture Course, at Jagiellonian University in Kraków. The language course was a crucial part of my fieldwork experience not only because it enabled me to improve my spoken Polish, but also because it exposed a new layer of researcher positionality of which I had hitherto been unaware. In my class, I became the positioned subject – a foreign language student – seeking, like many others of Polish descent in my class, to rediscover parts of their cultural heritage. The language classes therefore constituted a starting point for participant observation and of a process of cultural immersion, which Crang (1998) has argued involves understanding how people relate to the world around them. These processes of immersion and participant observation entailed the strict enforcement of speaking only Polish in the classroom, attending cultural festivities as well as attempting

52 to gain an understanding of the aspirations of other classmates from different international groups of the Polish diaspora.

Robertson (1983) has also contended that researchers should endeavour to have a comprehensive understanding of the culture they are researching. While Miles and Crush (1993) have suggested that a one year period of cultural immersion is feasible within the time constraints of a doctoral thesis, they have also advocated that researchers allow adequate preparatory time in the field before commencing cross-cultural research methodologies. By attending the language school, I was able to engage more readily with the language customs appropriate to the study of Polish cultural landscapes. I learnt, in detail, about cultural customs, particularly the traditional celebrations of Christmas and Easter, but also of important religious holidays that I have not celebrated in Australia. Additionally, it would be remiss of me not to acknowledge the credibility I was afforded by attending the language school – my status as a student of Polish language at a well regarded university was an ice-breaker both with potential informants and in everyday situations (Gardner and Lehmann, 2002). As Watson (2004: 61) asserted, ‘there is a close relationship between language and experience’. The experience of being a foreign language student gave me a greater understanding of everyday living and the use of the Polish language in context, and it provided an ideal pretext from which to begin research at the three study sites.

3.5.1.1 Planty

The first study site, the Planty, is a green belt and highly traversed pedestrian thoroughfare that forms a boundary around Kraków’s Stare Miasto (Old Town) (see Figure 3.1 and 3.2). The Planty was originally the former moat around the fortified medieval city, and today the remaining fortifications form the inner boundary of the Planty, while the city’s major ring roads comprise the outer boundary. With the destruction of the fortifications in the early 1800s, the Planty was designated as parkland. The park’s original designer, Feliks Radwanski, oversaw the planting of trees forming a ring around the Old Town.

53 The Planty’s suitability as a study site lies partially in its location. It is a meeting place, a general thoroughfare, a place for exercise and for relaxation, and an innate part of the everyday landscape of the city. There are eleven monuments in the Planty (as listed in Table 3.2). The majority of the monuments portray cultural, literary and artistic figures from the Romantic Era. Only two monuments overtly memorialise political conflict – the monument to Colonel Narcyz Wiatr and the monument to the victims of a workers strike in Kraków. These are also the two newest monuments, built just after the okres komunizmu. I used a combination of visual methodologies in the Planty: a photographic diary for each monumentiv (Appendix B) and archival documents to contextualise and contemporise these monuments within the thesis. Historical and conservation documents obtained from Kraków City Council, detailing the historiography of the monuments supplemented my photographic evidence.

3.5.1.2 Katy Cross

The Katy Cross is located at the foot of the Kings Castle, Wawel, at the intersection of ul. Grodzka and ul. w. Idiziego, (circled monument on Figure 3.2). The Cross is a memorial to the 25 000 Polish service personnel massacred in the Katy Forest by Soviet forces in 1940. I chose this monument to illustrate two key points. First, Grodzka Street is part of the popular tourist route called the Royal Way but also an everyday route, which leads down from the medieval market square (Rynek Gowny) to Wawel. Despite the considerable pedestrian and tourist traffic passing by the cross, there is little information or explanation provided at the monument for the non-Polish passer-by. Second, the monument was not built until 1990 when the Soviet influence in Polish commemorative politics ended. At this site, I employed similar methods to those used in the Planty. A combination of visual and archival sources were utilised to contextualise the cultural memories articulated in this monument. I coupled this information with documentation of other Katy monuments and data collected at the Katy Memorial Museum in Warsaw.

54 Figure 3.1 Aerial view of Planty, Kraków, Poland, the green belt that encircles the Old Town Source: (Gorgolewski, date unknown)

55

Figure 3.2 Map of Planty, Kraków, Poland (note the monuments marked around the Planty and the circled location at the bottom centre of the map of the Katy Cross) Source: (Wdrychowska and Majerczak, 2005)

56 Table 3.2 Monuments in the Planty

Year Monument Explanation of characters depicted in the monuments Constructed Colonel Narcyz Wiatr Monument to Colonel Narcyz Wiatr who was killed by the 1992 Communist Ministry of Public Security (Urzd Bezpieczestwa Publicznego) on 21 April, 1944 Micha Baucki Poet, journalist and comic playwright of the Romantic Era 1911 Florian Straszewski Designer of Planty parklands and member of Kraków City 1874 Council Monument to the victims Monument to the ten victims killed as a result of police 1989 of a workers’ strike action to break a strike at the Semperit factory, Kraków, on 18 March 1936 Bohdan Zaleski Poet of the Romantic Era 1886 Jadwiga and Jagieo Queen and King of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth 1874 Lilla Weneda Character and title of Romantic Era poem by Juliusz 1885 Sowacki (1840) Artur Grottger Polish painter and draftsman of the Romantic Era 1901 Mikoaj Kopernik Polish astronomer and scientist 1901 Grayna Character and title of Romantic Era poem by Adam 1886 Mickiewicz (1823) Tadeusz Boy-eleski Writer, satirical poet and literary and theatre critic 1985

3.5.1.3 Paszów

The final Polish study site was Paszów, the former concentration camp constructed on the site of an old quarry site in the suburb of Podgórze, 10 kilometres the centre of Kraków. The camp’s establishment in 1944 coincided with the liquidation of the Kraków Ghetto. Unlike other former concentration camp sites, Paszów has remained largely untouched and more like an untended green space despite the wider infamy that the American film Schindler’s List, directed by S. Spielberg and based on T. Keneally’s novel, helped to generate. Kraków’s urban outskirts are slowly encroaching on the site. There are several monuments at the site, the largest of which is a Soviet-Era monument. The Paszów site is a stop on the Jewish Memorial Pilgrimage of Kraków, and contains two Jewish monuments. One commemorates Jewish victims of the camp, and the other Hungarian Jews transported to the camp.

While the three study sites were places where data was generated on the (re)production and transmission of Polish cultural memories, the interviews held with the public memory institutes sought to ascertain how cultural memories were part of public discourse. The

57 data generated in the field in Poland focused on how exploring cultural memories were (re)produced and transmitted in public spheres. Upon my arrival back in Australia, I shifted this focus to investigating how cultural memories were maintained in private settings.

3.5.2 In the field in Sydney, Australia

Interviewing was the chief qualitative methodology used during Australian fieldwork. Researching the role of cultural memory among the Polish diaspora in Australia required generating data that would both complement the study of public memory in Kraków, while also drawing attention to the different processes and outcomes of memory (re)production and transmission in private realms. The adoption of a ‘critical-realist’ approach as part of the mixed method format provided a common focus between fieldwork locations – an approach ‘recognising that underlying structures are complex and may be different from the observable events and discourses to which they give rise’ (Winchester, 1996: 119). As such, by combining in-depth interviews and surveys in Australia with the visual methodologies and participant observation from Poland, I sought to move towards an interpretative approach (Pile, 1991). I also applied this interpretative approach in selecting research participants from the Polish diaspora in Sydney, choosing to interview within and between the different migrant vintages and generational groups, while appreciating their diverse backgrounds. The key contextual factors were the influence of migrant experiences and the generational positioning on constructions of Polish identity in diaspora.

3.5.2.1 A snapshot of Polish diaspora in Australia

There have been two distinct waves of Polish migration to Australia: those arriving after WWII and those after okres komunizmu. Polish migration to Australia prior to WWII was vastly different in character from these two waves and was primarily characterised by individual and Jewish migration, with a large percentage of Polish immigrants being either soldiers, freedom fighters and political exiles (for detailed accounts of Polish migration to

58 Australia from 1803 to WWII see: Jamrozik, 1983: 2-27; Jupp, 2001: 621-627; Kaluski, 1985: 12-26; Paszkowski, 2001; Sussex and Zubrzycki, 1985: 1-9).

3.5.2.1.1 Post WWII Migration

There were three main categories of Polish post-WWII migrants: ex-service personnel, Displaced Persons (DPs), and those arriving under the Landed Permit Scheme (who were unassisted by the government but sponsored by individual Australian Polish migrants). The first to arrive were Polish ex-service personnel. This groups included both veterans of the siege of Tobruk, the highly regarded Polish pilots who fought in the Battle of Britain, and others (Kaluski, 1985). In total, 1457 Polish ex-service personnel migrated to Australia between September 1947 and August 1948 (Ozdowski and Lencznarowicz, 2001). The costs of their migration were borne by the Australian Commonwealth government as part of an agreement with the British government (Kaluski, 1985). This arrangement differed from the mandatory two-year work contract established to reimburse the cost of passage for DP migration. It also enabled the ex-servicepersons’ families a greater freedom to choose prospective employment and settlement location.

The largest cohort of Polish post-WWII migration was the DPs. A major characteristic of this cohort was that they had experienced both long periods of foreign occupation as well as forced displacement. These conditions were identified by Kunz (1988: 78):

being the first displaced victims of the war, of all the refugees the Poles suffered the longest. Some eight million Poles were killed or displaced in the many population movements which arose from Poland’s defeat.

Polish DPs migrated to Australia from a range of locations after WWII including Europe, British East Africa and India. Yet, the majority of Poles had been deported, both forcibly and voluntarily, to Germany as forced agricultural and industrial labour. Another major source of Polish DPs was the survivors of the Soviet deportations. An estimated one and a half million Poles – civilians and military officers – were taken to the Soviet Union between 1939 and 1940 (Allbrook and Cattalini, 1995). Overall, approximately 65 000

59 people of Polish originv arrived in Australia between 1947 and 1951, forming one third of all refugees resettled in Australia as part of the International Refugee Organisation’s Displaced Persons Scheme (Kunz, 1988; Ozdowski and Lencznarowicz, 2001).

Other sources of Polish migrants after WWII included: approximately 1000 Poles from refugee camps in India and British East Africa, Poles of Jewish origin, Poles unable to return to Soviet-controlled postwar Poland, Polish military prisoners, Polish children kidnapped as part of the Nazi Lebensborn organisation, and survivors of Nazi concentration camps (Kaluski, 1985; Kunz, 1988; Ozdowski and Lencznarowicz, 2001). Unlike DPs from other nationalities, the majority of Poles were poorly educated and unskilled, with only 4 per cent from professional backgrounds (Kunz, 1988; Ozdowski and Lencznarowicz, 2001). One reason for the paucity of DPs with higher educational qualifications was the ‘systematic elimination of Polish intelligentsia by both the Germans and the Russians’ (Kunz, 1988: 81).

In addition, many Poles migrated after the death of Stalin (at the end of the Stalinist Era) in 1956. Changes in Poland’s borders after WWII, and the likely persecution that some Poles faced if they returned to Poland, resulted in the separation of many thousands of surviving Polish families. For example, over two million Poles remained in the Soviet Union in 1956 for a combination of reasons relating to fear of persecution but also because of strict emigration and family reunion policies enforced during the Stalinist era (Kaluski, 1985). During the decade 1957-66, 14 890 Poles migrated to Australia, primarily from Poland (Kaluski, 1985). While family reunions formed the basis of much of this migration, many women migrated to prospective husbands in Australia. Numerous marriages had been prearranged because of the dearth of Polish born women arriving in Australia as part of the DP cohort.

3.5.2.1.2 Solidarity Migration

The second largest wave of Polish migration to Australia occurred because of the deterioration of economic and political stability in Poland during the late 1970s and early 1980s (as detailed in Chapter 4, Section 4.5).

60

This cohort is commonly named the ‘Solidarity’vi wave after the birth of the Solidarno trade union movement in 1980. The Polish government retained strict control on the issuing of passports to whole family units during the tumultuous period until the declaration of Martial Law on 13 December 1981 (Jamrozik, 2001). Nonetheless, many families groups and individuals did manage to leave Poland prior to Martial Law, on temporary, tourist or working holiday visas, to countries in Western Europe and most commonly to Austria. These migrants remained in hostels and workers accommodation until the processing of onward visas to countries such as Australia, America and Canada. The granting of visas to Australia was hastened by the declaration of Martial Law and the subsequent decision by the Australian Government in 1980 to recognise some prospective Polish migrants as refugees (Jamrozik, 1983). Between 1981 and 1991, 25 340 Poland- born persons migrated to Australia (Drozd, 2001) (Figure 3.3).

6000

5000 n

4000

3000

2000 Arrivals of Poland-born perso Arrivals of Poland-born 1000

0 1980/81 1981/82 1982/83 1983/84 1984/85 1985/86 1986/87 1987/88 1988/89 1989/90 1990/91 1991/92 1992/93 1993/94 1994/95 Year of arrival Males Females

Figure 3.3 Poland-born arrivals to Australia 1980 to 1995 Source: Adapted from Drozd (2001)

61 Solidarity migrants are characterised by two distinct groups: those arriving as refugees as part of the Special Humanitarian Program on assisted passage from Poland, and those attaining immigration visas on an economic basis. Between July 1980 and June 1983, 12 764 Poland-born persons arrived in Australia, three quarters of whom were admitted with refugee status (Jamrozik, 1983). The greatest number of the post-okres komunizmu migrants arrived in Australia after the declaration of Martial Law in 1981. Over the Martial Law period (December 1981 to July 1983) the proportion of post-okres komunizmu migrants who were refugees declined from 90.6 percent in 1980-81 to 47.1 percent of arrivals in 1982-83 (Jamrozik, 1983). Over a similar period the proportion of children emigrating as part of family groups increased, reflecting the changing Government policy favouring family over individual migration (Jamrozik, 1983). After the end of Martial Law, Polish migration remained consistent throughout the remainder of the 1980s, decreasing after between 1992 and 1993.

3.5.2.1.3 Contemporary snapshot of the Australian Polish diaspora

In 2006, there were 52 256 Poland-born persons living in Australia (ABS, 2006). The Polish population has fluctuated over the last eighty years (as shown in Figure 3.4), reflecting the two main waves of migration as well as deaths, mostly of the elderly post- WWII cohort. Notably, the number of Poland-born persons significantly decreased between 1991 and 2006. The age structure of the Poland-born persons in 2006 also clearly illustrates the two waves of migration (Figure 3.5). The oldest age grouping (75 to 84 years of age) reflects the post-WWII migration, whereas the 25 to 44 age grouping is indicative mostly of the post-okres komunizmu migrants, but also includes their elder children.

62 80,000

70,000

60,000

50,000

40,000

30,000

20,000

10,000

0 1921 1926 1931 1936 1941 1946 1951 1956 1961 1966 1971 1976 1981 1986 1991 1996 2001 2006

Poland Born Figure 3.4 Poland-born migration to Australia, 1921-20 Source: (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2006)

Males Females

85+

75-84

65-74

55-64

45-54 Age 25-44

15-24

5-14

0-4

8,000 6,000 4,000 2,000 0 2,000 4,000 6,000 8,000

Figure 3.5 Age and Sex Distribution of Poland Born Population, 2006 Source: (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2006) Note: There was no division of 25-44 age grouping available from the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

63 3.5.2.2 Participant recruitment

The research population was the Australian Polish diaspora, which comprises of two distinct waves of migration (Figure 3.5). In the research sample for this fieldwork component, I focused on how cultural memories were (re)produced, transmitted and maintained among Polish migrants from these two waves of migration, but also among the second and third generations of the post-WWII cohort, and among the second generation of the post-okres komunizmu migrants. My Sydney-based research in 2002 (Honours thesis) with Poland-born persons and people with Polish ancestry meant that I already possessed a list of potential contacts. While the interview schedule was considerably different, I was wary of interviewing the same people again. In the end, only three people participated in both projects, all of whom were particularly keen to participate.

The aim of the interviews was to ascertain both the content of cultural memories and the processes of their transmission. Most crucially, I sought to uncover how the cultural memories transmitted to the generational cohorts of the Polish diaspora informed their constructions of Polish identity. This objective required a focus on five different generational groups’ representative of the spectrum of age cohorts. The five generational groups are shown in Table 3.3. Participants were required to be 18 years or older at the time of the interviewvii.

Table 3.3 Five generational groups of interview participants

1. The post-WWII migrantsviii (ex-service persons, displaced persons, and migrants on the landed permits scheme) who arrived in the 1950s and early 1960s.

2. The second generation Australian born children of post-WWII migrants.

3. The third generation Australian born grandchildren of post-WWII migrants.

4. The post-okres komunizmu migrants who arrived mostly in the 1980s (though a small minority arrived late 1970s and early 1990s).

5. The second generation children of the post-okres komunizmu migrants who arrived in Australia under 12 years of age.

64 Following Baxter and Eyles’ (1997) suggestion of ‘purposeful sampling’, 15 participants per generational group were sought. Thus, the sample size was determined by the need to involve as many ‘information rich cases’ and experiential narratives to develop conceptual themes (Baxter and Eyles, 1997: 513). In two generational cohorts (post-WWII migrants and second generation children of the post-okres komunizmu migrants), a ‘saturation point’ was reached at 14 interviews – ‘when no additional data [could] be found that would add to the categories being developed and examined’ (Minichello, 1990: 199). In these two groups no ‘new information or insights’ were being uncovered as the number of interviews undertaken approached the target number (Cameron, 2005). A similar situation was reached with the second generation participants of the post-WWII migrants when 11 interviews of the targeted 15 were completed. The third generation grandchildren of post-WWII migrants proved the most difficult group to recruit, as they were generally less active in Polish community organisations. A final sample of 61 interviews was attained (as detailed in Table 3.4).

Table 3.4 Generational breakdown of interview participants

Group No. Generational Cohort Number of Participants 1 Post-WWII migrants 14 2 Second generation children of post-WWII migrants 11 3 Third generation grandchildren of post-WWII migrants 7 4 Post-okres komunizmu migrants 15 5 Second generation children of post -okres komunizmu migrants 14 Total 61 * Generation cohorts will hereafter be referred to by this ‘Group No.’.

I recruited these participants through community organisations and facilities, personal contacts and snowballing, as described in the following sections.

3.5.2.2.1 Polish Language Schools

In 2006, I was a student at Randwick Polish Language School, which catered for both adults and children with Saturday classes and activities. Having gained permission from the principal of the school, I employed several methods to recruit participants. First, I had classroom teachers distribute an information sheet to all Polish school students. I

65 personally distributed these sheets to the adult classes. On the same day, I addressed a school assembly – at which the children’s parents were present – to explain the information sheet and the nature of the research. This method yielded no responses primarily because the potential participants (the children’s parents) had been encouraged to make the initial contact. Subsequently, I constructed a short questionnaire focusing on migrational experiences (see Appendix C). The main intention of the survey was to familiarise potential participants with the purpose and context of my research and to gain additional information about the migration pathways of the post-okres komunizmu cohort. I distributed the questionnaire with an envelope containing a follow-up information sheet, an interview volunteer form and a replied paid envelope, to all Polish language schoolchildren to give to their parents. This method yielded ten positive responses. In addition, several people opted to return only the questionnaire.

I also approached a lecturer of Polish Language Studies at Macquarie University, where I previously been a student. As a stipulation from the Head of School of European Languages, the Polish lecturer had to act as an intermediary and forward an information package (containing an information letter, interview volunteer form and reply paid envelope) to all students enrolled in Polish language courses (these documents are catalogued in Appendix D).

3.5.2.2.2 Polish Retirement Village and Aged Care Facilities

Located in Marayong in Western Sydney is the largest and oldest Polish complex in New South Wales. The site was purchased in 1954 for the purposes of building a Polish Chapel and orphanage (Drozdzewski, 2002). The site now houses the Polish Chapel to the Lady of Czstochowa, the Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth convent, 30 self-contained retirement villas, The Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth Nursing Home, and Brother Albert’s Hostel (an assisted care facility). Although one set of my grandparents live in the retirement village, my main contact at Marayong was a Sister. The Sister suggested several potential participants with whom I could liaise primarily in English. Because of age of this cohort, in several of these interviews we spoke a combination of English and Polish. Culturally, it was more acceptable that the Sister introduce me, and she also

66 arranged a suitable times for the interviews. On one occasion, the Sister also acted as a translator to an elderly participant who preferred that interview be conducted in Polish.

3.5.2.2.3 Polish Welfare and Information Bureau

The Polish Welfare and Information Bureau is a Polish community organisation established with the aim to assist disadvantaged, aged and frail Polish Australians. I forwarded several copies of the aforementioned information package to the Bureau, who then distributed them to potential participants.

3.5.2.2.4 Snowballing and Other contacts

There were several other sources utilised to attain prospective participants. Two members of separate community groups aided in the recruitment of participants from specific cohorts. For example, in the initial stage of the interviewing process one informant provided numerous other valuable contacts, while not partaking in an interview themselves. Similarly, many participants suggested friends or family members as potential participants. My father-in-law also contacted two Polish families he knew well. In most cases where the snowballing technique was used, I would ask the contact person to make the initial approach to the prospective interviewee, to introduce me and ideally to familiarise the contact with the interview process. Alternatively, I sought permission from the intermediary to mention their name as the source of contact details to the prospective interviewee. In the majority of cases I recruited the potential participants quickly to mitigate against any lag in interest.

I also utilised personal contacts that I had established either through previous research in the Polish community or through my extended family. I employed the snowballing technique in cases where family members knew of prospective participants from specific generational cohorts. Where I already knew the prospective participant, the choice of whether to contact them was made based on the difficulty of filling the relevant generational cohort sample. For example, due to difficulty in recruiting Group 3 participants – because they were not readily associated with Polish organisations or located in one distinct place – I interviewed three third cousins. 67 3.5.2.3 Negotiating ethics and cultural sensitivity in the interview process

Winchester (1996: 117-118) has contented that ethics approval processes can sometimes fail to address ‘the significant ethical issues which arise from both using and interpreting the language of others’, particularly when applied to intensive qualitative research. With a view to maintaining an appropriate level of trust and cultural sensitivity, I drew on my knowledge of the post-WWII generation in attempting to mitigate their suspicion of overly formal processes. To maintain an appropriate level of cultural sensitivity I obtained formal consent to record the interviews in a number of ways. For example, in the elderly post-WWII generation, the majority of participants verbally consented to the interview and where possible this consent was recorded using a digital voice recorder at the beginning of the interview. I also reassured them of their anonymity several times, as a few participants from this generation initially flagged a concern that their personal stories would become the latest gossip of the retirement village. For other generational groups, I cautiously applied cultural judgement and obtained oral permission if necessary. In the majority of cases, however, I obtained written permission by way of the interview volunteer form, or other formal notifications such as a request for a copy of the transcript.

3.5.2.4 The interview process: the interview schedule and themes

The interview schedule followed five main themes – migrational experience, national identity, influence of the historical record, the passing down of culture, and cultural memories (Appendix E). As one of the main purposes of the interview was to encourage the narration of cultural memories, several questions within each theme were designed as probes and directed participants to ‘think back’ and consider past experiences or stories. As such, questions tended to be open-ended, to avoid simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answers. Each section was tailored to suit specific generational groups so that, for example, the third generation participants of the post-WWII cohort were asked to answer questions on their grandparents’ migrational experiences wherever possible. While providing demographic information pertaining to migratory paths and/or histories, the first set of questions around the theme of ‘migrational experience’ was also an important introductory and contextual feature of the interview. These questions allowed the participants to position themselves

68 both within a demographic category and as insider or outsider within the Polish diaspora. Consequentially, participants were not just, for example, second generation children of postwar parents. Many also positioned themselves so that they were detached and uninvolved, indifferent, or modest participators, or conversely highly active in Polish community organisations and the upkeep of their ethno-cultural identity.

3.5.2.5 The interview process: location and duration

Interviews were held in various locations, but in the majority of cases at the participants’ homes. Elwood and Martin (2000: 649-650) have commented on the propensity for the interview site to produce ‘micro-geographies of spatial relations and meaning’ and be the material location for the ‘enactment and constitution of power relations’. They argued that by holding interviews in participants’ homes, researchers could attempt to develop a ‘more reciprocal relationship with participants with the aim of fostering ‘an attitude conducive to sharing personal information’ (Elwood and Martin, 2000: 651). Interviewing at the participant’s home was advantageous in the development of rapport and trust. In many cases, interviews started with an informal ice-breaking chat over coffee and cake. This contributed to a relaxed environment and allowed me time to introduce myself and explain my positionality within the Polish diaspora. It also gave participants a chance to consider my position as the researcher, but also my generational standing, language ability, links to Polish community organisations, historical and cultural knowledge, and whether or not I had been to Poland. All these features of my Polish identity contributed to my position, credibility as a researcher, and perceived trustworthiness and were crucial to the subsequent flow of the interview. In some interview locations I was positioned differently. For example, I interviewed second generation children of the post-okres komunizmu migrants (interview group 5) in an interview room at the University of New South Wales. For these undergraduate students, my position as a postgraduate researcher was intriguing and I fielded many questions about my undergraduate degree and the PhD process. In some cases, however, it was necessary to interview participants in their place of employment or at a neutral space, such as in a café and during a lunch break.

69 The length of the interviews varied from 20 to 90 minutes. The duration generally increased with the age of the participant, with the younger participants (interview groups 3 and 5) completing the interview succinctly. Each interview was recorded with a digital voice recorder (after permission was obtained). At the completion of most sessions, the recorder would be switched off and general conversation usually extended for up to half an hour following the formal interview. During this time, I typically fielded questions about my exchange period in Poland and my grandparents, and where appropriate I also used this time to seek out future participants for the research.

3.5.2.6 The interview process: encountering trauma

Some sections of the interview schedule entailed participants recounting their own, their parents’ or their grandparents’ stories of migration and the events that prompted such relocation. For those first generation participants who arrived after WWII, or after the okres komunizmu, with first hand experience if this process, this questioning had the potential to elicit trauma. Several elderly participants found the process of recounting experiences of WWII very upsetting. In these circumstances, I attempted to redirect questioning so as to mitigate recollection of trauma. However, for many of these participants the narration of their stories was an important process, despite the difficulty in reliving distressing events. As Collins (1998: 3.18) has contended ‘it seems important that accounts are said aloud’. While I exercised extreme caution in pursuing these wartime and migration narratives, they provided indispensable detail about Poland and the migration context. Collins (1998: 3.35) has observed that:

the emotions experienced, whether by the interviewer or interviewee, are as real, as important and as interesting as any other product of the interview…To ignore or discount manifestations of emotion is as unreasonable as ignoring the talk that objectivity demands we record.

Collins (1998) has also commented that the emotions encountered during an interview are not solely those of the interviewee. In the case of particularly harrowing stories, I also needed time to absorb the narratives, to comprehend the participant’s experiences and

70 their ability to narrate such stories, and to recover from the experience of listening to such accounts.

3.6 Data Analysis

In this thesis I used a range of qualitative data methods to uncover and explore the processes of (re)producing and transmitting cultural memories in public and private settings. The use of a mixed method format reflected the diversity between and within research settings – in the four study sites in Kraków and in the different generational groups of the Polish diaspora in Australia. Because these research settings represented different articulations of Polish cultural memory, the use of qualitative sources allowed me to highlight the importance of incorporating an analysis of the context specificity and historical background of each research population into the thesis narrative (Jackson, 1991). This analysis helped to situate the (re)production and transmission of cultural memories and focus on the processual and performative functions of memory discourse. This was better than just focusing on the narrative component of the memory itself.

In the analysis of interview data, I chose not to utilise a computerised qualitative analysis program such as NVivo or N6. This was partially because there were five interview schedules adapted to each interviewed group. Therefore, there were five sets of interview transcripts according to each generational cohort, and my intention for the analysis of these data did not involve searches for specific words or strings of words throughout all the documents. While in some instances there were similarities across these generational groups, it was not my intention to draw comparisons over the entire research sample. Rather, my analysis of interview data sought to unpack constructions of Polish identity with reference to the differing contexts of each group. As such, themed questions were adapted to suit each generational cohort, but similar questions understandably elicited different responses due to the difference between and within migrant and generational cohorts. The chosen technique of manually coding interview transcript data thus drew attention to interpretations and meanings of cultural memories as constructed by each participant. It also highlighted how these experiences are relational to different times and spaces (Robinson, 1999). By examining the processes of (re)production, transmission and

71 maintenance within each group, I attempted to give a voice to individuals within each generational cohort and highlight the (dis)similarities and uniqueness of their constructions of cultural memories.

Situating the analysis of data generated in the Polish field locations required an awareness of the contextual paradigm informing understandings of memory and identity constructions. Drawing from the cultural turn in human geography, my analysis of the landscape readings, historical texts, field observations and photographs focused on (de)constructing the different histories, sources of knowledge and power differentials, apparent and hidden, in the public memory landscape. In addition, a semioticix analysis of the historical maps was undertaken to examine the street name changes in the Kraków city centre between 1934 and 1996. The range of different data sources complemented this analysis. They highlighted the mulitvocality and multi-layered nature of memory discourse and thickened the descriptive narratives of these different spheres of memory.

The overarching method of data analysis in this thesis was in the writing itself. This method of narrative driven analysis draws from post-structuralism. Narrative interpretations are part of an ongoing processes of (de)constructing and building on existing knowledges and discourses. The method of narrative analysis employed in this thesis seeks to draw attention to ‘how people talk about and evaluate places, experiences and situations, as well as what they say’ (Wiles et al., 2005:89). Through the analysis of cultural memory (re)productions and transmission, the development of themes ensued and were discussed in relation to their historical and contemporary settings. This method also allowed me to continually reassess my positionality and the continuum of Polish experiences within the thesis. As the thesis progressed, I gained new insights into Polish historical discourses, accomplished difficult idiomatic language translations, and became entwined in the cultural memories narrated by the interview participants. All the stages of research in this thesis, including the data analysis and writing, were part of a process and not just a product of methodological enquiry (England, 1994: 82).

72 3.7 Conclusion

In this chapter, I have detailed the methodological tools employed and outlined my positionality within this thesis. My positionality, grounded in personal and family connections to Polishness, has informed how I have approached and examined the maintenance of Polish identity. A crucial part of my positionality has been enabling an ongoing process of self-reflexivity. Through this process of reflection, I have realised that this research in itself is part of the maintenance of my own Polish identity. Thus, acknowledging my positioned perspective in this thesis has enabled me to better understand the complexities of identity maintenance.

To tackle these complexities in the chosen field settings I utilised a mixed methods approach to generate data in distinctly different field settings. In Poland a combination of methods were used, including interviewing, contemporary readings of the landscape, archival sources and participation observation. In Australia, I primarily used in-depth semi-structured interviews and participant observation. This combination of qualitative data methods was chosen in recognition of the multiple interpretations of memories and identity articulated in the field settings. The data generated for this thesis were analysed through writing the research narrative. This analysis technique allowed for the incorporation of new insights and the ongoing reassessment of my positionality through the development of themed chapters.

Using a mixed methods approach, particularly the combination of qualitative place and context based methodologies (landscape readings and interviews) with secondary and archival data sources, enabled the development of a narrative of identity maintenance that crossed different times and spaces. Crucial to the analysis of data in this thesis was an understanding of how contemporary constructions of Polish identity are historically grounded. In the next chapter I provide a synthesis of the history of Poland, to chart the development of a narrative of struggle and resistance to foreign occupation through time and across the research settings.

73 i During the course of my candidature, the Geography Program moved faculties from the Faculty of the Built Environment to the Faculty of Science. This move occurred when I was already in the field in Poland, thus my ethics approval came from Faculty of the Built Environment. ii Vernacular landscape is taken to mean the everyday and ordinary landscapes (cf. Jackson, 1984 and Meining, 1979). iii The Bo is a large recreation field about 10 minutes walk from the Old Town. iv A photographic diary of each monument in the Planty was kept for two main reasons. First, it provided a visual record of the monuments for further analysis in Australia. Second, while only six of the eleven monuments were utilised in the discussion in Chapter 5, the monuments in the Planty are part of a whole memorial landscape. Following Rose (2001:37), these ‘visual images do not exist in a vacuum’ and are presented in Appendix B to provide a pictorial representation of the Planty. v As Kunz (1988) acknowledged, the estimation of the extent Polish DP migration is complicated by the possibility of incorrect registration of Polish born persons under alternate nationalities, such as German, Austrian, Ukrainian or Russian. Indeed, many children under the age of six migrating with Polish born parents, were born outside of Poland, usually in Germany and thus commonly recorded as German nationals (Kunz, 1988). vi In this thesis, I have use the term post-okres komunizmu, to describe the migrants who arrived in Australia in this cohort of migration. vii This mitigated the investigation of another generational cohort in each migrant wave. There is an emerging fourth generation from the cohort of postwar migrants, as well as a third generation from post- Soviet migrants. viii It is important to note that while many migrants in this cohort arrived with parents, those arriving over the age of 12 represent a separate group as they were largely socialised outside of Australia (Burnley, 1986). ix A ‘semiotic’ analysis uses the language of signs. In this thesis the signs are the street and place names depicted on the historical maps. These street and place names have been decoded to reveal the historical and cultural discourses that prompted name changes through the different maps.

74 Chapter 4 – Charting the (re)construction of Polish cultural identity through turbulent times

Polish history is a cause, an ideal, a political instrument (Davies, 2005a: x).

Each of us possesses a heritage within us – a heritage to which generations and centuries of achievement and calamity, of triumph and failure, have contributed: a heritage which somehow takes deeper root and grows new tissues from every one of us. We cannot live without it. It is our soul. It is this heritage, variously labelled Fatherland, or the Nation, by which we live (Pope John Paul II, Walicki (1990: 31)).

This chapter chronicles Polish history. Integral to this historical outline has been the development and maintenance of a shared and distinctly Polish narrative – a storyline of struggle for national autonomy and cultural survival by Polish people. To underscore the importance of this narrative to the construction of a national discourse in Poland and its invention as a metaphoric tradition, most of this chapter’s historical commentary focuses on Polish history from the 16th Century onwards. Concurrent to the emergence of national ideology from that time was this Polish narrative of resistance and struggle against foreign oppression, which became particularly strong when the Polish state was formerly dissolved. In addition to this theme of resistance, emigration features prominently throughout this Polish story. Together these provide evidence of the development of a discourse of Poles in active and ongoing opposition to foreign oppression. In addition to Poland’s quest for autonomy, a major contributor to Poland’s historical plight has been its geographic location lying between two powerful and oppressive former empires, Russia and Germany. It was at the nexus of ‘three main branches of Christianity (Catholicism, Orthodoxy and Lutheranism)’ (Prizel, 1998: 40). Poland was also once home to a large proportion of the world’s Jewry.

The history of Poland is long and complex and it is not the intention of this one chapter to document a complete history. Two highly regarded records of Polish history, ‘God’s playground: A history of Poland’ (Davies, 2005a and b) and ‘A concise history of Poland’ (Lukowski and Zawadzki, 2001) have provided historical details and have been drawn on

75 for historical accuracyi. This chapter chronicles historical events that are of particular relevance to this thesis because of their contributions to the development of Polish narratives of struggle and resistance. These narratives are integral to the (re)production, and transmission of cultural memories in both public and private settings. So my intention has been to detail how the events of these historical periods factor into and influence the (re)construction of this narrative of resistance and struggle against foreign occupation.

4.1 Pre-partitioned Poland

There are many folkloric tales about the origins of the Polish nation. Perhaps the most common is that of the three Slav brothers Lech, Czech and Ru, who founded the lands of Poland, Czech and Rutheniaii, respectively. According to legend, Lech found an eagle’s nest (‘gniazdo’ in Polish) and proclaimed it as the emblem of the Polish people. The eagle nest referred to Gniezno, the original capital of Poland, and now widely considered the country’s ecclesiastical centre. Commonly referred to as the ‘cradle of Polish Catholicism/Christendom’, the township Gniezno in the region of Wielkopolska (Great Poland) was reputably the dominion of Piast, (the first Polish ruler to settle Wielkopolska) (Szajkowski, 1983: 68). It was also the location of the official conversion of the first Polish Prince to Latin Christianity in 966.

4.1.1 Polish Origins

The progression from what is commonly now referred to as Piast Poland involved a complex series of invasions and intermarriages between successive generations of Polish rulers with their Slav neighbours, Bohemians, Silesians, Germans, and Moravians, and what is now considered modern day rulers of Hungary and Slovakia (Lukowski and Zawadzki, 2001). Historical records indicate that it was Mieszko I (c.922-92) who first accepted Christianity into Poland by marrying the daughter of Duke Bolesaw I of Bohemia (Davies, 2005a). It is of importance to note that at this stage many of these leaders also ruled over regional areas as broad as from the Elbe River in the West, the Bug River in the East, to the Baltic Sea in the North and Carpathian Mountains in the South, and not over the land comprising modern day Poland (Figure 4.1, p77).

76

Figure 4.1 Piast Poland (966-1370) Note: The location of ‘Brandenburg’ coincides with the actual location of Prussia, while the location of ‘Prussia’ should correctly be annotated as ‘East Prussia’ Source: Pease (1992)

Additionally, the territorial influence of Poland shifted with each monarch. For example, King Wadysaw okietek (‘the elbow-high King’) (c.1306-33) was crowned in Kraków, which then became the royal capital, chiefly because of okietek’s territorial control (Lukowski and Zawadzki, 2001). At that time in Polish history the development and spread of Christianity was also important, as demonstrated by ‘the coming of monasteries and friars in the 12th and 13th centuries’ (Lukowski and Zawadzki, 2001: 7).

77 4.1.2 Jagiellonian Poland and the Commonwealth of Nations

Prizel (1998) has suggested that the period of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was central to the collective Polish memory even through the 19th Century. Jagiellonian Poland (1386-1572) saw the Polish-Lithuanian influence extend from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea and this was an important period of economic, cultural and social growth in Poland (Figure 4.2, p 79). The formation of the Commonwealth was contrived by the marriage of Queen Jadwiga of Poland (daughter of the Hungarian King Louis of Anjou), to the newly converted Christian Prince Joaglia (Jagieo in Polish) of Lithuania in 1386, in Kraków. This politically and territorially advantageous union began the Jagiellonian period of Polish history, during which Poland continued to expand territorially and had substantial influence in Europe. This era, commonly remembered as Poland’s Golden Age, ironically began with the marriage of two non-Poles (a Hungarian and Lithuanian), and lasted nearly 200 years until the death in 1572 of the last and heirless Jagiellonian King, Zygmunt August II.

Shortly before his death, Zygmunt August II instituted a new union, Rzeczpospolita Obojga Narodów, Polskiego i Litewskiego (The Commonwealth of Two Nations, Poland and Lithuania) in 1569. The resulting Commonwealth was created through the ‘Union of Lublin’ for a combination of reasons: the mounting pressure of an aging heirless king; the threat from both Muscovyiii and the south and eastern provinces (Maopolska and Podole); and ‘the inadequacy of existing military, financial and administrative practices’ (Davies, 2005a: 120-121). The new Commonwealth had one King, elected through a joint Sejmiv (Lower Parliamentary Assembly) and a common Polish currency (Davies, 2005a). Lukowski and Zawadzki (2001: 64) argued that the union was Zygmunt August II’s ‘greatest achievement and greatest failure’. It ensured continued security and growth of the szlachtav (noblemen/landed gentry), and saw the ‘creation of massive complexes of estates’ through a mixture of intermarriages and exchange of royal favours between szlachta families (Lukowski and Zawadzki, 2001: 70). Maintaining these vast estates meant that regional differences among the multi ethnic magnatesvi were commonplace and exemplified by a mixture of languages, religions and customary differences (Tazbir, 1982). At that time, Poland was renowned for its doctrine of religious freedom and

78 tolerance, which it saw as a necessary part of the democratic process and the smooth functioning of the Commonwealth. For example, part of the Confederation of Warsaw in 1573 stated:

We who differ in matters of religion will keep the peace among ourselves, and neither shed blood on account of differences of Faith or kinds of church (Davies, 2005a: 126).

Sixteenth century Poland was populated by Polish Catholics, Jews, Byelorussians and Ruthenian Orthodoxy, Pagan Lithuanians, Islamic Tartars, and Monophysite Armenians (Tazbir, 1982). The diversity and religious tolerance of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was expounded internationally as evidence of the pluralistic capacity of

Figure 4.2 The Jagiellonian Realm (c.1500) Source: Davies (2005a)

79 Polish society. However, the most notable development of the late period of the Commonwealth was the institution of liberum veto (The Golden Freedom) into the Sejm in 1652. Liberum veto meant that a single vote of dissent could prohibit the passing of legislation through the Sejm. While the Poles celebrated this ‘golden freedom’ as evidence of a strong democracy (but as Prizel (1998) has reminded us that this democracy privileged the nobility who comprised only eight per cent of the populationvii) in practice it only secured the interests of the most powerful magnates, especially those with vested interests in neighbouring countries. It also resulted in only 12 pieces of legislation being enacted in 37 meetings of the Sejm between 1697 and 1762. Effectively, the liberum veto was utilised by the powerful magnates to stunt the legislative capacity of the Sejm, which left the Republic ‘incapable of organising itself or offering resistance to Russian policy’ (Davies, 2005a: 265; Lukowski and Zawadzki, 2001).

4.1.3 Sarmatianism in collective Polish cultural memory

The social and political conditions established during the Jagiellonian period in Poland and the Commonwealth of Nations were instrumental in the construction of Polish national identity in the following epoch – Partitioned Poland (and the Romantic Era). During the 16th Century, when the Commonwealth and the Sejm were multicultural and linguistically diverse, references to the ‘nation’ in fact referred to the political nation. More specifically reference to the ‘nation’ referred to the 10 per cent of the population (the nobility) who enjoyed political liberty and civil rights (Walicki, 1989). The szlachta and magnates needed to construct a shared national political ideology, which would tie together the religious and multicultural differences that distinguished them. Walicki (1994: 10) has identified this prevailing political ideology as Sarmatianism, which he argued reproduced a melding of the different components of the political nation into a ‘single cohesive nation’ with one multicultural parliament. Walicki (1994: 10) contended that the szlachta ‘wanted to facilitate the process of integration by endowing the multi ethnic nation with a feeling of being united by the common ancestry’. In doing so, the szlachta effectively established a collective political ideology. This definition of the nation was operationalised despite the under-representation of more that 90 per cent of the population. Thus, the ‘noble nation’s’ apparent unity lay in the belief that they harked

80 from a common descent of an ancient Slavic tribe known as the Sarmatians, who were hailed as a distinct privileged group separate to the burghers and peasant masses. The Sarmatians ideology was based on three tenets. First, the Commonwealth was to remain the granary of Europe, which effectively tied Poland’s development to its agrarian capacity and neglected the economic modernisation seen in other Western countries. Second, Poland was to be the Bulwark of Christendom and defender against the impending invasions of the infidels. The Battle of Vienna against the Ottoman Turks is one such occasion when Poles obtained as international reputation for their skilful victory, both for Jan III Sobieski’s great military triumph and for protecting greater Europe from the threat of Ottoman invasion (Davies, 2005a). The third Sarmatian tenet was the firm belief in the Commonwealth’s political system, contingent on and upheld by the liberum veto in stark opposition to Western monarchies. While other factors were also at play, it was the liberum veto that was widely acknowledged as the primary reason for the downfall of the Polish nation. The szlachta manipulated the use of the liberum veto to their own advantage ultimately disabled the effectiveness of the Sejm.

The importance of Sarmatianism as the principal ideology prior to the enactment of the partitions in Poland was that its privileges and civil liberties were extended only to a select proportion of the Commonwealth’s population. They used these liberties to their own advantage and not to the benefit of the wider population. Furthermore, the practical implications of this ideology were that the szlachta effectively ‘kept the majority of the population consisting of craftsmen [sic] and farmers in serfdom’. This division created a political and economically stratified national community (Wagner, 2003: 202). Wandycz (1974) has pointed out that these negative repercussions occurred despite the personal liberties of the szlachta. The ultimate consequence of the misuse of the liberum veto by the szlachta was the enactment of the first partition of the nation in 1773.

4.2 Partitioned Poland: developing a history of resistance and struggle for autonomy

In this section, I chart how a national narrative of resistance and struggle to foreign occupation developed in Poland. From the end of the 18th Century until 1918, Poland not only endured a prolonged period of occupation by its powerful neighbours – Austria,

81 Prussia and Russia – but Poles also suffered the forcible suppression of Polish identity. In this section, I have outlined how resistance to these foreign occupiers was variously articulated in the absence of a Polish State. The forging of a narrative of resistance has been the focus of the first two subsections (Sections 4.2.1 and 4.2.2). In the two following subsections (Sections 4.2.3 and 4.2.4), I have traced how Poles responded to the threat to their lives and the suppression of their Polish identity. Emigration and the production of distinctly patriotic artworks (including literature, paintings and poetry) were two ways that resistance continued to be enacted, both in diaspora and within Poland. Lastly, in Sections 4.2.5 and 4.2.6, I have focused on the legacies of the partitioned period. I explain how the genealogy of the Polish narrative of resistance and suffering has been sustained by Polish Romantic Messianism. Overall, the discussion in this section (Section 4.2) has exemplified that period of ‘partitioned Poland’ has indeed been formative era of Polish history.

The partitioning of Poland was effected in three stages. First, in 1773, Russia, Austria and Prussia annexed 30 per cent of the borderlands of Poland and 35 per cent of its population. Then, in 1793, Prussia and Russia again annexed large portions of the former Commonwealth, reducing it to 60 per cent of its former size at only 200 000 square kilometres. Finally, in 1795, the three powers signed the last agreement effectively removing Poland from the map of Europe (Figure 4.3, p83) (Suchodolski, 1987). Therefore, the culmination of these partitions was that,

on 12 January 1796, tripartite convention between Russia, Austria and Prussia in St. Petersburg insisted on the need to abolish everything which can recall the memory of the existence of the Kingdom of Poland (Lukowski and Zawadzki, 2001: 105).

82

Figure 4.3 Partitioned Poland, 1795-1918 (before the creation of the Duchy of Warsaw) Source: Wandycz, 1974.

The partitioning of Poland was especially important to the emergence of a collective national discourse identity, forged through the common goal of reuniting the lost lands of the former Commonwealth. Anderson (1991) and Hobsbawm and Ranger (1983) have argued that it was in the 16th and 17th centuries that nations began to develop a concept of national identity through the invention of traditions and formation of a sense of common, though invariably ‘imagined’, communityviii. In Poland, the constructions of traditions coalesced around the goal of the (re)formation of the Polish state and the maintenance of Polish cultural traditions and language in the absence of this formal state. In addition,

83 existing collective national customs and traditions were continued during the partitioned period to assist the maintenance of the existing cultural identity at that time. The dismantling of the Polish state also meant that a culture of struggle and resistance against foreign occupiers began to manifest itself. The creation of new traditions – associated with literature, music, active insurgency and religious imagery – provided material support for the development of a narrative of Polish struggle against and resistance to foreign occupation.

4.2.1 Forging resistance in the absence of a Polish State (1): Uprisings and Polish Legions

The origins of the establishment of a cultural tradition of active resistance to foreign occupation were manifest in the numerous armed insurrections by a variety of Polish forces. Most famously, in the Battle of Racawice, before the final partition of Poland in 1795, Tadeusz Kociuszkoix led an insurgency consisting of peasants, armed predominantly with scythes, to victory against the Russian army under General Tormasov. The Battle of Racawice is portrayed in Polish history as a glorious victory by scythe- wielding peasants against a superior Russian Army. Indeed, the symbol of the mounted scythe now represents resistance and victory to Poles (Jedlicki, 1990). In reality, however, the Polish triumph was short lived as Warsaw surrendered to the Russian Army only days later. The Russian army sought retribution for their loss at Racawice, which culminated in the deportation and abdication of the last Polish King, Stainsaw August Poniatowski, and heralded the final separation of the Polish state (Davies, 1984).

While Poles repeatedly and doggedly attempted to prevent the partitioning of Poland, the institution of the final partition in 1795 did end the Polish efforts to overthrow their occupiers. Following the final partition, Poles who had fled to elsewhere in Europe, as a result of the partitions, formed military units – Polish Legions – these fought alongside other European armies. The most notable were Ddrowski’s Legion, which formed and fought in the Second Coalition War in Lombardy under Napoleon (Zubrzycki, 1953). While the ultimate intention of Poles partaking in the Legions was the restoration of Poland’s freedom, the Legionnaires and their commanding officers gained significant

84 international credibility by ‘fighting for other people’s causes and the Polish cause’ (Zubrzycki, 1988: 19). This fame was critical in championing the cause of Polish autonomy on an international stage. It was Ddrowski’s legions – formed primarily from the French capture of Galician peasants conscripted into the Austrian army – that became synonymous with active military participation and resistance against foreign occupation for Polish autonomy. In fact, Dbrowski’s Marzurka became the Polish National Anthem, capturing the spirit of resistance, fighting for Polish autonomy, and immortalising it as the tradition of tantamount importance to the maintenance of Polish identity. The song has been the country’s official national anthem since 1926 and is representative of literary and musical attempts to document Poland’s struggle for autonomy. Written by Józef Wybicki in 1797, the first verse recalls Dbrowski’s Polish Legions fighting in Italy as part of the Napoleonic Armies. The verse, quoted below, is emblematic of Poland’s ongoing attempts to fight for freedom.

Jezscze Polksa nie zgnia Poland has not perished yet Póki My yjemy. So long as we live Co nam obca przemoc wzia That which alien force has seized Szabl odbijemy We at sword point shall retrieve Marsz, marsz, Dbrowski! March, march, Dbrowski! Ziemi Woskiej do Polski! From Italy to Poland! Za Twoim przewodem Under thy command Zczym si z narodem. Let us now rejoin the nation.

The enshrining of this tradition of active resistance to foreign occupation through the national anthem has meant that the plight of these insurrectionists, and of the Polish nation during the partitions, is contemporarily reiterated in Poland.

4.2.2 Forging resistance in the absence of a Polish State (2): The Catholic Church and the clergy

The church was another outlet for resistance and the maintenance of Polish identity, which has continued to remain relevant to contemporary generations of Poles. Between 1773 and 1795 when Poland was being partitioned, the church became a site of resistance where Polish identity was (re)produced and maintained. Cviic (1983: 93) has argued that during that time the church became the ‘chief guardian of the nation’s culture’. This role was

85 particularly important during the partitioned period because there was less religious freedom and tolerance than in the previous Commonwealth. The partitioning powers (Russia, Prussia and Austria), recognising the position of the church as a vestige of Polish identity, sought to weaken the connection between the Catholic Church and its Polish congregations. For example, in the Austrian partition, despite being a Catholic, Emperor Joseph II (1780-90) initiated a policy of subordination of the church to the State, including the secularisation of schooling (Davies, 2005b). In both the Austrian and Prussian partitions, church property was confiscated, religious orders removed, and attempts made to Germanise religious instruction (Cviic, 1983). In the Orthodox Russian partition, the Polish Catholic Church was controlled by secular authorities and endured the subordination of all ecclesiastical affairs and a total denial of access of the clergy to Rome (Davies, 2005b). Yet the church, and Polish Catholicism, stood steadfast. Ultimately, the Church remained one of the only completely Polish institutions accessible to the whole of Polish society. It was an exclusive outlet for Polish speaking and the maintenance of the many Polish traditions that were heavily associated and interrelated with religious customs. So the prominence of the church in discourses of Polish patriotism, which have endured to this day, burgeoned during the 18th and 19th centuries. Another aspect, as Jerschina (1990: 78) has argued, is that the church

by defending the religion of the Catholic peasant against the pressures imposed on them by Orthodox and Protestant Churches, it defended them at the same time against Russification and Germanisation.

This quotation also alludes to a key reason why the church took an active role in forging resistance to foreign occupation. Not only was Polishness under pressure to assimilate to the culture of the occupying powers, but so too was the church itself. As a physical and psychological site of resistance, it facilitated the identification of the Polish Catholic Church with Polish identity as a collective national identity. The church had become a bastion of Polishness.

86 4.2.3 Contextualising the establishment of a history of emigration: The November Uprising (1830-1831) and the Great Emigration

Despite the attempts of both the Church and the Poles fighting in the Legions and insurrections, the Polish state formally ceased to exist in 1795. Both Davies (2005b) and Halecki (1963) have noted that there has been a plethora of Polish and foreign research focusing on the reasons for the demise of the Polish State. Much of this research focuses on Poland’s inability to defend itself against its powerful neighbours. As outlined earlier, this weakness was related to the internal squabbling of noble families and an ineffectual Sejm, stunted by the liberum veto, the Golden Rule by which one dissenting vote could stop the passing of new legislation (Kaminski, 1983). In addition, Davies (2005a: 387) has argued that,

the partition period can never be properly understood unless it is realised that Poland’s internal troubles were systematically promoted by her [sic] more powerful neighbours.

During the 18th and 19th centuries Poland was geographically positioned at the intersection of the country’s occupying powers (Prussia, Russia and Austria) and Napoleon’s revolutionary ambitions for greater Europe. From the First Coalition of the Napoleonic Wars in 1792 until the end of the Seventh Coalition in 1815, Poland’s partitioning powers were involved in a complex net of alliances and factions with, and against, Bonaparte’s French Armies. The outcome of Napoleon’s earlier and successful incursions into Austria (in 1805) and his advance against the Prussian and Russian armies culminated in consultations with Tsar Alexander at Friedland in 1807 and the signing of the Treaty of Tilsit (7 July 1807). The Treaty of Tilsit effectively created the Duchy of Warsaw (1807- 1815), which as Davies (2005b: 216) has contended was born of ‘uneasy liaison between Napoleonic France and the stateless Polish nation’. However, the Duchy of Warsaw was also a concessionary state for the members of the Polish legions who played a supportive role in the Napoleonic Wars (Chapter 4, Section 4.2). While conceding territory to the Polish State, the creation of the Duchy of Warsaw ‘did not satisfy Polish national aspirations’ because its constitution was dictated by Napoleon and its economy was weak

87 and reliant on French support (Lerski, 1996: 121). However, it was Napoleon’s eventual defeat and retreat from Moscow that saw the Duchy of Warsaw become the Congress Kingdom of Poland (1815-1864) at the Congress of Vienna in September 1814. While the Tsar became the official monarch, the Kingdom still had its own constitution and upheld the prospect of national and political development. Both Wandycz (1974) and Walicki (1994) have commented that despite the union with Russia, the Congress Kingdom was a satisfactory outcome for the Polish State considering that the remainder of the former Commonwealth still remained under partition.

The November Uprising (1830-1831) by the Congress Kingdom of Poland against its Russian occupiers is widely regarded as being both doomed to fail and a reckless risk by a radical few to the relative stability of the only remaining Polish territory (Davies, 2005b; Walicki, 1994; Wandycz, 1974). Russian retribution for the insurrection was swift: the Kingdom lost its constitution, its independent parliament and the Polish army, and suffered the closure of the University of Warsaw and the eventual imposition of Russian language instruction in all schools (Lukowski and Zawadzki, 2001). A momentous outcome in terms of Polish identity was the resulting Great Emigration, the exodus of approximately nine thousand people. Of these, two thirds were of noble background and the remainder were peasants. The majority of the émigrés settled in Paris, where their concentration created a hotbed of Polish political thought, literature, music, history and poetry. In this way ‘Polish romanticism rose to its full stature in the emigration’ (Wandycz, 1974: 117). The exiled Poles, while also taking part in various uprisings, forged a new tradition through the production of tangible cultural artefacts, including poetry, literature, paintings and musical compositions, all infused with national sentiment. Similarly, Walicki (2001: 19) has also emphasised the importance of the location and concentration of these émigrés’ communities in Paris. At the centre of a burgeoning revolutionary movement in the early 19th Century, the émigrés in Paris were exposed to current and emerging political discourses and philosophies from within France and Western Europe. Growing revolutionary fervour in continental Europe coupled with this influx of Polish political exiles, resulted in what Zubrzycki (1988) has called the great tradition of Polish emigration. Inevitably, this environment further spurred the émigrés’

88 patriotism, though arguably, the tattered condition of what remained of the Polish nation was fodder enough to compel the émigrés to actively resist the occupation of their homeland (Krzyzanowski, 1968). Pearton (1996:1) has argued that the Romantic Movement and the French Revolution ‘subscribed to a common objective, the reintegration of a fractured society’. Accordingly, the rebirth of an independent Poland, through the maintenance of Polish cultural tradition and spirit, remained the focus, indeed the ‘historical mission’ of the Polish émigrés (Walicki, 2001: 18). The traditions invented during this period became cultural artefacts that have remained synonymous with the plight of the Polish nation against its historical and contemporary era occupiers. Furthermore, the significance of these émigrés’ contribution to maintaining cultural identity through the continual reassertion of a narrative of Polish resistance and struggle is evident in the memorialisation of these authors, artists and composers in monuments and statuary throughout Poland (as discussed in Chapter 5).

4.2.4 The pen is mightier than the sword: Romantic Era literature and the Polish language as forms of resistance and cultural maintenance

Cohen (1999) has argued that links between a collective historical consciousness and national identity are constructed and maintained through the shared meanings of language, and shared common spatial territory. As Brock (1969) has acknowledged, the maintenance of Polish language was a crucial component in safeguarding national culture throughout the partitioned period, especially considering the assimilationist ambitions of the partitioning powers. Moreover, he contended that this ‘linguistic nationalism’ became intertwined in this period with a traditional and ‘older concept of the nation’, the territorial state (Brock, 1969: 316). In 1795, the partitioning powers attempted to remove the official language of the State and Church (Latin) and replace it with Russian and German in their respective partitions. Polish language was removed from schools – in 1864, 1869 and 1872 in the Russian, Austrian and Prussian partitions, respectively – further threatening the survival of the Polish language. Bismarck’s Kulturkampf attempted to subordinate Polish language usage in Prussian-controlled Poland through the removal of Polish language and religious instruction in schools, and the compulsory use of German language in government offices, courts, post offices and railway stations. Lukowski and

89 Zawadzki (2001: 157) have identified that the Kulturkampf actually had the unintended outcome of strengthening the links between religion and nationality, because the church became an exclusive outlet for Polish language speaking (as detailed in Chapter 4, Section 4.2.2). Furthermore, Brock (1969: 330) has contended that in terms of national identification, the reaction to the Kulturkampf was most significant among the peasantry, who were initially reluctant to support the nationalistic aspirations and actions of the szlachta. In Prussian controlled Poland the assaults on religion and native language led to the increasing prevalence of Polish nationalistic sentiment among the peasants. In Russian controlled Poland, the forcible closure of the Uniate Church and of centres of education in Wilno and Kiev were examples of the offensive on Polish language and culture. Replacing these were centres of Russification aimed at suppressing and inhibiting Polish speaking among Polish youths (Sawicki and Sawicka-Brockie, 1982). Thus, it was during the partitions that the Polish language became an important unifying force. Bridging social, religious and spatial barriers, it became the common ‘language of the freedom’ of Polish nobility and peasantry, Catholics and non-Catholics, Jews, and all those who were opposed to the partitions (Davies, 2005b: 16). The Polish language ‘became an essential touchstone for nationality’ (Davies, 2005b: 16).

Knowledge of the Polish language afforded access to a wealth of Romantic and heavily patriotic literature, especially that produced by the Polish diaspora in Paris. Those émigrés took the challenge of continuing and cultivating national values for Polish and international dissemination. Walicki (2001: 18) referred to this commitment as the ‘historical mission’ of the Romantic generation. This mission – ‘to give spiritual leadership to the nation’ – was in effect a continuation of the historical struggle for independence that began with the November Uprising, but with the pen not the sword (Wandycz, 1974: 180). The three men regarded as the bards of Polish Romantic literature (ironically born in what is now Lithuania), Adam Mickiewicz (1798-1855), Juliusz Sowacki (1809-49) and Zygmunt Krasiski (1812-59), wrote the great works of Polish Romantic literature while in exile in Francex. While Poles fought in battles and uprisings, the Polish literature simultaneously bolstered Polish identity in the absence of a Polish State. Indeed, the literature commonly portrayed the image of martyrdom and sacrifice of

90 the insurrectionary Pole. As Jedlicki (1990: 45) has noted, the archetypal hero of these dramas was frequently a young ‘romantic individualist’, ‘who by his [sic] individual deed and sacrifices tries to save the nation’. Mickiewicz’s Pan Tadeusz (1834) epitomised the longing Poles had for their homeland and for its redemption from foreign occupation. These resonant themes have explained why these writers have remained so critical to contemporary Polish history and society. Gross (1983) has stated that for the Romantic émigrés, patriotic poetry and political text were a means of both preserving Polish identity and furthering its cause. As I have argued, the patriotic significance of the use of the Polish language, itself under attack by foreign oppressors, was integral to the force of this literature. However, the maintenance of Polish national identity has not been solely limited to literature. The cultural influence of other artists such as Frederick Chopin (composer), Jan Matejko (artist) and Stanisaw Wyspiaski (author and playwright), demonstrates that the subject of Poland’s struggle for autonomy stretched across and was influenced by a wide range of artistic disciplines.

4.2.5 The legacies of partitioned Poland (1): Polish Romantic Messianism

The partitioning of Poland prompted the development of the longstanding conviction that Poland is a martyr, whose sacrifices – aligned with Jesus Christ – were seen as being for the greater good of humankind. Polish Romantic Messianism (known hereafter as Messianism) saw ‘Poland as the chosen nation’ whose role, not unlike Christ’s, positioned the country as the chief instrument in universal salvation (Walicki, 1990: 31). Walicki (1982) has argued that the emergence of Messianism must be understood as a direct consequence of the failed November Uprising and the emigration that followed. It was from this point that the mission of ‘striving for an imminent and total regeneration of earthly life’ through the recreation of the Polish nation began (Walicki, 1982: 243). Furthermore, Walicki (1982) was at pains to delineate ‘Messianism’ from other forms of national, political and Romantic Messianism prevalent during this period. His definition of Messianism draws on religious consciousness to assert the belief that salvation is not yet complete, and that a second salvation was imminent in the form of a ‘collective and terrestrial salvation of mankind [sic]’ (Walicki, 1982: 241). Basically, the doctrine of Messianism gave Poles something to believe in – that their nation’s rebirth was indeed

91 possible. Yet, the adoption of Messianism by the Romantic Era poets, Mickiewicz, Sowacki and Krasiski, also indicates the general sense of disbelief at the demise of the Polish nation and fuelled the idea that the Polish cause was worthy of earthly and divine intervention. As Walicki (1982: 244) has stated:

This theodicy was of great value for the Poles – it enabled them to explain the national catastrophe of Poland, and made them believe that her [sic] sufferings were not in vain, since, like the suffering of Christ, they served as a purifying force for the general redemption and regeneration of mankind [sic].

The enactment of Messianistic dogma materialised through the patriotic literature and poetry, particularly in the works of Mickiewicz, Sowacki and Krasiski. For example, written just one year after the failed November Uprising, Mickiewicz’s Books of the Polish Nation and of Polish Pilgrims (1832) epitomised the martyrdom of Poland and defined the universal mission of Poland and particularly that of the Polish émigrés (Brock, 1969; Walicki, 1982). Mickiewicz envisaged that Poland, as the Messiah of nations, would rid Europe of the political tyranny and immorality that led to the destruction of the Polish state, thereby saving other nations from a similar fate. Thus, there was a level of internationalism implicit in the patriotic sentiments of Polish Romantic nationalism. The phrase ‘za nasz i wasz wolno’ (for your freedom and ours), utilised during insurrections of the partitioned period exemplified the Polish view that their national situation was important in the wider context of revolutionary Europe (Gomuka and Polonsky, 1990). In addition, Zubrzycki (2006: 45) has pointed out that Mickiewicz’s Books of the Polish Nation and of Polish Pilgrims effectively utilised religious vocabularies and metaphors to expound an acutely nationalist verse:

And they martyred the Polish Nation and laid it in the grave, and the kings cried out: ‘We have slain and we have buried Freedom’. But they cried out foolishly…For the Polish Nation did not die: its body lieth in the grave, but its soul hath descended from the earth, that is from public life, to the abyss, that is to the private life of people who suffer slavery

92 in their country, that it may see their sufferings. But on the third day the soul shall return to the body, and the Nation shall rise and free all the peoples of Europe from Slavery…And as after the resurrection of Christ blood sacrifices ceases in all the world, so after the resurrection of the Polish Nation wars shall cease in all Christendom.

Positioning the Polish mission alongside, and akin with, the crucifixion of Christ facilitated the strengthening of the bonds between the stateless Polish people and the historic narrative of the Catholic Church. Catholicism became an integral component of national discourse emanating from the émigrés in Paris and it cemented the connection between the Catholic Church and Polish identity. Furthermore, while the peasant classes could not read Polish literature like Mickiewicz’s work (and his biblical incantations were particularly inaccessible), the church was a conduit between the high literature and the peasantry. In other words, not only did the Romantic artists adopt Messianic symbolism, but the church also adopted the language and patriotic spirit of these artists, strengthening further the positioning of Polishness that was concentrating in the church. Indeed, the union between the church and the national cause was already burgeoning through the active use of Polish language by the lower clergy and the church. Zubrzycki (2006: 49) asserted that the Catholic Church had assumed the role of ‘a major “national” institution’, ‘providing a significant space for Poles to affirm their sense of community’. The naissance of Messianism signified a major legacy of partitioned Poland. It intensified the bonds between Polish identity and the Catholic Church, and the strength of this relationship proved crucial to future foreign incursions within the Polish state. Moreover, Messianism affirmed the then well-established narrative of Polish suffering and resistance had developed in tandem with the partitioning of Poland. The narrative of Poland as the Messiah of Europe was again reinforced through the Second World War and the okres komunizmu.

93 4.2.6 The legacies of partitioned Poland (2): factoring emigration and resistance into constructions of Polish identity.

In Soldiers and Peasants, Zubrzycki (1988) has argued that many Polish émigrés had to leave Poland because they were faced with persecution and/or exile. The émigrés and Legionnaires established an ongoing characteristic of Polish emigration, one that is recognisable in more contemporary cohorts of Polish émigrés. These emigrants did not simply leave and forget about the plight of their country. Their patriotic fervour is evident in the establishment of a tradition of active resistance, both militarily and through the cultural arts. This tradition carried through to the underground resistance of WWII. It was also encapsulated in the words of the Polish national anthem and in the slogan of the November Uprising ‘za nasz i wasz wolno’ (for your freedom and ours).

The role of Polish peasants was important in the development of the Polish Legions (Zubrzycki, 1988). These peasants were often those interned into Russian, Prussian and Austrian armies depending on the partition of Poland in which they resided. Yet, many were also captured by Napoleon’s armies and integrated into the French army as a Polish Legion. Their role in the wider quest for Polish independence was timely: rival political factions among Polish exiles had begun debating the restoration of Poland and with it the abolition of serfdom. Furthermore, the contribution and solidarity of the peasant military contingents demonstrated their capability to rearticulate the village and familial bonds and loyalty on a national level. These bonds were also described in The Polish Peasant in Europe and America, where Thomas and Znaniecki (1958) identified the strong links to family structures in Polish-American immigrants in the early 1920s. Such participation in collective national causes is an essential ingredient in Anderson’s (1991) concept of imagined national communities – that is, the willingness of the everyday citizen to risk one’s life fighting for the collective national cause. The uniting of both the peasantry and the szlachta in the common cause of Polish autonomy took Anderson’s (1991: 6) image of a shared communion between members of a nation one step further. In the Polish case, such unity bridged the historically embedded divisions of class in pre-partitioned Poland. Indeed, by the 1840s a consensus was reached among the Polish political parties in acknowledgment of the importance of the peasantry to the national cause (Lukowski and

94 Zawadzki, 2001). This was certainly a progressive move considering Poland’s historical predisposition to the overarching authority of the szlachta.

4.3 The Second Republic

The Second Republic (Druga Rzeczpospolita Polska) is the brief period of Polish independence between the two world wars, 1918-1939. The Polish autonomy of the Second Republic was a testament to the strength of the narrative of resistance within Polish identity and its endurance through 123 years of struggle against foreign oppression. The Polish Republic returned to the map of Europe, filling what Davies (2005b: 291) has termed ‘the void left by the collapse of the three partitioning powers’ at the end of World War One (WWI) (as illustrated in Figure 4.4, p96). While the Polish nation was restored, it was not the end of Polish territorial struggles. Poles engaged in six wars concurrently between 1918-21 with the aim to regain lost borderlands in Lwów in the Ukraine, Pozna in western Poland, Silesia in south western Poland, Wilno in Lithuania, Cieszyn at the foot of the Carpathian Mountains, and most notably against the Soviets in the Polish Soviet War from 1919-1920 (Davies, 2005b)xi. The latter was to leave a lasting mark on the Soviets for future years.

However, the major challenge for the new Republic was the stable integration of the three regions that had been under disparate foreign rule for 123 years. These regions had their own characteristic economic and political circumstances that were further complicated by ethnic, social and class tensions (Nagengast, 1991). Davies (2005b: 298-300) has summarised this situation well: there were six different currencies, five regional centres of administration, four languages of command in the army, two different railway gauges and eighteen political parties. Additionally, Suchodolski (1987) has also detailed the impact of the loss of horses as a source of power in farming, the lack of available land for immediate remediation for agricultural purposes after WWI, and the long exploitation of Polish resources by the former partitioning empires.

95 Figure 4.4 The Second Republic, 1921-1939 (note the inclusion of the Eastern Province of Lwów and the abscence of the prsent day Western Province Wrocaw) Source: Polish Genealogical Society of America (2004)

A further distinguishing feature of the Second Republic was its cultural heterogeneity. Poles comprised 68.9 per cent of the population, Ukrainians 13.9 per cent, Yiddish- speaking Jews 8.7 per cent, Byelorussians 3.1 and Germans 2.3 per cent. Such multiculturalism was indicative of the ethnic composition of the former Polish and Lithuanian Commonwealth of Nations. With the great difficulties facing the newly regained Polish nation – reintegrating the three partitions, placating ethnic minorities and difficulties feeding the nation’s population – Poland again became vulnerable to its powerful neighbours. Each neighbour harboured resentment against the reformation of

96 the Polish state and the lost territories. The German-Soviet Pact of Non-Aggression (The Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact) signed on 23 August 1939 sealed Poland’s fatexii and again destabilised its already insecure reputation as a nation state.

4.4 Poland’s macabre past: World War Two (WWII)

The destruction and inhumanity suffered by Poland during WWII haunts Polish memory. The macabre destruction of WWII – ‘the greatest manmade [sic] catastrophe of all time’ (Ferguson, 2006: xxxiv) – is remembered as an event of sheer brutality. A large majority of this mass destruction occurred on Polish soil. As such, the memory of this period in Polish and world history is manifest in the everyday Polish landscape in the form of monuments, museums and war cemeteries (as discussed in Chapter 6). Despite Poland’s misfortune as the veritable stomping ground for the expansionist and nihilist ambitions of both Hitler and Stalin, two main points about WWII in this period of Polish history are often overlooked within academic and popular literature.

First, suppressed during the okres komunizmu was knowledge of the extent of the Soviet aggression and annihilation in Poland during WWII. The impact of the Soviet influence goes much further than the installation of communist ideology on much of Eastern Europe after WWII. Bullock (1991: 970) has suggested that one reason why Soviet destruction is looked over in Western discourse is because while Hitler’s regime left a ‘legacy of defeat’, Stalin emerged after WWII sporting a ‘legacy of victory’. As the axiom goes (sometimes attributed to Winston Churchill) ‘history is written by the victors’. The outcome of the war effectively shielded the Soviet Union from international criticism, despite its earlier incursions during WWII into Allied aligned territories such as Poland. The Molotov- Ribbentrop Pact secretly signed in 1939 by Germany and Russia had signalled the beginning of Russia’s eastern invasion of Poland. The Soviet Union proceeded to annex territories lost in the Polish-Soviet war and began a process of cultural cleansing in which ethnic Poles were deported to the Soviet Union (Allbrook and Cattalini, 1995). The Soviet deportations of 1939-40, from the eastern provinces of Poland and of Polish nationals living within the Ukrainian and Byelorussianxiii border regions, amounted to almost one and a half million Polish persons exiled to Gulags in Siberia and what is now

97 Kazakhstan (Applebaum, 2003; Davies, 2005b). However, the Nazi’s launch of Operation Barbarossa on 30 July 1941 – Hitler’s move on Moscow – both dissolved the Molotov- Ribbentrop Pact, and led to the granting of an amnesty to all Polish persons ‘deprived of their freedom on the territory of the USSR’ (Applebaum, 2003: 407). This meant that the Poles who had been deported to the Soviet Union were free to leave, but not before nearly half of those Poles originally deported had perished in the harsh arctic conditions.

Many of these newly emancipated Gulag prisoners and deportees formed the new Polish army under the command of General Wadysaw Anders who, prior to the amnesty, had spent twenty months in Lubyanka prison in Moscow. Upon his release following the amnesty, he had negotiated in Moscow for the re-formation of the Polish army on Soviet territory. Yet while there was general acceptance of Anders’ proposal, the Soviets did little to materially or morally support it. So although the Poles were freed, many detainees were not told of the re-formation of their national army due to take place at the Polish Consulate at Kuibyshev, in Russia. Many simply found out by chance from fellow Poles whom they encountered on their travels south to the Black Sea and out of the Soviet Union (Applebaum, 2003). The Soviet Union’s original pact with Germany against Poland, coupled with the deportations of Polish civilians to the Soviet Union left a lasting mark on Polish memory. The longevity of the memories of the Soviet invasion and mistreatment is partly due to the public suppression of these events during the okres komunizmu by the Soviet-led Polish postwar government.

In addition to the large-scale deportation of ordinary citizens to Siberia for forced labour, the Soviet Union was also responsible for the largest massacre of a single group of Polish army officers in the Katy Forest on the Dnieper River near Smolensk in 1940. In 1943, Wermacht soldiers discovered a mass grave at Katy of nearly 25 000 corpses, whose cause of death was a single bullet to the base of each person’s skull (Davies, 2005b). The Nazi administration vehemently denied responsibility for the massacre on the premise that these officers had been taken into Soviet detention in September 1939. Soviet responsibility for this massacre was publicly silenced until 1990, when Gorbachev formally acknowledged Stalin’s role at Katy. Katy is an example of the macabre nature of recent Polish history but also of the influence of changing hegemonies in the Polish 98 memory landscape (as detailed in Chapter 7). The Polish nation was unable to memorialise victims of Katy until 1990. In Soviet controlled post WWII Poland, public knowledge of Katy was suppressed because it challenged the publicly purported Soviet propaganda of a long-standing friendship between Poland and Russia. The effect of this public suppression was that the private sphere of the family became a site for the resolute maintenance of narratives of the massacre over many decades (as discussed in Chapter 7).

The second commonly overlooked aspect of WWII within Anglophone literature is twofold. It involves both the extent to which the war decimated the Polish population and Poland’s unenviable geopolitical predicament post Yaltaxiv. Despite reassurances from the then British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, to the Polish government in exile in London, and the critical role Polish fighter pilots played in the Battle of Britain (see for example: Olson and Cloud, 2004), Poland was undersold at the meeting of Stalin, Churchill and Roosevelt at Yalta in February, 1945. Not only were Poland’s borders to be redrawn along the Curzon Line (denying Poland access to the two historically significant cities of Lwów and Wilno) but more importantly Churchill and Roosevelt gave Stalin control of the provisional government in Warsaw (the borders are shown in Figure 4.5, p100). The (re)drawing of Poland’s post WWII borders also meant that for the first time in history the population was predominantly Polish. However, as Lukowski and Zawadzki (2001: 244) have asserted, ‘for many Poles, Yalta was the ultimate betrayal by their western allies’. The resulting instalment of a foreign hegemony in post WWII Poland not only impacted on both the physical memory landscape, but it also instituted a vast divide between Polish cultural memory in public and private spheres (as discussed in Chapter 7).

Poland’s population suffered considerable losses during WWII. However, had it not been for the existence of Nazi concentration camps in Poland (Auschwitz-Birkenau (1940-5), Majdanek (1941-5), Treblinka (1942-4) and Paszów (1944-5)), it would be easy to overlook Poland’s involvement in the war, especially amid the glorification of American and British heroics. Davies (2005b: 344) has identified an additional reason for this omission of Poland’s wartime involvement: the difficulty of quantifying and distinguishing Polish war dead from Jewish Holocaust victims.

99

Figure 4.5 Poland's borders post 1945 Source: Pease (1992)

He contended that, ‘Jewish investigators tend to count Jewish victims. Polish investigators tend to count Polish victims’, whether Jewish or not. Overall, 2.9 million Polish Jews were killed during WWII and the ‘population of the former Polish republic was reduced by 6,028,000’ (Davies, 2005b: 344). There were also millions of Poles displaced during WWII. Of all the countries embroiled in the war, it was Poland that endured the longest period of foreign occupation, which lasted for five years, six months and 28 days in the town of Gydnia on the Baltic Sea (Davies, 2006). 100 One of the most important details in Polish narrations of WWII was that Poland did not surrender. Its government evacuated and reformed in London and its armed forces continued to fight alongside the Allies outside of Poland for the duration of the war (Brodecki et al, 2005). Further, the Nazis found very few collaborators within the Polish nation. The Nazi’s faced ongoing resistance, including the sixty-three days of fighting in the Warsaw Uprising, which resulted in 200 000 Polish fatalities while the remaining 800 000 residents were forcibly evacuated before the city was razed to the ground (Taras, 1986).

The combination of these factors – destruction through the removal of the territorial state, continued resistance to the occupiers and non-collaboration – enabled the re-emergence and strengthening of the narrative of Messianism. That narrative established a common thread through history of the suffering of the Polish nation and its continual struggle against occupation. These linkages are elaborated in Chapter 5 in reference to the memorialisation of the instigators of Messianism; the Romantic Era émigrés.

4.5 Changing hegemonies of power: Okres Komunizmu (the Communist Period)

Lukowski and Zawadzki (2001) have argued that Poland’s tragedy during the okres komunizmu was again linked to its geography: Poland was on Stalin’s path to Berlin, which was to become part of the Soviet-led government in Democratic Deutschland Republic (DDR). Poland was of particular strategic importance to Stalin’s plans for the Sovietisation of East Central Europe; the actualisation of these plans resulted in the annexure of two-fifths of pre-war Poland to the Soviet Union (Lukowski and Zawadzki, 2001). Davies (2005b: 413) has defined three distinct phases of the Soviet-led Polish ‘People’s Republic’: from 1944 to 1948, the construction of the communist ‘People’s Democracy’; from 1948 to 1956, the period of Stalinism; and from 1956 onwards, the period of ‘native communist rule’ (by Polish national communists). Yet, the final decade (from 1980 to 1990) of Soviet influence in Poland is the most famous. It was in this period that ‘images of striking workers in the shipyards of Gdask and the characteristic white flags with the word Solidarno’ along with their leader, Lech Wasa, became symbols of the Polish flight for independence (Enstad, 2000). The use of emblematic

101 imagery during the shipyard strikes, and during the okres komunizmu more generally, created an important link to historical struggles for freedom from foreign oppressions. For example, striking workers recited Mickiewicz’s poetry along with their own at the Lenin Shipyards in 1980 (Kubik, 1994), highlighting the longstanding relationship between Polish literature and politics. (Furthermore, the cancellation of a production of Mickiewicz’s play, The Forefathers, in 1968, because of its ‘anti-Russian’ overtones, is testament to the perceived threat of patriotic sentiment in Polish literature (Koakowski, 1983)).

Preluding the establishment of Solidarno (The Independent and Self-Governing Trade Union, NSZZ) on 17 September 1980 was the announcement of a round of strikes at the Lenin Shipyards in Gdask, on 14 August 1980. The impetus for the strike had been an increase in meat prices in July 1980 that had already prompted strikes at two factories in Warszawa – the Ursus Tractor Factory and Zeran car assembly plant – and a rail workers strike in Lublin. At Gdask, however, the recollection of the fallen shipyard workers killed in the strikes of 1970 loomed large in the workers’ memories. Thus, at the shipyards, 17 000 workers went on strike. They demanded: the reinstatement of Wasa and Anna Walentynowicz (a long-term employee sacked for ‘disciplinary reasons’); a guarantee of no reprisals; a wage increase of 2000 zoty a month; family subsidies such as those given to police and security services; the return to normal meat prices; and, the permission to erect a monument to the 1970 Gdask shipyard workers (Dobbs et al., 1981; Kemp-Welch, 1983; Kubik, 1994; MacShane, 1981). During the unprecedented periods that followed the strikes (from 31 August 1980 to 12 December 1981), the trade union movement gained significant support, with 6 million members joining within 16 days of its formation (Garton-Ash, 1999). What distinguished Solidarno from previous attempts to establish free trade unions in Poland was that it was a ‘mass social movement committed to the democratisation of political life, the dismantling of the command economy, and the introduction of autonomous production units’ (Lukowski and Zawadzki, 2001: 274). Through strong membership, Solidarno challenged the legitimacy and authority of the Soviet-led Polish government, which quickly lost control of 90 per cent of its workers in the weeks following the legalisation by the Polish judiciary of Solidarno

102 on 31 August 1980 (Enstad, 2000). The movement posed the first sustained threat to the continuance of a Soviet authority in Poland. Hence, the regime’s response, once a national compromise failed on 4 November 1981, was the initiation of Martial Law.

The declaration of Martial Law on the 13 December 1981 sought to curb

the independent social forces and reform hopes of 1980-1981, to administer a severe psychological shock to the Poles and to halt the processes of political contestation, social unrest and economic collapse (Sanford, 1986).

The resulting Military Council of National Salvation (WRON) was headed by General Wojciech Jaruzelski who oversaw the suspension of all social organisations, the militarisation of factories, transport and communications, a general curfew, and the arrest of Wasa along with 6000 Solidarity activists (Lukowski and Zawadzki, 2001). Martial Law formally ended in July 1983, and Jaruzelski’s government continued to make little progress towards achieving the aims of Martial Law during the mid 1980s. Increasing foreign debt, decreases in industrial production and quality of life, as well as another round of food shortages, provided the impetus for many young Poles to migrate. Korcelli (1992) has noted the changes to the outflow of Polish immigrants during the 1980s: in 1981, 79 000 Poles migrated, whereas in 1982 the instigation of Martial Law saw this number drop to 27 000. However, after this period with ‘liberalisation of passport policies’ migration steadily increased with a peak of 230 000 emigrants in 1988 (Korcelli, 1992: 293). It was not until 1988 following three years of ongoing strikes that the government agreed to roundtable talks with Solidarno, which finally occurred on 6 February 1989. While several years of propaganda had targeted the Solidarno movement, Martial Law was deeply unpopular, especially because it constituted the first use of the Polish Militia (albeit Soviet controlled) against the Polish people. As Cirtautas (1997) has argued, the weakening of both Solidarno and the Polska Zjednoczona Partia Robotnicza (PZPR, the Polish United Workers Party) during Martial Law created an environment in which peaceful negotiations were possible.

103 4.5.1 Maintaining sites of resistance in a ‘non-religious’ state: the church, the Pontiff and the clergy

Throughout the okres komunizmu in Poland, the Catholic Church posed a constant and real threat to the government’s authority. Sawicki and Sawicka-Brockie (1982: 11) have argued that during that time the church became ‘an institution rallying social and political opposition’, and ‘an outlet for feelings of national humiliation’. The church again became a site of resistance and an outlet that linked Catholicism once more with a Polish narrative of resisting and struggling against foreign oppression. It also provided a substantial link to the experiences of Poles during the partitioned period. Thus, pro-Solidarity priests, like Father Jerzy Popieuszko – murdered in October 1984 by members of the Ministry of Interior – posed a serious threat to the ongoing legitimacy and authority of the Soviet’s dogma. Davies (2005b) and Michnik (1993) have argued that Popieuszko’s murder only further exposed the infallibility of the PZPR, as international and domestic pressure for retribution led to the unprecedented prosecution and sentencing of the party members responsible. Furthermore, the clergy’s readiness to ‘suffer for the cause’, along with the Pope’s two visits from the Vatican in 1979 and 1983, strengthened the church’s position as the ‘shepherd of the nation’ (Davies, 2005b: 499).

The timing of the election in 1978 of the first non-Italian Pope for 460 years was indeed fortuitous: the Pope’s country of birth, Poland, was in political and economic turmoil. Cardinal Karol Józef Wojtya was elected and took the name John Paul II. The Pope’s election triggered an intensification of the Catholic Church’s stature in Poland and generated an atmosphere of religious fervour. Poles now had an alternative authority to which to look for moral and religious guidance, and the PZPR’s stranglehold over public discourse was significantly weakened (Cviic, 1983; Holzer, 1990; Kubik, 1994). Following his election, the Pope made clear his intentions to visit his homeland. When the Pontiff first visited in 1979, millions of Poles undertook pilgrimages to see him. Kubik (1994: 145) has argued that as a result of the visit ‘John Paul II emerged as the central symbol of national identity’. Indeed, his concern for the governmental situation in Poland was evident in the political overtones of several of his sermonsxv. In the following

104 year, his support for Solidarno lent considerable moral credibility and effectively international support to the movement.

Under Martial Law, government authorities forbade the Pontiff from visiting Poland. Despite this, he remained heavily involved in the mediation process between Jaruzelski’s coup and the Polish Episcopate led by Primate Cardinal Glemp (see for example: Szajkowski, 1983: 155-220). The 1981 assassination attempt, purportedly instigated by Russian KGB (Lukowski and Zawadzki, 2001), slowed the negotiation process, stunned the Polish nation and ultimately exposed the significance of the Polish Pontiff to the ongoing authority of the regime. It was not until after the cessation of Martial Law in 1983 that the Pope returned to Poland, and both sides stipulated conditions for the visit. The Soviet-led Polish government authorities insisted that he spend only one night in Warsaw and stay the remainder of the visit at Jasna Góra, from where he would travel by helicopter in order minimise contact with the wider population (Szajkowski, 1983). The Vatican accepted these conditions on the proviso that an amnesty be set up for all pro- Solidarno affiliated prisoners arrested after Martial Law. Through his involvement and support of the Solidarno campaign, he provided ordinary Poles with a sense of hope, and as he stated at the meeting of the Polish Episcopate in Czstochowa during his second visit, ‘the Church in Poland is intimately bound up with the life of the nation’. The late Pontiff’s involvement in Solidarno negotiations brought international attention to Poland, a country that Poles believed had not yet perished.

Historically, the town of Czstochowa encapsulates the struggle for survival of Polish identity through Polish history. Its church and monastery on Jasna Góra (Bright Mountain) house the shrine to the Black Madonna, Our Lady of Czstochowa (as shown in Figure 4.6, p106)xvi. Czstochowa became an essential stop on the visits of Catholic dignitaries, including the late Pope John Paul II and Cardinal Stefan Wyszyski, the late Primate of Poland. On the latter’s visit as part of the preparations for the celebration of 1000 years of Christianity in Poland, Wyszyski proposed that a copy of the Black Madonna portrait travel the country before official celebrations commenced at Czstochowa. When it was travelling between churches, however, Soviet authorities seized the portrait, returned it to Czstochowa and refused to allow it outside of Jasna 105 Góra (Michnik, 1993). Wyszyski had succeeded in exposing the vulnerability of the Soviet-led Polish government to the established links between Polish Catholicism and Polish identity, while also strengthening the authority of religious symbolism to Polish identity. Indeed, Kubik (1994) has argued that during the 1970s pilgrimages to Czstochowa became synonymous with demonstrations of Polishness because the church’s discourse provided a tangible historical link to national identification. In addition, such pilgrimages became sites of resistance to ‘foreign tyranny’ (Szajkowski, 1983: 2). More recently, during the 1980 Solidarno strikes at the Lenin Shipyards in Gdask, pictures of the Black Madonna were displayed both on the rooftop of the shipyard building and at Gate Two (the site of exchanges between the outside world and the striking workers). Dobbs et al. (1981) have highlighted that an important part of Wasa’s public image included the characteristic lapel badge displaying the Black Madonna as Poland’s patron saint.

Figure 4.6 Black Madonna Our Lady of Czstochowa Source: artist unknown (c.1434), painting on wooden panel 122.2 x 82.2 x 3.5 cms

106 4.6 Niepodlego (Independence)

The PZPR’s inability to resolve the dire financial state of the government without bringing on a paralysing new round of strikes or reinitiating Martial Law, resulted in an election being declared for 4 June 1989. It was the first semi-free election in the Soviet controlled East/Central Europe, whereby PZPR allowed (only) 35 per cent of seats in the Sejm and all 100 seats in the Senate to be contested by non-PZPR candidates. However, in the remaining 65 per cent of seats in the Senate the PZPR fell victim to an old constitutional rule that required a 50 per cent vote of approval, which they achieved in only five government-backed seats (Lukowski and Zawadzki, 2001). Jaruzelski himself won the Presidency by only one vote, and resigned ten days later. The fundamental outcomes of this election were as follows: first, under the slogan ‘Your President, Our Prime Minister’ published in the pro-Solidarity newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza, Tadeusz Mazowiecki was appointed as the first non-communist Prime Minister since the okres komunizmu began; second, Wasa quickly realised that two smaller communist aligned parties (Zjednoczone Stronnictwo Ludowe, the United Peasant Party and Stronnictwo Demokratyczne, the Democratic Party) could be persuaded to join a large pro-Solidarno led coalition in the Sejm; and last, as part of the original round-table negotiations Solidarno established a declaration that ensured entirely free elections within four years (Davies, 2005b). Symbolic gestures (re)defining Polish national identity ensued, including the placement of the crown back on the Polish emblem of the White Eagle (symbolising Poland as a Kingdom with the Virgin Mary as Queen) and the renaming of the country to Rzeczpospolita Polska, the Polish Republic. However, the PZPR still controlled the Government. For example, Jaruzelski was still able to dissolve the sejm (Davies, 2005b).

There are several other important events in this recent period. The Balcerowicz Plan (also known as the period of ‘shock therapy’), introduced on 1 January 1990, initiated Poland’s transformation to a capitalist economy. This period of transition brought many institutional changes, such as privatisation and the decentralisation of governmental control, but it also brought high levels of unemployment and decreased productivity (Davies, 2005b). In October 1992, Poland witnessed the first fully free elections with Wasa elected as President. However, by this stage the original Solidarno political

107 party and the former PZPR had both split into smaller rival groups, leaving the Sejm fragmented and dominated by small party groupings. The next parliamentary elections, in 1995, saw the revolt against Wasa, whose presidential style had been described as ‘unpredictable, high handed, and occasionally petty’ (Davies, 2005b:512; Lukowski and Zawadzki, 2001). Meanwhile the population was starting to experience the benefits of the Balcerowicz Plan. The newly elected President Kwaniewski was leader of the post- communist Sojusz Lewicy Demokratycznej (SLD), Democratic Left Alliance. Under Kwaniewski’s presidency, Poland joined NATO in 1999 and the European Union in 2003. In the recent 2005 election, the Prawo i Sprawiedliwo (Law and Justice Party) was elected to government led by President Lech Kaczyski. Due to the inability of his brother the Prime Minister Jarosaw Kaczyski’s government to form and maintain a parliamentary majority in the Sejm (the lower house), early elections were held in 2007. In the largest voter turn out since 1989, the Prawo i Sprawiedliwo party suffered a significant defeat and the Platforma Obywatelska (Civic Platform) gained the majority in the Sejm. Donald Tusk became Poland’s new Prime Minister.

4.7 Moving forward: (re)producing and (re)negotiating Polish cultural memory

In this chapter, I have provided a historical outline of Poland that has centred on elucidating the development of a narrative of struggle and resistance against foreign occupation during the partitioning of Poland. This period of partitioned Polish history has had the decisive impact of bolstering the strength and necessity to continue a narrative of resistance to foreign occupation into the contemporary era. As I demonstrate in the following chapters (Chapters 5, 6 and 7), it is a narrative that dominates to this day. Yet the genealogy of this narrative was founded in the social, political and economic conditions that proceeded the partitioned period. The exploitation of the liberum veto by the szlachta resulted in the effective disintegration of the legislative ability of the Polish State. Unable to govern itself Poland lay susceptible to its powerful neighbours. During the partitioned period (1795 to 1918), the continuation of narratives of resistance and struggle to foreign oppression were tantamount to the ongoing maintenance of Polish identity. Because Poland experienced two further defining periods of hegemonic rule, subsequent to the partitioned period, the plight for autonomy became deeply rooted in the

108 national psyche. Thus, the partitioned period has left many legacies. Most notably, as seen in these two 20th Century periods of struggle – during WWII and the okres komunizmu – the historically embedded narrative of Messianism has continued to be pertinent to contemporary understandings of Polish identity.

In the next chapter, I explain how this historical outline has been encapsulated in the (re)productions and transmission of cultural memory in public and private settings. The first setting, in the Polish public sphere, cultural memories have been materialised using visual imagery in the form of monuments of the Romantic Era personalities in the Planty, in Kraków. This memorialisation links the history of the narrative of resistance to a parallel Polish experience of emigration. Both these narratives have been important parts of the Polish historical storyline (as discussed in this chapter, section 4.2). In analysis of the second setting, I focus on the private realm of the home in the Australian Polish diaspora. In this setting, I trace how the Polish language, custom and memories continue to be used to maintain Polish identity.

i While both texts are written in English, they are widely accepted as accurate and one is used in the Polish school system. ii These names correspond to the modern day nations of Poland and the Czech Republic, with Ruthenia now comprising Russia, Belarus and Ukraine. iii Muscovy is a historical region of western-central Russia (capital Moscow) founded in c.1280 and existing as a separate state until the 16th century, at which time it was amalgamated into the Russian Empire. iv The Sejm, developed in the 15th century as a national legislative authority that grew out of the amalgamation of smaller regional based councils called Wiec. In 1463, it was changed into a two-chamber institution of the Senate and the Sejm, ‘whose deputies represented the Sejmiki’ – the local territorial governments (Lerski, 1996). The Sejm represented one early examples of democratic government in Slavic and greater Europe and it functioned primarily to legislate bills and taxes, confer nobility status and discuss foreign policy (Lerski, 1996). The Sejm comprises szlachta and elected representatives of the Council of Landlords (higher landed bureaucracy) (Lerski, 1996). However, the Senate was not elective – ‘its members were appointed by the monarch from among the highest state officers’ – and it functioned to ‘give instructions to their Deputies to the Sejm and listen to their reports’ (Lerski, 1996: 534). v The social standing of the szlachta was aggregated against the number villages they owned – ‘poor’ szlachta owned less than one village, ‘middle szlachta owned one to five villages, ‘well-to-do’ szlachta owned six to ten villages, ‘wealthy’ owned ten to fifteen, and ‘very wealthy’ owned fifteen to twenty villages (Kaminski, 1983). Notably, a szlachta could also be landless and live from the land as a peasant, despite their similar material circumstances; the szlachta would always be afforded greater opportunities for social mobility and access to the legal system (Kaminski, 1983). vi A Magnate owned over 20 villages.

109 vii The figure for the percentage of Polish nobility is quoted by Kaminski (1983) as being slightly higher at 10 per cent. This is based on his utilisation of Wodzmierz Dworzaczek’s criterion for determining membership to the Polish aristocracy, whereby the nobleman in question had to be part of a long standing family of high economic standing, had served in the Senate and had connections with other aristocratic families through marriage (Kaminski, 1983: 25). viii The development of a concept of national identity arose as a consequence of several determining historical events: the advent of the printing press and print media in vernacular languages; the movement from small scale village economies to economies of scale; the decline in the influence of dynastic and monarchistic rule throughout Europe; and the decline of the role of religion and religious authority (Anderson, 1991; Hobsbawm, 1992; Hobsbawm and Ranger, 1983). Poland does not necessarily fit these preconditions. While there was an increase in the number of urban residents in Poland after WWII, Davies (2005b: 133) argued that ‘throughout the modern period and right until WWII, the Polish population was overwhelmingly rural in character’. In fact, the urban population at the time of the final partition (1795) was only 10 per cent and grew to only 31.8 per cent in the first post-war census in 1946 (Davies, 2005b). The first printing press arrived in Kraków in 1476. However, at that time (and through the partitions) the szlachta and the clergy were the only social classes likely to have access to available literature and to be literate. Furthermore, Poland remained under monarchistic rule until 1793 and the Catholic Church has continued to be synonymous with Polish identity. ix Kociuszko would later travel to America and take part in the Wars of Independence. He is also the namesake for Australia’s highest mountain, named by Polish geologist Edmund Strzelecki. x This is by no means an exhaustive list of influential Polish literary figures, such as list would include Sienkiewicz, Miosz, Conrad, Kochanowski, Norwid, and Rej to name a few. However, in the context of the era of Romanticism and which for Poland was coupled with numerous insurrections, these three writers are the most commonly referenced for their significant contributions to Polish literature and national identity. In the section that follows, Mickiewicz’s work will be discussed further. xi The Austrian empire gained Lwów and Cieszyn in the Carpathians in the first partition in 1772. Prussia orginially gained Pozna and Siliesia in the second partition in 1793. Russia annexed Wilno in the final partition in 1795. xii The Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact (or the German-Soviet Pact of Non-Aggression) was negotiated and signed under the guise of German-Soviet trade talks, it effectively sealed the fate of Poland during WWII as evident by the following clause: ‘In the event of a territorial and political rearrangement of the areas belonging to the Polish state the spheres of influence of Germany and the USSR shall be bounded approximately by the line of the rivers Narew, Vistula, and San’ (Davies, 2005b: 321). xiii Byelorussia was a constituent republic of the Soviet Union and is today recognised as the Republic of Belarus. xiv Yalta was the location for the first meeting by Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin in February 1945. xv This was especially evident in the sermon he delivered at Mogia, near the purposely-Socialist constructed steelwork town Nowa Huta, where he stated, ‘Remember this: Christ will never agree to man being viewed only as a means of production’ (Szajkowski, 1983: 70). xvi The Black Madonna holds an esteemed position within narratives of Polish cultural identity. Reflected in the thousands of annual pilgrimages to the shrine located at Jasna Góra monastery in Czstochowa is ‘her position as the Patroness and Defender of Polish sovereignty, national identity, and culture’, and the narratives of the Queen of Poland miraculously saving Poland from defeat on several occasions (Kubik, 1994: 110). Szajkowski (1983: 2) argued that the importance of the Black Madonna lies both in its religious symbolism, and as ‘a symbol of Poland’s resistance to foreign tyranny’. Indeed, in Polish history, tyranny comes in many forms and resistance to it was again evident during the partitions, when Jasna Góra was again the last line of defense in the war sparked by the Confederates of the Bar during the Russian partition in 1771 Davies (2005a). During the partitioned period the Black Madonna represented the ‘main revolutionary’ and the number of pilgrimages in this period did not decrease. Within contemporary narratives, the connection of the Black Madonna with the ‘Miracle on the Wisa’ (Vistula River), involves the defence of Warszawa from Russian invasion during the Russo-Polish Wars of 1918 (Szajkowski, 1983).

110 Chapter 5 – Maintaining Polishness: Imaginations and (re)formations of the Polish language

…the nurturing of a collective memory and social cohesion [comes] through the representation of national narratives in symbolic places, monumental forms, and performance. Taken together, these constitute the geography of identity (Osborne, 2001: 40, original emphasis).

5.1 Introduction

In this chapter, I have drawn on and developed key themes emerging from the historical outline of Poland (Chapter 4). These themes centre on exposing how the maintenance of Polish identity has occurred through acts of resistance, and in spite of numerous struggles against successive foreign occupiers. This chapter focuses on how cultural memories have been (re)produced and communicated through the Polish language, imagery and symbolism. The continuing use of the Polish language has been of particular significance to the ongoing survival of Polish identity both through periods of foreign occupation, and in diaspora. During foreign occupation, hegemonic acts of Polish language suppression included changing the language of instruction in schools, as well as in public offices and administration. The Polish language has played the important role of safeguarding Polish identity through times of occupation and across different settings. In this process of maintaining identity, these different settings have acted as the conduits through which the Polish language is communicated and commemorated. Different groups of Poles have also created places where the Polish language could be spoken, and thus preserved. This chapter has two parts, which accord to the different research settings in this thesis. In Part 1, I have detailed the (re)production and transmission of cultural memories in the public setting of the Planty, in Krakow – an area of green open space surrounding the city’s Old Town. In Part 2, I have shifted the focus to the private spheres of identity maintenance that have been constructed by the Polish diaspora in Australia.

In Part 1, I detail the (re)productions and transmissions of cultural memories that have commemorated the Polish language and the cultural arts associated with the Romantic Era

111 artists in the Planty. I trace how Polish narratives of resistance, as these Romantic Era artists expressed them, have been memorialised through the construction of six monuments. In this chapter, I show that the commemoration of the Romantics encourages the transmission of Polish cultural memories using symbolism and imagery. The Romantics used the Polish language, art and music to convey patriotic messages of resistance to occupied Polish publics. In doing so, they popularised a narrative of Polish identity maintenance in the national consciousness. The monuments commemorating them are stoic reminders of resistance and occupation. They capture the patriotic Polish literature and art of the Romantic Era as fundamental methods of identity maintenance through this period of foreign rule and partitioning. The monuments are positioned in the everyday landscape of the Planty. Residents and visitors, traverse the Planty on their way in and out of Kraków’s Old Town. As such, these monuments and their narratives, portray everpresent reminders of resistance, struggle and patriotism in the contemporary landscape. However, they also remind contemporary audiences of how the suppression of Polishness was actively resisted. The monuments use symbolism to transmit these cultural memories. Through the (de)construction of this symbolism, I have shown how these public articulations of memory convey hidden messages, which provide linkages to forms of private sphere identity maintenance.

In Part 2, I examine how the Polish language has been variously maintained by the two main waves of Polish migrants to Australia. Both migrant cohorts have positioned the continued use of the Polish language as integral to sustaining Polish identity in diaspora. Yet, each wave enacted this sentiment differently. The maintenance of Polish identity through the use of the Polish language in private settings has involved the construction of distinctly Polish-speaking spheres. These private Polish spheres have not only enabled Polish to be spoken, but also social practices and cultural traditions to be continued in diasporic Polish communities and in the home. In this part of the chapter, I trace how the migrants’ use of ‘Polish places’ has been influenced by differing levels of language and identity suppression experienced in Poland before emigration to Australia. These different pre-migration experiences have affected how each group has enacted Polish language maintenance in diaspora. Moreover, they have also influenced the level of perceived

112 importance placed on the active maintenance of the language through diasporic generations.

The overarching intention of this chapter is to show how the Polishness, particularly the language has been variously interpreted and materially articulated to maintain Polish identity. In the next section, I explore these articulations in one Polish public place – the Planty, in Kraków.

Part 1 Public re-imaginations: (re)productions and transmissions of Polishness through language and symbolism

5.2 Remembrances of the Polish language: Commemorating the Romantics

In Part 1 of this chapter, I explore how in the Planty, Kraków, Poles have chosen to commemorate and celebrate (the language of) the Romantics. As discussed in Chapter 4, during the partitioned period the Romantics articulated a newly emerging national consciousness through participation in uprisings and the production of patriotic cultural artefacts. In this section I focus on the latter contribution to the Polish cause, the (re)production of narratives of Polishness through literature, poetry and art. In the Planty, these narratives are (re)produced through the use of six monuments, which act as the transmitters of cultural memories to contemporary populations using this central public space. These monuments were constructed in an era of foreign subjugation, and this draws attention to the importance of the use of Polish language and imagery as a means of perpetuating Polish identity.

My discussion of these publicly articulated cultural memories is informed by the cultural turn in human geography. The cultural turn has championed the use of a constructivist approach to uncover the multiple interpretations and context specificity of ‘culture’ and ‘identity’. Using the Planty monuments as an example, I have argued that there are multiple ways of (re)producing Polish cultural memories but in this place they have converged around a common objective. This objective focuses on ensuring the continuance of historical narratives of resistance and struggle to foreign occupation. These cultural memories are positioned in an everyday location. The Planty is a popular

113 thoroughfare surrounding Kraków’s Old Town. Memorialisation in the everyday landscape links the past to the present and can comprise memory markers – monuments, street names, historic sites and public squares (Koshar, 2000). Such materialisations of memory portray cultural memories in the public sphere to contemporary audiences. Forest et al. (2004: 358) likened articulations of cultural memory in the public sphere to ‘the cultural spaces and processes through which a society understands, interprets and negotiates myths about its past’. In the Polish context, narratives of the past involve struggle against foreign oppression. Current generations of Poles living in Poland have understood this narrative because they have lived under different foreign regimes. As such, cultural memories as articulated in the public places perform the integral function of informing, preserving and popularising specific characteristics of a nation’s past. In the Polish case, the landscape has been used as a conduit for preserving and protecting narratives of identity. In the Planty, I have revealed how the (re)production of cultural memoires have been linked to a specific historical era, the partitioned period and to those who campaigned for Polish autonomy during this period.

During the Romantic Era, Poland was under partition by the Austrian, Prussian and Russian Empires. A national discourse developed during that time to maintain, preserve and safeguard Polish identity. As argued in Chapter 4 (Section 4.2), the establishment of this national narrative was a reaction to the assimilationist intentions of the country’s historical (and contemporary) foreign occupiers. The ‘Romantics’ launched this narrative of active resistance to foreign occupation through the production of patriotic artistic work, including music and art but particularly literature and poetry. These art forms were a means of communication of national sentiment. Numerous failed uprisings (The Kosciuszko Insurrection 1794, November Uprising 1830-1861, Kraków Uprising 1846 and the January Uprising 1863) resulted in ever-increasing censorship and recriminations by the partitioning powers, but also in an alternate means of conveying a message of ongoing resistance. In the context of cultural suppression, language, literature and other arts because mechanisms by which Polish identity could be championed and maintained. The clandestine productions of these art forms, and their dissemination and distribution

114 ensured that educated Poles were able to feel part of the resistance to foreign occupation in their everyday lives.

5.2.1 Commemorations and representations of the Romantics in the Planty

The memorialisation of Romantic Era personalities in the Planty is significant because it draws attention to the geneses of collective notions of Polish identity. It also highlights how the narrative of struggle and resistance has been (re)produced through Romantic Era literature and other art. Moreover, the placement of national poets, writers and artists in a highly visible everyday thoroughfare demonstrates the importance of the cultural arts, and particularly the use of language, within publicly articulated national discourse. As a central and highly pedestrianised public place, the Planty provided an example of how the past informs present day interpretations of Polish identity. The Planty monuments tie this everyday place back to the partitioned period, when the Polish language was a principal avenue for the perpetuation of Polish identity. During that period, the Polish language was a suppressed vernacular. Through literature, poetry and everyday discussion, the Polish language communicated the patriotic ideas of Poles fighting for Polish independence, both in diasporic exile and in Poland. In the absence of a formal Polish state, these Romantics played a critical role in maintaining Polish identity, and their patriotic sentiments appealed to the vast populations across the former Polish-Lithuanian territories. The memorials commemorating the Romantic’s contribution to identity maintenance in the Planty make the national cause visible in the vernacular landscape. They have provided constant public reminders of the ‘historical mission’ of Polish independence (Walicki, 2001: 18) (Chapter 4, Section 4.2.3) to which many devoted their lives.

Six of the eleven monuments in the Planty depict writers or artists who were active during either the Romantic Era and the period of Young Polandi (Chapter 4, Section 4.2.4) (Table 5.1). Following Forest et al. (2004), I argue here that the Planty is a cultural place, a highly visible and accessible public landscape utilised to communicate important themes of Polish cultural memory and identity maintenance.

115 Table 5.1 Planty monuments depicting Romantic Era personalities Monument Depiction Year erected Historical Era Occupation Micha Baucki (1837-1901) 1911 Romantic Writer and playwright Wernyhora and Child* 1886 Romantic Poet and writer (Józef Bohdan Zaleski, 1802-1886) Lilla Weneda* 1884 Romantic Poet and writer (Juliusz Sowacki, 1809-1849) Artur Grottger (1837-1867) 1903 Romantic Artist Grayna* 1886 Romantic Poet and writer (Adam Mickiewicz, 1798-1855) Tadeusz Boy-eleski (1874-1941) 1979 Young Poland Writer and satirist

* In these monuments the Romantic Era personalities are depicted through characters of their poetry.

These monuments are representative of the messages championed in the Romantic Era. They are emblematic of how the Polish language and art has been used to maintain tangible links to Polish culture – an undertaking of active resistance in what seemed to be a futile cause. With the exception of Micha Baucki and Tadeusz Boy-eleski, these ‘Romantics’ were émigrés who produced their patriotic art, literature and poetry in diaspora, mostly in Paris. In fact, Mickiewicz, Sowacki and Zaleski all died without ever returning to their homeland. Grottger returned briefly in 1865 but went back to Paris the next year, where he passed away.

Krzyzanowski (1968) has argued that the émigrés undertook the work of state institutions that would normally have been responsible for cultural maintenance. These institutions were absent because of the cultural and religious repression by the three partitioning powers, Austria, Prussia and Russia (Chapter 4, Section 4.2.4). In the absence of such Polish institutions, the Polish language and patriotic art forms became a means of resistance against the assimilationist intentions of the partitioning powers – against the loss of Polish identity.

Represented in the Planty are two of the three “bards” of Polish literature, Mickiewicz and Sowacki. Notably, both poets are represented through two female characters. In the following sections (5.2.1.1 and 5.2.1.2), I have analysed the use of this symbolism as a forms of remembering Polishness. I have drawn on the interpretations of and commentaries on the two poems in question, Grayna and Lilla Weneda, by Miosz (1969) 116 and Krzyzanowski (1968; 1978) (Appendix F). Using these commentaries, I have sought to interpret the representations of these poets in the public sphere. Symbolised in their monuments was the defining Polish message of struggle for freedom from the oppression of foreign occupiers. These two poets has popularised this message in public settings.

5.2.1.1 The commemoration of Adam Mickiewicz (1798-1855)

Mickiewicz is a poet of note in Polish literature. Reflecting Poland’s subjugation and Mickiewicz’s status in exile, his work is infused with patriotic spirit and nostalgia for a country lost. Mickiewicz’s Ode to Youth (1819) is largely credited as being the first Polish poem written in the Romantic style. That places the commencement of the age of Romanticism in Poland before the November Uprising (1830-1831). However, it was the years following the November Uprising, when Mickiewicz was in Paris, which many authors credit as his most productive (Fagin, 1977; Krzyzanowski, 1968; Miosz, 1955; Miosz, 1969). While a large monument to Mickiewicz assumes a central vantage point in Kraków’s Rynek Gowny (Main Square), his representation in the Planty (Figure 5.1) appears via the title character of an earlier poem, Grayna (1823). Grayna is one of two poems in the second volume of Mickiewicz’s Poezyje (Poems) – a two-volume work of poetry known for its incorporation of folk motifs and rhythms. The character Grayna is a heroine, a wife and a commander, as well as a love interest (Miosz, 1969). Miosz (1969: 214) argued that Mickiewicz’s use of a ‘a heroic woman fascinated the public’. The selection of the character of Grayna from this poem is an intriguing choice. Grayna is far from Mickiewicz’s most patriotic or well-known poemii.

117 Figure 5.1 Grayna and Litawor (1823), Planty, Kraków Source: 36-108mm/digital/exp.auto/DD

Heroism and honour are central themes of the poem. The heroism derives from Grayna upholding her husband Litawor’s honour by foiling a disreputable pact that he made with the Teutonic knights – Poland’s enemies. In this pact, Litawor would help the Teutonic knights to overthrow the ruler of his homeland, the Grand Duke of Lithuania. However, Grayna took up arms against the Teutonic knights and died in battle protecting her homeland, while also saving her husband from the dishonour of an alliance with the enemy. The intrigue of the monument lies foremost in the positioning of a female as the heroic character. Grayna is placed above the male character. She looks down on him while he is sleeping. Depicted in a traditionally male capacity, she is dressed in her

118 husband’s armour, carrying a sword and wearing a helmet. She is ready for battle. She is in motion, setting her plan in action. Meanwhile, her husband remains inert.

Two themes relating to the maintenance of Polish identity are exhibited in this monument. First, through the choice of a female hero, the monument alludes to the role of women as the custodians of Polish identity. Women played an important role during foreign occupation, when maintenance of cultural memory and identity was spirited into the private spheres of Polish homes (as discussed later in this Chapter 5, Section 5.2.3). In private settings, Polish identity was safeguarded away from the public censorship and repression enacted by the Austrian, Russian and Prussian occupiers. Second, by representing Mickiewicz and his work, the monument refers both to the struggle for Polish independence during the partitions, but also to the role of the Polish arts and language in that struggle. During this struggle, literary and musical works were a means of resistance. They were smuggled back to Poland from places such as Paris, where Poles such as Mickiewicz were in diasporic exile. For example, the suppression of Polish identity extended during this period to the prohibition of Romantic patriotic literature and art. Due to the persuasive power and overt patriotism of Mickiewicz’s literature, the authorities forbade even any mention of Mickiewicz’s name in the mid 19th Century (Miosz, 1969). Accordingly, the transmission of Romantic literature, such as that produced by Mickiewicz, occurred primarily in private settings, by women to their children and grandchildren. Indeed, Davies (2005b: 44) has argued that ‘the mechanism of transmission [of patriotic sentiment] owed a great deal to a particular breed of courageous and strong-minded women’.

The monument of Grayna in the Planty has embodied that feminine courage through Grayna’s costume of armour. Moreover, her costume of armour and plans for battle, are seemingly ‘out of place’ for the portrayal of a woman in an everyday public landscape. Warner (1985: 124) has suggested that in such monuments ‘[female] bodies are made masculine through buckler, breastplate, helmet and spear’, creating a non-normative representation of females in monumental form. Warner (1985) has controversially contended that the symbolism of women donning armour is linked to the need to strengthen a woman’s inherent physical and metaphorical weakness. She has also argued 119 that such monuments invoke a sense of women’s ‘law-abiding chastity, [and] their virtuous consent to patriarchal monogamy’ (Warner, 1985: 124). Grayna’s character defies both of Warner’s contentions. Her strength is emphasised through her opposition of the patriarchal tradition of war and the championing of her country over her husband.

That Grayna is ‘a poem decrying collaboration with the enemy’, as Miosz (1969: 214) has pointed out, relates again to the second significant theme of Polish identity maintenance during occupation. The topic of collaboration has remained highly contentious to this day, nearly twenty years after the end of the okres komunizmuiii. The “true” national spirit of Poles of course, decries collaboration. Indeed, the portrayal of the theme of non-collaboration in the monument of Grayna is a continuation of longstanding sentiments not only of resistance, but also of Poland as in opposition to foreign occupiers. Mickiewicz, through his poetry, articulated the Polish cause and struggle for the reinstatement of the Polish nation within Grayna.

The monument of Grayna in the Planty is a symbolic sign of gratitude for Mickiewicz’s contribution to the Polish cause. Not only did Mickiewicz write and lecture about resistance, but eventually died for this cause; while organising a Polish legion against the Russian forces in the Crimean war. The ‘historical mission’ of the Romantics was to energise a collective narrative of Poles resisting foreign suppression. Another bard of literature, Sowacki, also contributed to the Polish struggle for autonomy.

5.2.1.2 The commemoration of Juliusz Sowacki (1809-1849)

Sowacki left Poland on a diplomatic mission to London during the November Uprising and its failure prompted him to seek exile in Paris. Sowacki has often been described as the extreme opposite of Mickiewicz in both style and upbringing. Yet, their ashes lie side by side at Wawel Castle in Kraków. Representing Sowacki in the Planty is his female character Lilla Weneda (1839) (Figures 5.2). In his poem Lilla Weneda, Sowacki wrote about the rise and fall of a nation using two mythical and ancient ‘tribes’ pitted against each other. One tribe, the Weneds were the original owners of the land who fought the

120 invading Lechs. The interference of one trivial character, who disrupts the destiny of and ultimately victory for the Weneds, is integral to the poems narrative of struggle.

Figure 5.2 Lilla Weneda (1839), Planty, Kraków Source: (left) 36-1088mm/digital/exp.auto Source: (right) Kobos (2003)

This monument presents a more evocative image of the female body, with a snake extending from the ground up around Lilla’s exposed torso towards the harp held in her hands. Lilla’s personification in the Planty is in stark contrast to the armoured figure of Grayna. Lilla’s naked torso, her closed eyes and demure composure present a more classical representation of a feminine figure. Warner (1985: 324) stated that feminine nakedness expresses a close association with nature outside the realm of our ‘flawed and fallen world’. Sowacki’s external world was flawed because it was a world in which 121 Poland no longer existed. The means of regaining independence for the Weneds is the harp held aloft in Lilla’s arms. Despite its closeness, she is unable to secure victory and freedom for her family and tribe. The proximity of a snake to the harp represents the external threat closing in on their autonomy – the everpresent vulnerability of a nation’s independence. In Sowacki’s poem, the closeness of the threat is enacted by the trivial but ultimately decisive intervention of a marginal character who inhibits Lilla from taking the harp to her father, the leader of the Wened tribe.

The poem is allegoric of the Polish struggle through war and subjugation, and of the everpresent threat of continuing occupation. Krzyzanowski (1968:139) argued that in this poem Sowacki examined the power that moved nations, which he attributed to both to

the inhuman thirst for influence and domination, and in the weakness which in some nations, after long periods of flourishing and wealth, dooms them to exhaustion and decline.

The rationale for placing this narrative in a public place is revealed in Krzyzanowski’s (1968) summation of Sowacki’s poem. He argued that Sowacki had aimed to awaken the reader’s commiseration and sympathy for the vanquished nation, and to arouse the awareness of the ongoing existence of such devastation (Krzyzanowski, 1968). The monument has served to remind the passing audience of the fragility of nationhood.

5.2.1.3 The commemoration of other ‘Romantics’ in the Planty

Mickiewicz and Sowacki were the most prominent Polish émigré personalities in Paris during the Romantic Era, particularly following the November Uprising. The contribution of these two poets to the national cause, and the sheer volume of their work cannot be overstated. However, many lesser-known poets, writers and artists living in émigré communities in Paris, and some remaining in Poland, contributed to the national cause. The four other Romantics commemorated in the Planty are testament to the variety of contributors to the Polish struggle for autonomy and the use of cultural artefacts in this struggle. Krzyzanowski (1968) has argued that a feature of the lesser-known Romantics

122 was that the scope of their work was narrower than that of Mickiewicz and Sowacki. These other writers tended to be limited geographically, particularly to certain eastern provinces of Poland, and to align themselves with provincial schools.

Józef Bohdan Zaleski belonged to the Ukrainianiv School, a well-known provincial school. Both Krzyzanowski (1968) and Miosz (1969) have credited the lyrical quality of Zaleski’s early poetry and nostalgic references to his peasant upbringing in the Ukraine. Zaleski is portrayed in the Planty through his character Wernyhora, a legendary blind harpist and fortune teller (Figure 5.3). Zaleski’s poetry is well known for its use of fairy- tale characters such as the harp player and the small child depicted in this monument. That characteristic harks back to childhood stories told to him by his peasant nurse.

Figure 5.3 Józef Bohan Zaleski, Planty, Kraków Source: 36-108mm/digital/exp.auto/DD

123 Zaleski’s patriotic inclinations were manifest in his participation in the November Uprising, though they also flourished in Paris where he was active politically in the Democratic Society and the Slavonic Society.

In another monument, Artur Grottger (1837-1867), an artist active during the Romantic Era, is memorialised. Grottger’s artworks have been described as a ‘cohesive political, social, literary and satirical commentary’ of Polish events (The Grove Dictionary of Art, 2000). For example, he painted ‘Closure of the Churches’ (1861) (Figure 5.4) in response to the closure of places of worship and the arrest of worshipers by Russian soldiers in Warsaw (Lukowski and Zawadzki, 2001). The painting exemplifies the importance of Catholicism to Polish identity as it depicted the church as a place of resistance (during the partitioned period). Grottger is most famous for his patriotic cycle drawings based on themes from the January Uprising (1863), including Warszawa I and II (Warsaw), Polonia (Poland), Litwa (Lithuania) and Wojna (War).

The monument to Grottger is interesting both in its placement in the Planty and for the sculpted plinth entitled ‘Victims of War’ (1901) (Figure 5.4). Sculpted by Wacaw Szymanowski, the monument includes the bust of Artur Grottger and a depiction of a scene at the base of the column. The scene depicts two characters in the throes of death, which Szymanowski based on one of the recurring imagesv from Grottger’s drawings Wojna (Torowska, 2003). Part of an eleven-picture cyclevi, Wojna illustrates war as a national and timeless tragedy. For Grottger, the victims of war were those Poles who fought for the fledgling Polish nation during the partitions. Yet his theme of war as a timeless tragedy has remained pertinent for subsequent generations of Poles, who have also witnessed wars or foreign occupation.

124

Figure 5.4 Artur Grottger Monument and Paintings (top left): The Closure of the Churches, Artur Grottger (top right): Monument to Artur Grottger, Planty, Kraków (bottom left): Plinth sculpture at base of monument, Victims of War, sculpture by Wacaw Szymanowski. (bottom right): Bust Artur Grottger

Source: (top left): Lukowski and Zawadzki (2001), and remaining, 36-108mm/d digital/exp.auto/DD

125 The Grottger monument is regarded as one of the best and most successful works of art in the Planty (Torowska, 2003). Szymanowski’s decision to reference ‘Wojna’ emphasised Grottger’s national sentiments that are so characteristic of the artwork and literature of the Romantic Era. Furthermore, two features of the monument’s spatial location are noteworthy. The monument’s prominent location, between ul. w. Tomasza and ul. Szczepaska, places it close to the intersection of three main thoroughfares and transport hubs (ul. Karmelicka, ul. Krupnicza and ul. J.Dunajewskiego). This location attracts a high volume of pedestrian traffic passing through the Planty along two main entry points (ul. w. Tomasza and ul. Szczepaska) into the Old Town, thus giving the Grottger monument a potentially larger audience than other monuments in the Planty.

Two other cultural personalities from the Romantic Era, and from Young Poland, are depicted in the Planty. Micha Baucki (1837-1901) was a writer and comic playwright who remained in Kraków during the Austrian partition, after his arrest and subsequent imprisonment in Galicia. Taduesz Boy-eleski (1874-1941) was part of the Young Poland movement that followed from the Romantic Era. After conscription into the Austrian army in WWI, he pursued a literary career writing cabarets and satirical songs and verses. He drew from the plethora of works by the Romantic writers. Miosz (1969) has cited his passion for liberal ideology, most notably for the equality of women, and his use of colloquial idiom. He died during the Nazi executions of the Lwów intelligentsia on 4 July 1941. His representation among the Romantics in the Planty provides a tangible link from the Romantic Era to more contemporary events.

5.2.2 Hidden nationalistic messages in subjugated public settings

The six monuments discussed in the previous sections sustain contemporary relevance because they are located in a central public place. The Planty, as a thoroughfare through to the Stare Miasto (Old Town) joins the historic centre of commerce, and the tourist and retail hub to the suburbs of Krakówvii. The location of the Planty has meant that the monuments’ messages are stoic reminders of how Poles have enacted resistance, especially during the partitioned period. They are transmitters of a shared collective Polish memory underscored by the importance of continuing the Polish interest in the arts,

126 particularly using them to convey sentiments of resistance to the dissolution of Polish identity and the Polish language. While the everyday location of this place potentially maximises the audience viewing these monuments, their embedded narratives however may not be obvious to the non-Poles using this public landscape.

To passing tourists, the Planty may be simply a thoroughfare and place of relaxation without specific significance. Devoid of inscription, Polish or otherwise, the monuments seem somewhat out of place in a busy pedestrian landscape. However, I argue that because these monuments were constructed under a subversive norm of cultural repression, they had other uses; they conveyed hidden messages to Polish audiences. Wedel (1990: 239) has contended that ‘Poles often conceal their true convictions and activities as a result of living through continuously hard and uncertain, and sometimes fearful, times’. Indeed, five of the six monuments were erected before the re-formation of the Polish State in 1918, while Kraków was still part of the Austrian empire. During the Romantic Era, the question of an independent Poland still loomed large, and successive failed revolts had ‘marked the end of many Romantic illusions’ (Walicki, 2001: 21). Therefore, it is likely that these monuments were specifically designed to convey hidden messages to an informed Polish audience of the ongoing need for resistance to cultural suppression. The messages beseech the maintenance of Polishness, speak of the longing for Polish autonomy, and highlight the importance of cultural expression through the Polish language. One interview participant in Australia contended that hiding messages was a routine method of identity maintenance:

our (Polish) literature, especially literature, was always conveying some hidden message, because we were always oppressed by someone. From 15th Century onwards, we were always at war with some neighbours (Respondent 58, 21 June, 2006).

The remembrance of Polishness in a public place such as the Planty is therefore paramount to the construction of transmission points for the conveyance of narratives of resistance to an aware Polish public. As the previous quotation suggests, the monuments’ significance in the present is that their narratives of struggle, and of maintaining Polish

127 identity have not been lost on the contemporary Polish passer-by. Moreover, this participant’s contention was that Poles knew to look for these messages. Furthermore, Withers (1996: 328) has argued that ‘memory, and its expression in memorial or act(s) of commemoration, is a potent means..[of].. connect[ing] historical meaning and contemporary cultural identity.’ After the construction of these five of the monuments, Poland regained independence in 1918. Yet, it twice more suffered occupation by foreign regimes of power. Therefore, for a Polish audience, these monuments have remained utterly relevant ‘points of connection’ to the past. They are ‘emotionally evocative narratives and images’ (Simon, 2005). As such, Simon (2005: 89) has argued for a ‘sense – not of belonging, but of being in relation to – of being claimed in relation to the experiences of others’. In other words, the monumentalised figures in the Planty “claim” contemporary Polish populations into their narratives, especially as many contemporary Poles have also experienced periods of foreign occupation. The connection between past and contemporary narratives of struggle for autonomy demonstrates that the cultural memories broadcast by these monuments are not merely historical. Furthermore, as Azaryahu (2003: 2) claimed, monuments

aimed at the production of a shared historical consciousness, commemorative measures and memorial spaces in particular transpose history into contemporary sights and insights and conflate the past and the present in terms of historical memory.

Poles have hidden messages of Polishness in public settings. These settings have acted as conduits for transmissions of narratives of resistance to foreign occupation. The monuments have materialised the struggle and provided patriotic reminders in public places of the Polish cause. This example of public memorialisation in the Planty has demonstrated how historical narratives are available for (re)interpretations in the present by passers-by because of their symbolism and placement in public settings. Romantic Era Polish language and literature have been commemorated as a conduit for these messages in the public sphere. Yet embedded in these monument depictions is a pointer to the further transmission of this symbolic narrative. The female characterisations in the Planty point also to another sphere of the maintenance of Polish identity: the private realm. 128 5.2.3 Symbolic representations of private sphere identity maintenance in the public

In the first part of this chapter, I set out to establish that the monuments in the Planty provide a strong link to the patriotic intentions of the Romantics. The monuments to Mickiewicz and Sowacki also allude to the (re)production and transmission of similar sentiments in the private sphere. The two female characters in the Planty, Grayna and Lilla Weneda, represent the two most prominent and respected Romantic Era Polish poets, Adam Mickiewicz and Juliusz Sowacki. The choice of these subjects is notable on two counts: they are the only two instances of female characters in the Planty monuments, and they are two of only three cases where a character is utilised to memorialise a Romantic personality. As Warner (1985:331) has stated, ‘men often appear as themselves, as individuals, but women attest the identity and value of someone or something else’. In the case of Grayna and Lilla, I have identified two key objectives for the use of female characterisation in the Planty: the first is to draw attention to the Romantics, Mickiewicz and Sowacki, whom the monuments represent (as discussed in Sections 5.1.1.1 and 5.1.1.2 of this Chapter 5); and the second is to highlight the messages embedded in the poems in which they feature.

This second objective focuses on the allegorical significance of the two characters, or, in Warner’s (1985) words, on the ‘something else’. I argue that another intention of their embodiment in this public place was to stress the ongoing role of women in the struggle for Polish autonomy. That role entailed maintaining cultural traditions and Polish identity in the home. Women’s role in the home, and indeed constructions of the home as the foremost of private settings were not merely historical, as a post-okres komunizmu respondent in Australia testified:

I think [Polish identity] is centred around the home. The woman is just this person who keeps the walls of the family…and keeps the tradition of the family. So the mother was taught by her mother. It will be passed on further on … I think that in Poland the tradition is passed through women, I think they play a much bigger role than men. All this Polishness…survive[d] because of women, cause they were able to pass

129 this tradition through the generation and kept this Polishness going (Respondent 11, 21 July, 2006).

Both Mickiewicz and Sowacki saw the importance of this type of domestic ‘grass roots’ cultural transmission as evidenced in the poets’ dedications to their own mothers. Davies (2005b: 44) has noted that, ‘the memoirs of revolutionaries rarely fail to pay tribute to the mother and grandmother who first instilled them with their lifelong political faith’. Both authors also wrote odes to their mothers. Written six months prior to the November Uprising, Mickiewicz’s Do matki Polski (To a Polish Mother) (1830) records his patriotism with references to the many nameless heroes arrested and killed in the name of Polish freedom (Krzyzanowski, 1978). His warning is to the Polish mother to recognise that the seeds of patriotism in a young child would lead to sorrow and persecutionviii. A more traditional theme resonates in Mickiewicz’s ode, that of the burden of sorrow that women carry through such turbulent times. Sowacki’s List do Matki (Letter to Mother) (1841), similarly expresses the ‘sorrowful restlessness and despair’ of their condition and pledges his heart in death to his mother (Miko, 2002:104). Both poets refer to the tragedy of the female role, charged with the duty of maintaining Polish identity in the home yet inevitably suffering the loss of fathers, husbands and sons. Once again, that role was not merely historical: Polish women played integral roles (on and off the battlefield) right through to more recent cases of foreign occupation. An interviewee in Australia, for example, commented in relation to the role of females in WWII:

One thing that brought [Polish] culture …the Polish women – they are very strong really. Especially those with higher education mind…they were the target of both Germans and Russians from the beginning, but somehow they survived. So they are very strong element in Polish society (Respondent 6, 20 July, 2006).

The Grayna and Lilla monuments exemplify how the narrative of resistance and maintenance of Polish identity has been (re)produced and transmitted through two distinctly different mechanisms in public and private settings. In Polish culture, the home has long been a matriarchal space where everyday customs, food, literature, music, special

130 traditions and language convey and maintain the Polish culture. With their feminity, the Grayna and Lilla monuments represent female Polishness, which by association includes the home. While the concept of homes as matriarchal spaces is not solely a Polish construct, the interrelation between matriarchy, the home and wider Polish narratives of struggle and resistance is significant. Given the contemporary and historical context of invasion, partitions and cultural repression, the maintenance at home of Polish language has been crucial to the survival of Polish identity.

Part 2 Imaging and re-imagining into diaspora

5.3 Diasporic Journeys of Polish Language Maintenance

Speaking Polish in the home is a natural and habitual way to maintain Polish identity and cultural traditions, across different settings – in Poland and in the Polish diaspora – and through time. Maintaining language has strengthened what Smolicz and Secombe (1985:109) have called the ‘indissoluble link’ that exists between the ‘Polish language and the perpetuation of the Polish people as a distinct social and cultural group’. During the Russian, Austrian and Prussian partitions of Poland in the 18th and 19th centuries, the preservation of the Polish language was integral in safeguarding Polish identity until Poland regained autonomy. The ‘indissoluble link’ between language and home, however, is rooted in the historical suppression of the Polish language throughout the numerous periods of foreign occupation. Continuing the Polish language at home was critical when Poles were in exile in foreign countries – such as the Romantic Era émigrés – as it was when the two main waves of Polish emigrants left Poland after WWII and the okres komunizmu. One interview respondent in Australia confirmed this assertion:

People were speaking [Polish] at home, their own language at home…Of course [it was] forbidden [at] schools. Polish language was taught [at home] because of the oppression, because of the intentional elimination of the language…Language people tried to preserve (Respondent 50, 8 August, 2006).

131 Emigration is one of the many consequences of Poland’s turbulent history. Poles and their language have been displaced to distant lands, including Australia. Gunew (2003: 42) has contended that displacement augments the importance of language, because language provides reminders of home in ‘palpable ways’. For example, post-WWII Polish migrants tended to be ‘indistinguishable’ from Australia’s Anglo-Celtic majority ‘by appearances alone’ (Kwiatkowski, 2007: 77). Language and accent were the main features distinguishing the post-WWII Polish migrants, and as such have remained key factors in maintaining Polish identity. Within the different migrant vintages and generations within the Polish diaspora, however, the diasporic experience has had varying levels of influence on the importance of speaking and maintaining the Polish language.

In this second part of this chapter, I trace how Polish identity has been (re)produced, transmitted and maintained using the Polish language by different migrant vintages and generations of Polish diaspora in Australia. Polish migration to Australia has been characterised by two main waves: post-WWII and post-okres komunizmu (detailed in Chapter 3, Section 3.5.2.1). These two groups of Polish migrants experienced different migratory pathways and their migration decisions were influenced by different political, social and economic contexts. Situating these two migrant cohorts in their differing migration contexts is crucial to understanding how and why Polish identity (re)productions and transmission have taken various forms in diaspora.

5.3.1 Situating private sphere cultural memories: ‘forces’ of emigration

Common to the migratory experiences of these two waves of Polish migration to Australia (and to the Romantic Era émigrés) were the risks to personal and family security faced by migrants had they stayed in or returned to Poland. The political conditions in Poland tended to ‘force’ their migration decisionsix. Stola (1992: 324) has defined ‘forced migration’ as occurring when

the migrant is compelled to leave home under threat or due to actual force, as well as due to insecurity caused by violent circumstances such as war, revolution…or on a well founded fear of being persecuted.

132 Sussex and Zubrzycki (1985) have argued that among post-WWII Polish migrants in Australia the ‘refugee mentality’ often dominated, because their emigration was prompted by factors beyond their control. Further, they contended that for some of the post-WWII generation this led to the upholding of an entrenched sense of nostalgia and homesickness (‘heimweh’) (Sussex and Zubrzycki, 1985). Similarly, Morawska (2000: 1051) referred to this sense of personal trauma related to the suddenness and distress of leaving the homeland (‘Heimat’). In her account of leaving Poland, Eva Hoffman (1989:115) affirmed this feeling of uprooting and nostalgia (tsknota):

I am pregnant with images of Poland, pregnant and sick. Tsknota throws a film over everything around me, and directs my vision inward. The largest presence within me is the welling up of absence, of what I have lost.

A migrant’s past, often tightly wrapped up in this condition of nostalgia, is an important part of their identity in the present. The conditions preceding, and immediately following, departure from the homeland influence the process of re-settlement (Joly, 2002). Thus, it has been important in this thesis to analyse the migration conditions of both migrant cohorts before exploring how identity, post-migration, has been maintained. Two Australian authors, Martin (1981) and Kunz (1973; 1981), have attempted to categorise, using two typologies, the preceding conditions that force migration and contribute to a sense of loss. In this thesis, I have adopted these typologies as heuristic devices. They have helped to widen the lens through which I have thought about the Polish migrants’ experiences, while also directing my attention towards the circumstances that preceded their migration. The first typology, devised by Martin (1981: 160-162), examined the 1970s cohort of Vietnamese refugee migrants to Australia. Martin (1981) has articulated several distinct characteristics of refugee groups that distinguish them from voluntary migrants. By adapting Martin’s typology to the study of Polish migrants (as shown in Figure 5.5), Jamrozik (1983) has then argued that the assimilationist climate in Australia had paid no credence to the actual experiences preceding emigration from Poland. Instead, the focus was on defining immigrants as settlers (Jamrozik, 1983).

133 Jamrozik’s adaptation of Martin’s typology of Refugee Settlers

1) There is an overwhelmingly inability to return home.

2) The arrival in the host country comes after a considerable period of physical hardship, emotional distress and extreme anxiety about the future. As Martin (1981: 161) stated, ‘they did not ‘choose’ to come in any true sense of the word’.

3) In the process of departure close relatives were left behind and as were valuable possessions, money and clothing.

4) The composition of these refugee groups is rarely homogenous.

Figure 5.5 Jamrozik’s adaptation of Martin’s typology of Refugees Settlers Source: Jamrozik (1983) adapted from and Martin (1981)

On the other hand, the second typology, outlined by Kunz (1973) in his ‘Kinetic Model of Refugee Movements’, worked on the axiom that an ‘immigrant’s background affects [their] future as a settler’. Kunz developed this model intending to bridge the gap in the literature concerning a refugee’sx flight and their process of settlement (Kunz, 1973: 125). Kunz’s typology is more expansive than Martin’s (Kunz, 1973, 1981) as it distinguished between ‘anticipatory’ and ‘acute’ refugee movements. Kunz defined the anticipatory refugee as one who arrived ‘door-to-door’, and left the homeland before the predicted disintegration of social and political order. Some of the post-okres komunizmu migrants who left Poland prior to the declaration of Martial Law fit this category.

Kunz (1973: 132) has suggested that the ‘anticipatory refugee may be mistaken for a voluntary migrant seeking better opportunities’ because the flight generally takes place in times of relative stability and safety. However, with reference to the post-okres komunizmu cohort of Polish migrants, Drozd (2001) has maintained that by developing an

134 understanding of the historical context, the difference between voluntary migrants and anticipatory refugees becomes clear. Acute refugee movements, on the other hand, are directly associated with major political upheavals and the mobilisation of armed forces (Kunz, 1973). Kunz further demarcates acute refugees by how they are initially displaced, whether by flight, force or displacement (Figure 5.6). Yet even within these subcategories the experiences of refugees may differ markedly. Indeed, many of the participants I interviewed for this thesis had experience at least two of Kunz’s categories of displacement. Thus, while there are commonalities in the characteristics of displacement, these categorisations also suggest more differences, and draw attention to a multiplicity of displacement experiences.

Forms of Initial Displacement in Acute Refugee Situations

I. Displacement by Flight Mass flight Individual or Group Escape

II. Displacement by Force Army in Flight or Pursuit Separated Army Units

Prisoners-of-War Expellees and Population Transfers The Banished Deported to Captivity Forced Labour

III. Displacement by Absence, Delegations, Travellers, etc.

Figure 5.6 Forms of Initial Displacement in Acute Refugee Situations Source: Kunz, 1973

Kunz (1973: 140) has argued that while a vintage must go through the same process of displacement, displacement groups ‘do not necessarily contain only a single vintage’. Kunz’s concepts of vintages are useful because they broadly unite people who shared common experiences before and after displacement. In this thesis, there are two

135 displacement groups of Polish migration: post-WWII migrants who mostly experienced displacement by force, and the post-okres komunizmu migrants who, as Drozd (2001) identified, had mixed experiences of displacement. Both migrant cohorts had participants who had experienced each of the Kunz’s forms of displacement. The heterogeneity within migrant vintages is also evident in the different migration journeys of post-WWII migrants (Chapter 3, Section 3.5.2.1).

5.3.2 Journeys of language for post-WWII Migrants

The post-WWII cohort of Polish migrants safeguarded the Polish language to maintain their identities in diaspora. This vintage of Polish migrants had a specific set of migration conditions, which distinguished them from other post-WWII migrant nationalities. The foremost condition was the demise of formal contact after WWII between Polish migrants and the government in Poland. Unlike other migrant groups, the Poles had neither diplomatic or consular representation or protection, nor any other official channel of communication with Poland (Unikoski, 1978). A second condition relates to their social isolation both from their homeland and within their adopted environment as “new Australiansxi”. A crucial feature of the post-WWII Polish migrant’s condition, which the 18th and 19th Century émigrés also experienced, was the realisation that their migration might be permanent. The decisions of Churchill, Stalin and Roosevelt at Yaltaxii had virtually precluded the possibility of Poles returning to Poland. The increasingly widespread fear of Soviet reprisals, especially against former members of the Home Armyxiii and those deported to the Soviet Union at the beginning of the war (Chapter 4, Section 4.4), was a clinching factor. As one post-WWII research participant lamented,

I couldn’t imagine myself being arrested by another Pole because I didn’t believe in what he believed, and then be tortured and put in the jail and so on. After fighting the Germans, [to then] be arrested by the Pole because I wasn’t a communist? That’s why I didn’t go back (Respondent 52, 12 June, 2006).

Another explained:

136 You don’t want to go [back] to Poland because Soviet troops are there … [especially if] you came from [detention in] Siberia and spent years in Siberia (Respondent 51, 12 June, 2006).

It was common for Poles to fear returning to Poland. The diaspora participants foresaw recriminations, the loss of family members and general uncertainty about the Soviet governance of the post-WWII Polish State. The inability to return meant that maintaining the Polish language became a crucial reminder of ‘home’, as well as a means of communicating and conducting Polish cultural practices. Tomczak (2004) has argued that in the case of postwar Polish migration to Britain, adherence to the Polish language was reinforced by the belief of an end to Soviet control and possible return. Similar sentiments were common in an Australian context, as one post-WWII participant recalled:

Many of us…thought about a time when [we] would be going back to Poland, because we were expecting something would change there and we never saw that it would take such a long time in those days. We thought, oh well, there are wars going on [and] the antagonisms between the two blocs was getting to point were there is going to be a war. After that war of course, we thought it would be somewhere in the 50s or something like that and we’d go back (Respondent 50, 8 June, 2006).

Migration decisions were influenced by the fear of returning to Poland, and the hope that migration was only temporary. Yet, there was another factor influencing migrants’ initial responses to Australian society and their adherence to specific homeland cultural practices. This factor was linked to Australia’s history of intolerance to difference. Legitimated through the White Australia Policy, the Australian government sought to maintain the Anglo-Celtic norm. The Australian government initially sought British- based migration to increase its post-WWII population. When the actual numbers of British migrants fell short of targets, an alternative strategy was adopted. In cooperation with the International Refugee Organisation, 170 000 Displaced Persons (DPs) were accepted, primarily from Central and Eastern Europe, in Australia’s largest ever intake of

137 non-British migrantsxiv. Before the war, Australia’s population was overwhelmingly British. The expectation emanating from the Australian Government was that migrants fit into a society dominated by a British-based, Protestant norm. As O’Connor (2005: 7) has pointed out, ‘international migration is a confronting experience because it involves encounters with the unfamiliar by both migrants and receiving societies alike’. To predominately Catholic Poles, Australian was quite a foreign culture. The assimilationist immigration policies instituted in Australia after WWII operated on several ideological levels. Most importantly, they sought to ‘re-assure the Australian community and influence its acceptance of non-British Europeans’ (Jamrozik, 1983: 18). The intake of DPs was intended to augment Australia’s population significantly, and the multicultural composition of Australia’s population was to change dramatically.

Despite the assimilationist climate, the Polish language was preserved by post-WWII migrants. This preservation would prove pivotal to the continuation of Polish identity in Australia (Ozdowski and Lencznarowicz, 2001). The Polish language was maintained in two main diasporic settings that are representative of the ‘private’ realms of identity maintenance. First, Polish community organisations developed based on the exclusive use of the Polish language. While community organisations might appear to be public spaces, these were constructed for the exclusive use of Polish migrants. Their exclusivity made them distinctly private, particularly within the wider context of Australian multicultural society. The post-WWII Poles established a network of community facilities with the intention of providing links back to Poland. However, these were also places where cultural memories could be freely exchanged with other Poles who had shared similar experiences during the war. These community organisations included: the Polish Clubs and Polish Houses, the Lady of Czstochowa Chapel in Marayongxv, folkloric dancing troops, the Polish scouts, and Polish language schools held on Saturdays. Kwiatkowski (2007: 78) posited that Polish community infrastructure could be subdivided into four main categories:

Community clubs and groups; religious institutions; commercial outlets providing predominately polish specialist goods and services; and service-provider businesses owned by, or which employ, Polish- 138 speaking individuals and which serve the wider public as well as the Polish community.

The second pathway to maintaining Polish language was the exclusive and continuing use of Polish in the home. Smolicz and Secombe (1981: 95) have identified two further mechanisms by which the Polish language was maintained in the home by Polish postwar migrants more generally. One was the positioning of the home as an exclusively Polish domain and the other was the emphasis on Polish literature in the home (and at Saturday language schools). The Polish language was taught to the second generation through the deployment of these mechanisms. However, parents found that their children’s exposure to the English language meant that maintaining Polish proved difficult (Smolicz and Secombe, 1981). As I found in this thesis, the home remained a setting for the (re)production and transmission of the Polish language especially before children entered school. This environment was complemented by involvement in community organisations, which were also established as Polish speaking arenas. Therefore, I argue that the Polish language was operationalised as an innate part of the Polish diaspora’s identities – in the home and within community spaces. As the post-WWII participants concurred, using the Polish language was simply an easier means of communication, especially given the lack and difficulty with English language skills. This viewpoint was evident in the following post-WWII participants’ comments:

When I came here I didn’t understand English...I didn’t understand much (Respondent 63, 27 June, 2006).

Similarly another participant stated:

It was hard, no English, I didn’t know English. We didn’t go to school, [you] just learn by yourself (Respondent 70, 10 July, 2006)

Moreover, the preference for speaking Polish, particularly in the home, is illustrated in the following post-WWII participant’s response:

139 At home we have to speak Polish (Respondent 7, 21 July, 2006).

This experience was shared by another participant, who claimed:

We just spoke Polish language at home, and they [the children] learnt it, and [they know the] Polish language until today, very well (Respondent 17, 26 July, 2006).

However, the post-WWII participants’ diasporic journeys of the Polish language revealed that the methods of language maintenance used in the home were not always straightforward. I found that there were two main situations hampering the continued speaking of Polish at home: mixed marriages (Pole to a non-Pole) and where the Polish- speaking parent worked long hours. Of participants in this thesis, each mixed marriage involved a Polish ex-serviceperson who had arrived separately from the DP cohort of migration. The DP migrants arrived mostly in large national cohorts or in family groups, whereas ex-servicepersons arrived earlier and the majority were unmarried. Indeed overall, Polish men arriving in Australia after WWII were more likely to intermarry than women because there were more male than female Polish migrants. Along with the uneven gender ratio in the post-WWII Polish migrant communityxvi, changing governmental policies in Polandxvii also contributed to the high rate of intermarriages by Polish men (Price and Zubrzycki, 1962). Price and Zubrzycki (1962) have calculated that between 1947-1960, 60 percent of Polish males married non-Poles, compared to only 33 percent of Polish females. In all of the cases in this thesis, the female partner was the English speaker, and a traditional patriarchal household pattern prevailed. Despite the patriotism of the service personnel (for example: ‘I still was very patriotic….[service personnel are] very patriotic people, very good fighters [who] love their country’, Respondent 51, 12 June, 2006), this presented a clear barrier to maintaining Polish language at home. The non-Polish mother, who spoke English, remained at home with the children and the Polish father worked. As one respondent summarised,

[The children’s] language is [the] mother’s language. [Their] mother look[ed] after them – then that’s it (Respondent 6, 20 July, 2006).

140 Another stated:

[It was] my wifexviii that keep Polish traditions…cause I was busy working, my wife was having children and looking after them (Respondent 52, 12 June, 2006).

This marital situation complicated the (re)production of a Polish home setting because it was the English-speaking parent who stayed at home. The second factor hampering Polish language transmission was the work arrangements of Polish migrants, especially the Polish-speaking parent in mixed marriages. Long working days, erratic and non- standard hours and extended periods working awayxix from the family home characterised the employment circumstances of many migrants in the first years of settlement, as this participant explained:

On the railway, when I went to work my children were asleep, [and again] when I come back home. Because there was different hours all around [the week], one o’clock, two o’clock…it start tomorrow different, next week different. [It] wasn’t like normal regular shift (Respondent 62, 27 June, 2006).

Despite the interference of work and other obstacles, many participants still attempted to speak Polish at home, and to their children. These attempts suggest that it was the contextual impediments of mixed marriages and working hours that affected language maintenance, and not any lessening of the importance of the Polish language to Polish identity itself. Furthermore, several participants emphasised that the lack of conveniently located Polish cultural organisations augmented an already difficult situation:

I used to teach my children to speak. I tried to teach them to speak Polish…but it was very hard when you come from a mixed marriage and there’s no church here, Polish church, no Polish school (Respondent 51, 12 June, 2006).

141 Community organisations, constructed as private Polish spheres within public Australian society, were generally located in suburbs with relatively high concentrations of Polish migrants, such as Sydney’s Ashfield, Bankstown and Blacktownxx. The initial diasporic experiences of post-WWII migrants involved frequent encounters into these ‘Polish speaking’ spaces. The rationale for these encounters was straightforward: speaking Polish was the easiest means of effectively communicating, as well as being a coping mechanism, for newly arrived migrants. For example, one participant stated: ‘For my daughter, for those young people at that time, it was because we feel welcome among [Polish speakers]’ (Respondent 7, 21 July, 2006). The Polish facilities afforded familiarity after extended periods of displacement and provided distinct forums through which the only culture that they knew could be maintained. ‘People, because their English was very poor and everything, and they were lost among those new people, so they said: “we need some place where we can meet’’ (Respondent 7, 21 July, 2006). Affirming this need to speak Polish, one participant viewed speaking Polish in Australia as a natural extension of the family and the family’s identity:

When a family comes from a background, no matter if it’s Polish, German or any other nationality, naturally they would speak their native tongue, and that’s what happened with us. We knew who we were and we spoke Polish (Respondent 50, 8 June, 2006).

Thus, the desire to speak Polish was a dominant feature of the post-WWII migrants’ motivations to establish cultural, social, and religious infrastructure, and to preserve and maintain Polish identity in diaspora (Jamrozik, 1983; Pakulski, 2001; Unikoski, 1978). Referring to Italian diaspora in London, Fortier (2000) argued that community organisations such as ethnic language schools perform an important function in addition to the preservation of language through diasporic generations. They create community spaces where the ‘spirit’ and ‘feeling’ of migrancy is ‘performed and inscribed’ (Fortier, 2000: 82). In Australia, community organisations founded in the 1950s included Polish clubs and houses, Polish scouting groups, sporting clubs, folkloric dancing troops, music ensembles and Saturday language schools. In addition to their prescribed functions, these organisations created such ‘community spaces’, where through speaking Polish the 142 passing down of cultural memories became an implicit part of the maintenance and performance of diasporic identities. For example, when I asked a participant if they had narrated their experiences in Poland to their children, they responded:

Naturally the children… would join the Polish scouts, Harczerstwo. Even as young people, they would [go to] Syrenka, for Polish dances. So they knew all along what their background was (Respondent 50, 8 June, 2006).

This participant’s response shows that part of the responsibility for the transmission of cultural memories also lay with the various community organisations. These became integral methods of cultural memory transmission to the second generation. The post- WWII migrants constructed spaces with material and tangible links to Poland that continued to be relevant culturally to the second generation. Fortier (2000) suggested that the provision of community organisations focused on language maintenance had a symbolic as well as functional meaning for migrant parents. Through the process of (re)producing cultural memories for their children, the post-WWII migrants were also (re)producing these memories for themselves. They were partaking in the performance of maintaining multiple Polish identities – in the home and in the community – in an Australian diasporic context. Through the construction of community organisations, these identity performances became part of everyday life, as the following participant explained:

People even after church they sat meeting, talking to each other – ‘how are you going?’ – it was nice. For the young people there was dancing groups, they were [also involved in] scouting. So we also meet [at] picnics, camps. It was really nice. I think in every State [in Australia] started a Polish house. In the Polish house there was also a school, a Saturday school, [where] children if they wanted could learn Polish, or even sing in Polish…It [was] only natural [for us] (Respondent 7, 21 July. 2006).

143 Encounters in these (re)produced and diasporic Polish settings were woven into everyday life. The settings enabled the transmission and maintenance of Polish identity through everyday practices such as attending Polish Mass at Marayong, or at specific Polish- speaking services at other Catholic churches and language schools. The everyday character of these Polish settings of cultural memory transmission parallels the places of cultural memory diffusion in the Planty. The Planty is an everyday public location, and the customs of the diasporic Polish community organisations and home are everyday by nature. In the Planty, this everydayness is essential to the successful conveyance to a wide public of hidden messages of resistance and struggle against foreign oppression. The greatest achievement of the monuments in the Planty has been the ongoing importance of these narratives to subsequent generations of Poles passing through that landscape. The same theme of resistance resonates in the significance of the cultural institutions to the second generation of post-WWII migrants. de Certeau et al.(1998: 171) have argued that cultural practices and customs take place in the ‘indivisible everyday’ and ‘under the mask of the obvious’. Enacting these cultural practices in the everyday was a form of resistance for the post-WWII Polish migrants. In this case, it was resistance to the dissolution of Polish identity and culture in diaspora. It was also a significant response to the assimilationist policies of the Australian government at that time. By making the customs associated with these cultural organisations part of everyday Polish life, they appear as normative practices, even though they are Polish (re)productions taking place in the Australian environment (albeit effectively privately). The effect of this type of everyday (re)production and transmission of cultural memories was that for many second- generation participants, Polish cultural organisations and Polish culture were an integral part of their daily childhood.

5.3.3 Journeying further: second and third generations

In this section, I trace how cultural memories communicated through the Polish language were (re)produced and transmitted through to the two subsequent generations of the post- WWII cohort in Australia. I argue that such (re)productions of Polish identity are not necessarily linear. Nor do they routinely progress from the post-WWII group via the second generation to the third generation. Rather, cultural memories have been

144 constructed and transferred between and within the second and third generations as part of the ongoing (re)negotiations with their ethno-cultural heritage in diaspora. I argue that there is a multiplicity of (re)negotiations of the Polish identities of these groups, demonstrating the multilayered, inter-generational and intra-generational nature of cultural memory (re)production and transmission in diaspora.

The second generation of Polish post-WWII migrants is an intriguing group because they are at the forefront of generational diasporic (re)negotiations of Polish identity. Only two of the 11 second generation participants were born in Poland (and both arrived in Australia aged five years or younger). The group’s Polish heritage factored into constructions of Polish identity as the participants recalled their childhoods. When asked to remember their earliest Polish-oriented childhood memories, the second generation participantsxxi commonly recalled their involvement in one or more of the Polish speaking cultural organisations. The most common remembrances were attendance at Polish Catholic Mass, classes at Polish School, participation in folkloric dancing and family oriented traditional practices, including cooking at home. The following response was typical:

A big part of my childhood was going to Polish school. Otherwise, don’t ask what my childhood could be. I don’t think it would be as good, without the Polish people (Respondent 5, 18 July, 2006).

Notwithstanding these references to associations with the Polish community in childhood and adolescence, only two of the 11 second-generation participants identified as being solely Polish. Three identified themselves as exclusively Australian. The remainder traversed various paths of dual identity, of Polish Australian and/or Australian of Polish descent, or “Australian Pole”.

The transmissions of cultural memories in private settings, to the second generation of post-WWII migrants (interview group 2) were similar in content to those constructed by the first generation. Consequently, this group identified the home as a key private sphere for Polish speaking. They also referenced the Polish language speaking in association

145 with the practice of traditional rituals, including Wigilia (Christmas Eve) and Wielkanoc (Easter). The most common reference was to the use of the Polish language as the first and only language spoken until the respondents attended school:

I grew up only speaking Polish at home, never a word of English (Respondent 74, 10 July, 2006).

Another participant recalled:

I only spoke Polish until I went to primary school (Respondent, 35X, 22 August, 2006).

A third participant stated:

We weren’t allowed to speak English at home (Respondent 43X, 11 November, 2006).

Another participant commented:

As a kid I guess we spoke more Polish around the house (Respondent 39, 6 September, 2006).

Such responses reflected the importance placed on (re)producing Polish language and customs within the home by post-WWII migrants. Smolicz and Secombe (1981) have recorded that keeping the home as a solely Polish domain, particularly before children attend school, represented an attempt to instil a proficiency in Polish at a young age. Therefore, language maintenance in the home was of strategic importance. Setting this language foundation permitted attendance and participation at a wide variety of Polish- speaking community functions, such as practising the Catholic religion at Polish Mass. The community organisations, places constructed to speak Polish, were also the social settings of the second generation.

146 One social setting that featured prominently in the second generation participants’ remembrances was the Polish church. Catholicism has remained an interesting constant in the diasporic Polish speaking community, in effect linking the maintenance of Polish language to Catholicism and to Polish identity. This linkage mirrors the history of the church in Poland as a site of resistance (Chapter 4, Section 4.2.2). In Sydney, the first Polish speaking community facility was the establishment of Polish Mass at the Australian Catholic Church in Ashfield (located in Inner West Sydney). As one respondent recalled, ‘First there wasn’t even [any] organisation, only [the normal Catholic] church at Ashfield. That was the first Polish gathering’ (Respondent 46, 8 June, 2006). Indeed, the second generation participants rarely failed to mention Polish Catholic Mass and other religious rituals and celebrations in their recollections of childhood:

Polish church, we used to go to Polish Mass a lot when I was still little. So I used to get a big dose of [Polish Mass]…cause it was the only Polish mass (Respondent 71, 10 July, 2006).

Another recalled:

My dad was very much on [about] rituals and routines…Being Catholic, it was very much the linkage between Catholicism and being Polish. It was…the stuff that we did around Christmas time and Easter (Respondent 41, 10 September, 2006).

The intersection of Catholicism and Polish language maintenance created a space where community and religious identities overlapped and interlinked. The preservation of Catholic rituals remained part of normative practices of diasporic Polish identity. Smolicz and Secombe (1981) have observed that while the exclusive speaking of Polish in most Polish community organisations gradually declined during the 1970s, Polish Catholic Mass remained a notable exceptionxxii. Furthermore, the combined setting of Polish Catholicism and the Polish language meant that the language went hand in hand with the celebration of important Polish traditions, particularly rituals associated with Easter and Christmas. For example, during Easter Week, known as the Wielki Tydzie (the Holy

147 Week), attendance at Mass is traditional on Holy Thursday, Good Friday, Easter Saturday morning for the blessing of an Easter offertory basket, and again on Easter Sunday and Easter Monday morning. The tradition of the Easter offertory basket is known as Swiconka. It involved preparing a basket with food to be blessed by the priest at Easter Saturday Mass. Each of the foods placed in the basket have a symbolic meaning, for example: eggs represent new life, salt is a sign of hospitality, and wine and vinegar are symbolic of Christ’s crucifixion. Similarly, the celebration of Wigilia on Christmas Eve traditionally involves the breaking and sharing of a piece of Opatek (the Holy Eucharist) before the family meal. During this ritual celebration twelve non-meat dishes are cooked and an extra place for an unexpected visitor is set at the family dinner table. When the first star appears in the sky, dinner begins, and is followed by attending Midnight Mass.

While the second-generation participants have continued the celebration of Wigilia and Wielaknoc, very few have maintained the full extent of these celebrations. Most commonly, aspects of the traditions, including reproduction of specific foods and even the Opatek, changed to centre on the home and the family. Attendance at the various Polish Masses by the subsequent generations of the post-WWII migrants declined. These changes signalled a shift in the importance of the home as a distinct location of speaking Polish and the maintenance of traditional customs. Moreover, they have demonstrated that (re)productions of Polish identity occurred through a (re)positioning and (re)interpretation of Polish Christmas and Easter traditions in the home, by members of the second generation. Traditions and customs of Polish identity concentrated in the home were maintained, and those connected with identity maintenance (and Polish speaking) in public places, such as Polish Mass and Dancing Groups, tended to decline.

The third diasporic generation’s conceptions of Polish identity have shifted away from the importance of participation in Polish community organisations such as Polish language schools and Polish scouts. Moreover, this generation revealed that the maintenance of language is no longer a prominent factor in how they (re)produce discourses of Polish identity. Only two of the seven participants mentioned their capacity to speak Polish, and both were learning the language. Instead, there is notable awareness that Polish identity involves associations with family heritage, principally distinguished by the close linkages 148 with grandparents and the language spoken by the older generations of the family. Polish identity was also articulated through the upkeep of Polish traditions of Wigilia and Wielkanoc: ‘How we celebrate a lot of days, Christmas and Easter’ (Respondent 45, 24 January, 2007). Many participants emphasised the importance of the family and the practice of Wigilia, for example:

I love Christmas, Christmas Eve, cause it’s the one time that our whole family, which is about nearly forty people now, all come together, with no exceptions. And we have a huge big dinner, and it’s great that we celebrate it on Christmas Eve, because everyone else has their own Australian or English families, which celebrate on Christmas Day, so it’s a time that we all come together (Respondent 40, 9 September, 2006).

Another third generation participant stated,

It’s more family orientated, the food’s different, just the little traditions, cause we have the bread, the breaking of the bread, Opatek, and we celebrate Christmas Eve – [it] is more important than Christmas Day (Respondent 46X, 24 January, 2006).

The references to the celebration on Christmas Eve specifically highlight the contrast to Australia’s dominant Christmas festivities occurring on Christmas Day. Maintaining Wigilia was viewed by second and third generation participants as advantageous for the scheduling of Christmas celebrations with non-Polish members of the family: ‘The beauty of say doing Wigilia is that it’s all my side of the family, which then leaves Christmas Day free for my wife’s [non-Polish] side of the family’ (Second Generation Respondent 39, 6 September, 2006). The (re)productions of Wigilia provide an example of the generational transformation and (re)positioning of how this Polish tradition, originally involving the Polish language through attendance at Polish Mass has been maintained and changed. The post-WWII migrants (re)produced Wigilia in its traditional form, as a religious feast day involving attendance at church, which necessitated understanding and speaking Polish.

149 Even though the childhood recollections of second generation participants’ entailed cultural memories from Christmas celebrations, their diasporic (re)negotiation(s) of Wigilia have led to a (re)positioning of the tradition around the family home and as a unique and distinct non-Australian way of celebrating Christmas. Within the third generation, the unique Polishness of Wigilia has been (re)oriented as a family celebration, with less focus on the traditional religious customs. Among the third generation participants, the performances of Wigilia varied, but the distinction of Polishness remained asserted through the celebration of Christmas on Christmas Eve. Most participants also mentioned the Opatek and traditional Polish food. References to language and the traditional religious customs were notably absent from the narratives of the third generation of post-WWII migrants.

Overall, the third generation participants demonstrated limited knowledge of their grandparents’ migration, despite it being their connection to Polish heritage. Nonetheless, in several instances, participants linked their sense of Polish identity to their Polish grandparents. Mostly the third generation participants did not identity their parents as Polish, but Australian, as the following comments show:

I more so than anyone else in my family was and am very connected to my grandmother, and spent most of my childhood with her. And for that reason I feel [very] Polish (Respondent 40, 9 September, 2006).

The same third generation participant also stated:

Polish culture, it was never my parents teaching [me]. For all intensive purposes [sic] they’re not Polish (Respondent 40, 9 September, 2006).

Another third generation participant asserted:

I always say I’m of Polish origin, or I’m Polish, or I speak Polish,… but I’m not sure why that is and partly I think…I lived, spent a lot of time living with my granny. I basically lived with her until I was about

150 25 and my mum doesn’t really like to promote her Polishness, or she doesn’t really want to know anything about that…(Respondent 64, 27 June, 2006).

The diasporic journey of the Polish language falters at the third generation, with the exception of the two participants actively learning the Polish language. This third generation group also had very little involvement in Polish community organisations as children. Their lack of exposure to established cultural infrastructure as children juxtaposes starkly to their parents’ generation. For the second generation participants, involvement in Polish community organisations was a key source of childhood and adolescent socialisation, surrounded by Polish culture. A number of the responses of the third generation participants indicate that their second generation parents increasingly saw themselves as Australian. Indeed, one second generation participant was very conscious of the process of “becoming Australian”;

I think I had very strong Polish identity in my teenage years. [However,] I purposely moved away [from it] and I purposely sought a non Pole to marry, and then I became Australian (Respondent 74, 10 July, 2006).

Drozdzewski (2007) found that the importance and methods of (re)production and transmission of Polish identity by the second generation participants were distinctly different from that of their parents. Unlike the post-WWII generation, the second generation did not combine the importance of maintaining Polish identity with raising children. Consequently, Smolicz’s and Secombe’s (1985) definition of an indissoluble link between language and identity holds little relevance when the third generation is taken into consideration. Their associations with Polish identity are based on cultural traditions and family, rather than language. In spite of this seemingly breakdown of Polishness through language, this evidence points to the maintenance of identity in diaspora as contextually and generationally dependent. Polish identity is still (re)produced by the second and third generations. Moreover, these (re)productions have occurred according to how the post-WWII generations first constructed them. They have been

151 (re)positioned so that Polish cultural traditions relating to Christmas and Easter, and an identification with the family’s distinct cultural heritage have become important to constructions of Polishness. Additionally, more than half of the third generation participants had visited Poland while on holidays and met with family members there, pointing to a new ‘transnational’ avenue of identity maintenance. These findings have confirmed Smith and Jackson’s (1999: 384) argument that ‘not only do diasporas change their character over time, but the process of scattering… makes diasporas lead to different ways of narrating the nation in different places and at different times’.

Polish diaspora, unlike those of most other post-WWII migrants groups, were effectively dislocated from their homeland after WWII (Kunz, 1988). Regardless of the experiences of dislocation, the post-WWII migrants have (re)produced a variety of distinctly Polish- speaking spaces, which are also in effect private spaces. These enable the performances and preservation of Polish identity. Through the diasporic generations of the post-WWII migrant vintage, the importance of different settings of cultural memory transmission has changed. This change has been evident in the shift away from the use of cultural infrastructure and the predominance for Polish-speaking homes, to the maintenance of unique cultural traditions and ethno-cultural identification connected to the family’s heritage. Yet, this is not the whole story because distinguishing Polish diaspora from other migrant groups is that a second large wave of migration to Australia occurred after the okres komunizmu in Poland. I refer to this group as the post-okres komunizmu migrants.

5.3.4 Journeys departing from behind the Curtain: the Polish diaspora’s second wave

The post-okres komunizmu wave of migration further exposed the heterogeneity of the processes of Polish language and identity maintenance in diaspora. Differences in the methods of Polish identity maintenance have related both to the markedly different conditions of migrations, as well as to the different use of Polish settings and different interpretations of this identity (cf. Smith and Jackson, 1999). As a starting point, it should not be overlooked that the Poland left behind by the post-okres komunizmu was four decades away from the Poland in which post-WWII migrants lived. Further, the post-

152 okres komunizmu migrants were predominately from large cities, had higher levels of general and vocational educationxxiii, and were relatively young (approximately three quarters were between 25 and 36 years of age, and only two per cent were aged over 50 (Jamrozik, 1983)). One thread common to these two migrant groups and to the Romantic Era émigrés (discussed in Chapter 4, Section 4.2.4) was that their migrations were prompted by the foreign occupation (and subjugation) of Poland. However, the conditions of migration for the post-okres komunizmu migrants were distinct from those of their post- WWII counterparts. For example, some the post- okres komunizmu participants asserted that their migration was economically, rather than politically motivated. These participants disputed the commonality with their post-WWII counterparts and insisted that their migration had little or nothing to do with the prevailing political situation in Poland. One participant stated:

I didn’t go to a refugee camp …I wasn’t really persecuted in any way, so I simply went there [to Austria] on some work. [I] rent[ed] an apartment and tried to get a visa to Australiaxxiv, which took about 4 or 5 months (Respondent 58, 21 June, 2006).

Another participant similarly stated,

[During the early 1980s] it was great opportunity to leave Poland and it was extremely strong migration at that time. It was a pity because lots of people with a great education – very well educated – left Poland. So obviously when they left Poland, having portrayed themselves as political refugees, but [for] 95 per cent [migration was actually for] economical reasons (Respondent 12, 22 July, 2006).

Such generalisations about the motivations of the post-okres komunizmu migrants overlook two points. First, after the declaration of Marital Law, Australia accepted Polish migrants under the Special Humanitarian Program, effectively as political refugees. Second, high inflation rates, empty supermarket shelves and a standard ten-year waiting period to purchase an apartment, while economic motivators, were direct consequences of

153 the political circumstances and economic mismanagement as much as they were contributors to political turmoil themselves (Chapter 4, Section 4.5). Many of the post- okres komunizmu migrants described how their frustration with the economic conditions in Poland prior to their migration influenced their migration decision. These conditions did include low wages, a country-wide housing shortage and rampant corruption. However, a couple, including the following respondent explicitly stressed the link to the political situation:

[My migration] had everything [to do] with [the] communist [system and]…the fact that you had to live, you work, and you basically work for nothing. Everyone had something little but basically that’s what you had. [Then] everything went down, the system went down but there was nothing to replace it (Respondent 68, 1 July, 2006).

The contexts of migration are important to understanding how this migrant group positioned themselves both within Australian society, and to the pre-existing Polish diaspora. In this thesis, I found that those participants who emphasised the underlying economic motivation of their migration provided a more pragmatic narrative of their transition into Australian society, including a sense of inevitability about taking a low skilled job (even though all these participants possessed at least Masters qualifications):

I came over here without knowing word of English, so my migration here was a totally different challenge. Not only further distance from Poland but at the same time my level…[of]…education has to be put in the pocket and start everything from scratch. I was working as a cleaner (Respondent 12, 22 July, 2006).

Another concurred:

I had to hide my PhD …I was looking for a job as a computer systems analyst, and one of the agents – I was doing [looking] through the agency – he told me: “Look, don’t even mention that you have a PhD.

154 Don’t even mention that you have Masters” (Respondent 58, 21 June 2006).

Despite the clear drawbacks (both personal and professional) that many Polish migrants faced in coming to Australia, Drozd (2001) has contended that the vast majority of post- okres komunizmu migrants left voluntarily and did not plan an imminent return. Thus, they did not fit into the category of refugee as defined by Kunz (1973) (discussed in this chapter, Section 5.2.1). Yet, following Kunz (1973, see Figure 5.6, p 135), characterising acute refugee movements are incidents of major upheaval and the mobilisation of armed forces. Both of these factors were present during the early 1980s in Poland, with the legalisation of Solidarno and the incursion of Martial Law. Consequently, Drozd (2001) also alluded to the inherent difficulties in accurately tracking the migration pathways of this cohort, suggesting that neither of Kunz’s categories (Chapter 5, Section 5.3.1) accurately represents the post-okres komunizmu migratory experience.

Another notable difference in the conditions of migration for this cohort was the different social climate and attitudes towards international migrants in Australia. The 1980s saw multiculturalism emerge as a national ideal. This new mindset was accompanied by a sizeable increase in governmental spending on adult migrant education and symbolised by the replacement of the term ‘alien’ by ‘non-citizen’ in the Migration Act (Jupp, 2003; Smolicz, 1997).

The circumstances of migration for the post-okres komunizmu migrants contributed to how they (re)produced and transmitted cultural memories, while also influencing the level of importance placed on maintaining language as a part of their Polish identities. The post- okres komunizmu migrants positioned the Polish language as integral to an overall sense of Polish identity. These participants related their identity directly to the language that they continued to speak: ‘I think between us we can best distinguish ourselves by Polish language’ (Respondent 11, 21 July, 2006). Regardless of their diasporic environment, speaking Polish was an intrinsic part of their Polish identity. Compared to the post-WWII migrant cohort, however, there was less overt emphasis on the necessity of maintaining the home as an exclusively Polish domain. While participants with young children

155 stressed the importance of only speaking Polish at home, many acknowledged the difficulty in actually sustaining an exclusively Polish environment. The factors inhibiting the transmission of Polish language included siblings speaking to each other in English, older English-speaking siblings influencing younger siblings, and the need for both parents and children to learn English. The following comments provide an example:

Our oldest child, she’s 14 and then [the younger ones are] eight and six. Her Polish…was the best because she was our only child for six years and when we had the nanny, there was always [a] Polish speaking one, because we wanted her to learn it. I knew if they don’t learn when they’re little, it will be very hard… Our youngest one, she’s six but when she was a baby she was earlier exposed to English language because our eldest had friends who were coming. And you know it was just different family (Respondent 33X, 21 August 2006).

Another participant responded:

[The children’s] Polish was good, and we used Polish at home. I mean they never even went to Polish schools…I wanted them to learn English. That was an issue which actually was the same with me: I needed to learn English (Respondent 68, 1 July, 2006).

While participants viewed the continuance of language as important, there was less concern about the potential attrition of language outside the home. Grounding this viewpoint was their desire for their children to speak English. However, a feature of these the post-okres komunizmu participants’ narratives of Polish identity was that they did not feel that their Polish identity was under threat. Before migration, they had spent the majority of their lives in Poland. Despite blatant attempts to shape Polish identity through the public sphere, the Soviet regime has a limited impact on the private sphere and personal (re)productions of Polish identity. Because this migrant group’s socialisation had occurred in Poland, participants felt that their Polish identities did not require ‘maintenance’ – ‘Because I spent so many years in Polish, I don’t need something to

156 maintain Polish’ (Respondent 18, 26 July, 2006). Furthermore, the following comments typify how many participants explained their Polish identity as relating to their Polish background:

My background, my upbringing – I really have been brought up in Poland. I left Poland when I was in my early 20s, so all my formation years happened in Poland. So I’ve learnt Polish history at school, I’ve learned Polish literature, I relate to those experiences (Respondent 4, 17 July, 2006).

Similarly, another participant stated:

It is the place where I was born, where I grew up, and from where I have my childhood and youth memories, and that’s something that… you can’t forget and cannot change (Respondent 61, 25 June, 2006).

In contrast, the post-WWII migrants had faced the spectre of Nazi and Soviet aggression and foreign occupation. During WWII, both regimes not only threatened the destruction of material cultural artefacts, but also the annihilation of the Polish nation. Additionally, Polish post-WWII migrants endured the longest period of foreign occupation of any country during WWII, as well as the longest period of displacement before migration than any other refugee group (Davies, 2005b; Jamrozik, 1983). As one interview respondent contended:

They [the post-okres komunizmu migrants] didn’t need Polish organisation as much as we need[ed them], because [we] wanted to build here our little country (Respondent 25, 9 August, 2006).

The post-WWII experiences of occupation, while not dissimilar to those experienced by the political émigrés in Paris, were very different to those experienced by the post-okres komunizmu migrants. For example, despite compulsory Russian language education at school, the post-okres komunizmu group still spoke Polish. (I do not wish to underplay the

157 significant role that Soviet censorship played in Poland, and this role has been discussed further in Chapter 7). Largely, the lack of perceived immediate threat also explains why the post-okres komunizmu migrants did not actively seek out or participate in the existing cultural infrastructure, such as Polish clubs and Polish houses, established in Australia by the post-WWII migrants as tangible links to Poland. Drozd (2001) also found that rather than frequenting existing cultural infrastructure, the post-okres komunizmu migrants commonly maintained cultural links to Poland via familial relationships and through visits to Poland. Thus, unlike the post-WWII generation, for whom such organisations were fundamental in providing a support network for cultural maintenance, and for whom home visits were not easy, many of the post-okres komunizmu migrants continued life in the home in ways that replicated their lives in Poland. As one participant commented,

I am Polish regardless of the community organisation[s]…I went to this Polish Club, first time, like the people who came in fifties. They spoke Polish, but I didn’t feel very much connected with them, because we didn’t have the same history. My history in Poland was when their history was here in Australia (Respondent 18, 26 July, 2006).

The responses of the second generation of the post-okres komunizmu migrants (interview Group 5) revealed similar patterns to their parents’ generation. They had also had limited contact with Polish community organisations and did not view these as important to maintaining their Polish identities. This finding parallels Drozd’s (2001) study of the post-okres komunizmu migrants in Melbourne, which also found that two thirds of the children surveyed did not participate in Polish community life. However, an exception was evident in four of the 14 participants from the second generation. They had attended Polish school as children and teenagers, and were or had been involved in a Polish dancing group or Polish scouts. Nevertheless, they did not emphasise the importance of these community organisations from their strong affiliations with other aspects of their Polish identity, such as practising Christmas and Easter traditions, speaking Polish at home, and attendance at Polish mass. Abundantly clear, however, was the incidence of Polish language speaking in the home: all but two participants – who were children of mixed marriages – indicated that they spoke Polish at home. Indeed, two participants 158 remarked that not speaking Polish at home would be strange and unnatural: ‘It’s really awkward to speak English to my parents’ (Respondent 32, 18 August, 2006), and ‘It’s always Polish at home – it’s awkward to speak English at home’ (Respondent 31, 18 August, 2006). The prevalence of the Polish language in the home existed despite the difficulties alluded to by the post-okres komunizmu migrants in maintaining a solely Polish speaking household.

5.4 Conclusion

This chapter has detailed how Polish language and symbolism have been crucial to remembrances of Polishness across different settings and through time. I have shown that the (re)productions of cultural memories through and relating to Polishness have been articulated and remembered in multiple ways. In the public sphere, memories have been (re)produced as reminders of how the Romantics employed forms of Polish cultural expression as a means of resistance during foreign suppression. The representation of Romantic Era personalities highlights their contribution to the maintenance of Polish identity. As explored in more detail in Chapter 4, the Romantics were responsible for the development of a narrative – linguistic and symbolic – of resistance and struggle against foreign occupation. Poles would be aware of the historical context necessary to understand the significance of these monuments. In the private sphere, the construction of different Polish-speaking places has facilitated the (re)production of cultural memories. In Australia, in the Polish diaspora, maintaining Polish identity has been largely predicated on the continued use of the Polish language and practices to (re)produce cultural life and traditions. These cultural traditions are maintained in purposely-constructed community infrastructure and in Polish-speaking home spaces.

The transmission of these cultural memories has been multifarious in nature. Cultural memories concerning the Polish language are mostly transmitted using the Polish language, but this is not always the case. Although the Romantics used the Polish language, music and art to transmit their patriotic messages, they and their messages are embodied in the Planty by a different method of transmission. As symbolic structures, the monuments have been prominent focal points for the transmission of cultural memories

159 concerning the struggle for Polish autonomy. For example, the monuments of Grayna and Lilla commemorate their respective authors and their patriotic narratives. In addition, their female characterisation has enabled other narratives to be transmitted. That symbolism refers to the tradition and importance of the continuation of Polish identities by women in the home.

In the private setting, imaginations and re-imaginations of Polishness through the continued use of the Polish language and cultural practices have taken diverse pathways. Different conditions of migration of each migrant vintage and the different contexts of subsequent diasporic generations have meant that the Polish language in particular, has been maintained variously through the diaspora. The cultural infrastructure (re)produced by the post-WWII cohort did not retain the same significance to second and third generations, or to the post-okres komunizmu migrant vintage. For instance, the post- WWII cohort’s particularly harrowing experiences of dislocation and foreign occupation meant that prior to migration they had already established certain mechanisms to safeguard their Polish identity. These pre-existing methods of identity maintenance hinged on the continuation the Polish language. The Polish-speaking places constructed by the post-WWII generations proved effective mechanisms of language and identity transmission to the second generation in their childhood and adolescence. However, the practices of traditional Polish customs – once based exclusively on the use of the Polish language – declined with time. These customs have been (re)positioned around the home and away from established cultural infrastructure. The third generation has also articulated different transmission points for the maintenance of Polish identity. For this group, their Polishness was remembered and performed through associations with family heritage, their Polish grandparents and increasingly with transnational space. Crucially, for the third generation, constructions of Polish identity have not been linked with language maintenance, or the participation in Polish community organisations that have been centres of Polish speaking.

The different conditions of migration and social climate in Australia also influenced how the post-okres komunizmu migrants have operationalised methods of identity maintenance. This group did not think that their Polish identities needed ‘active’ maintenance. They 160 regarded their Polish identity as an intrinsic part of who they were. This positioning largely related to the lack of a perceived threat against their Polish identities before migration. The group has largely attempted to simply (re)create their homes in diaspora as they would have been in Poland. That strategy of identity maintenance brought some success as the language capacities of their second generation demonstrate.

In analysing the imaginations and re-imaginations of Polish language and cultural arts in this chapter, I have sought to shift the focus from the concept of potential loss of identity and language in diasporic descendents. Rather, I have focused on the different ways the Polish language and other cultural artefacts have been useful, used, emphasised and (re)positioned, both in the Planty and in the sample of the Polish diaspora. As such, this chapter has discussed the differing enactments of Polish cultural memories through the use of the Polish language and symbolism.

The next chapter is the first of two chapters that examine how methods of Polish identity maintenance have been operationalised during periods of foreign occupation in the 20th Century. Chapter 6 focuses on how memories of WWII – a major part of Poland’s macabre past – have been variously (re)produced and transmitted in public forums in Poland and through the Australian Polish diaspora. The macabre past has perpetuated and strengthened the historically embedded narratives of Poles struggling against foreign oppression. Despite and because of their macabre content, such narratives have been integral to the genesis of contemporary discourses of Polish identity.

i Young Poland is the term given to the modernist period of Polish art, literature and music, spanning 1890- 1918. Generally considered as a continuation of romanticism it is also referred to as neo-romanticism. ii For instance, Konrad Wallenrod (1828) or Pan Tadeusz (1834) (Master Thaddeus) are frequently credited as examples of fervent patriotism in Mickiewicz’s poetry. iii Anti-collaborationist sentiments still loom largely in contemporary political debates in Poland. The newly instituted lustration laws, which seek to vet past collaborators from public position has been widely criticised by human and civil rights groups as a witch-hunts of the past. iv At that time the Ukraine was considered to be part of the former Commonwealth of Poland and Lithuania. v In the cycle, each painting has two reoccurring characters, one in white representing genius and one in dark colours representing the artist.

161 vi Grottger’s Wojna is a known as a black and white drawing cycle depicting 11 different scenes that portray the tragedy and futility of war. vii Pedestrians must pass through the Planty to enter the Old Town, as the Planty replaced the original moat around the fortified city. The main ring roads around the centre of Kraków adjoin the Planty. viii This is particularly evident in the first and third verses of the poem (Translated by Miko, 2002:42) O matko Polko! gdy u syna twego O Polish mother! If in your son’s eyes W renicach byszczy genijuszu wietno, There ever gleams the genius’s greatness, Jeli mu patrzy z czoa dziecinnego If on his childish brow there will arise Dawnych Polaków duma i szlachetno; Of the ancient Poles pride and nobleness

O matko Polko! le si twój syn bawi! O Polish mother! Your son plays the wrong part Klknij przed Matki Bolesnej obrazem Kneel before Our Lady of Sorrows I na miecz patrzaj, co Jej serce krwawi: And look at the sword which pierces Her heart Takim wróg piersi twe przeszyje razem! The foe will strike your breast with the same blows. ix It may be argued that the only category of Polish migration not to fully fit into this schema of forced and involuntary migration is the Solidarity migrants. This is because although their migration was prompted by the political and economic turmoil occurring in Poland at that time, only a small proportion can adequately be described as political refugees or asylum seekers in the sense that they faced targeted persecution if they remained in Poland. While, Fasserman and Heniz (1994) estimated that only 10 per cent of East-West migrants could be classified as political refugees, they also contended that the approximately 250 000 Poles that left Poland between 1980 and 1981 were effectively classified as political by the West following the logic of the Cold War. Furthermore, Drozd (2001) found that in her Australian sample of Solidarity migrants 68 per cent nominated that either political, economic, or a combination of both influenced their reasons for leaving Poland. x I use the term ‘refugee’ here as opposed to ‘migrant’, to keep the original terms employed by Kunz (1973) in his explanation of kinetic models and forms of refugee displacement. Kunz (1973) utilised a definition of refugee from the ‘Revised United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugee’ (1951). In this Convention a refugee was defined as ‘an individual who owing to well-founded fear of being persecuted or reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality and is unable, or owing to such fear, unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country; or, who, not having a nationality or being outside the country of his former habitual residence as a result of such events, is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to return to it’ (Kunz, 1973: 130). xi ‘New Australians’ was a colloquial and sometimes derogatory term used to describe post WWII migrants in Australia. xii The meeting at Yalta in February 1945, was convened by Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin to decide the post WWII border changes to the map of Europe, corresponding to territories won by the Allied alliance. At Yalta, Stalin gained control over the formation of the post WWII Polish government, excluding the Polish government-in-exile in London. Additionally, despite Churchill’s promises to the exiled Polish government, at Yalta, it was also decided that the eastern borders of post WWII would follow the Poland Curzon Line, meaning the loss of historic Polish territory. Many Poles believed that Yalta was the ultimate betrayal by the British and American governments. xiii The Home Army, or Armia Krajowa, was the largest underground resistance movement operating in Poland during WWII. The Home Army was aligned with the Polish government-in-exile in London. xiv Yet, ‘the war brought home Australia’s vulnerability’ (DIMIA, 2001: 3) – Australia’s small postwar population (approximately seven million) was incapable of defending the country, especially in light of Australia’s close encounters with the Japanese during WWII. The resurrection of the popular slogan, ‘populate or perish’, by Arthur Calwell, Minister for Immigration (1945-1949), signalled the beginning of largest immigration program in Australia’s history based on defence and development (Price, 1981). Calwell had aimed for a two percent increase per year, split between natural increase and net migration. However, he failed to attract the targeted 10 people from the United Kingdom for every foreign migrant within the net migration, turning instead the International Refugee Organisation’s (IRO) Displaced Persons scheme (Burnley, 2001).

162 xv The Lady of Czstochowa Chapel in Marayong was built in 1966 for the celebration of Polish Mass as a Polish chapel. However, the chapel is not an official ‘church’. This is because in 1958 the Australian Catholic Church decided that separate ethnic parishes would not be established in Australia. xvi Price and Zubrzycki (1962: 126) quoted the sex ratio of the Polish born community in 1954, as being 567 males (aged 15 and over) per 100 unmarried females (aged 15 and over). xvii These changing governmental policies meant that restrictions were imposed by the Polish government on further migration to and from Poland between 1953 and 1956 (Price and Zubrzycki, 1962). Thus, there is a marked decrease in the arrival of Polish migrants after the main cohort of DP migration. This changed with the relaxation of migration policies in Poland following the Stalinist era, and the Landed Permit Scheme for Polish migrants saw an increase in female migration and migrant brides arrive in Australia. xviii The participant’s wife was not Polish xix It was common for the male post-WWII migrants to be place in employment in regional areas, where salaries were slightly higher and where, given the large influx of migrant labour, the Australian Government had embarked on infrastructure development. For example, the major source of migrant employment was the building of the Snowy Mountains Hydro-Electric Scheme in isolated country on the border of New South Wales and Victoria. xx In Kwiatowski’s (2007) recent doctoral dissertation, he cited Ashfield (1.2 percent) and Liverpool (0.9 percent), as Sydney’s Local Government Areas (LGAs) with the highest proportion of Polish born residents, compared to the Sydney average of 0.4 per cent. These percentages are higher when Polish ancestry is considered. xxi The second generation of the post-WWII migrants were Group 2 participants; the third generation were Group 3 participants. xxii From personal experiences conducting Honours research at Polish community organisations in 2001, there remained an ‘unspoken’ requirement to speak Polish in most of these types of venues. xxiii Jamrozik (2001) cited a Sydney-based study that revealed that 40 per cent of this migrant cohort had completed tertiary education and more than half had been employed in white-collar occupations in Poland. However, Drozd (2001) contended that the estimation of tertiary education amongst this group varies significantly according to the location of sample population and their time departure from Poland. Furthermore, she points to large discrepancy between such estimations and the actual level of tertiary educated in Poland during the 1980s Drozd (2001). In her sample of 60 Solidarity migrants, 25 per cent had completed university. Additionally, due to the nature of the Socialist education many women were educated and employed in occupational fields foreign to most women in Australia in the 1980s. xxiv It was common for Polish migrants leaving Poland before Martial law in 1981 to apply for a holiday or working visa to Austria first, and then apply in Austria for a permanent visa to Australia.

163 Chapter 6 – Histories of the macabre in public and private settings

Some events, and the places connected with them, cannot be erased by the passage of time. Passing years and changing times merely endow them with new significance. Such terrible events as genocide are not deleted from the memory of subsequent generations; rather, they reverberate in it with a dreadful echo that is also a warning (Rymanszewski, 2003: 13).

That the dead, especially war dead, are central both to a nation’s territorial claims and the sense of a unique identity that unifies its people is something that scholars have long recognised (Grant, 2005: 509-510).

6.1 Introduction

I have chosen the term ‘macabre’ to highlight the horrific and violent nature of events such as genocide, but also to draw attention to the sombreness inherent in the individual and collective mourning of such events. Emerging out of WWII was a new standard of suffering and atrocity that, as Young (1990: 128) has contended, ‘became a referent, a standard, by which subsequent suffering would be measured.’ Genocide also became the new term through which difficult explanations of the human capacity to plan and carry out large-scale mass execution were forged. Rymanszewski (2003) has argued that the discipline of martyrology began after WWII with the growing number of both places and events associated with non-religious martyrdom. These places and events are what Nora (1989) has termed ‘les lieux de memoire’ or sites of memory, and examples of these places and events are manifest in the Polish landscape. ‘After the war, it was recognised that the country [Poland] has been a vast killing field’ (Charlesworth, 2004: 309). While it is arguable that for Poles, all places connected with WWII are macabre by naturei, there are specific places such as Auschwitz-Birkenau and Paszów that required special commemoration because of their international significance and the scale of their tragedies.

Many authors have referred to the memory of events of the same or similar macabre nature as ‘traumatic memories’ and have tended to focus on private memories and the

164 reconstruction of individuals’ identities (Bal et al., 1999; Brison, 1999; Caruth, 1991; Caurth, 2001; Edkins, 2003; Vidali, 1996). Macabre events are not easily forgotten; as Bal (1999: viii) has argued, ‘traumatic events in the past have a persistent presence… traumatic memories remain present for the subject with particular vividness and/or totally resist integration’. Vidali (1996: 33) has further argued that ‘violent events disturb the continuity in time of collective memory’. The national collective memories of macabre events punctuate the historical record and unsettle normative ways of remembering. These macabre events resist forgetting and remain in the memory of afflicted individuals, groups and whole nations because of their non-normative, macabre and disruptive nature.

In this chapter, I focus on the memories of the Nazi and Soviet atrocities committed against Polish people and on Polish soil during WWII, as they are publicly portrayed in Polish national collective memory and held in the minds of Poles in diaspora. My specific focus is on the (re)productions and transmissions of these macabre events in private and public spheres, and how they weave (or do not weave) into discourses of Polish identity. I detail how the deaths of non-Polish people in Poland during WWII have become part of a process of publicly (re)producing cultural memories, because the Polish nation has a responsibility to commemorate the vast numbers of international as well as Polish victims who also died during WWII in Poland.

Following the discussion of cultural memory articulation through the arts and language in the public and private settings in Chapter 5, this chapter also deals with the (re)production and transmission of macabre memories in these two distinct spheres – within public memory and within the generational cohorts of different migrant families. I show how the contexts in which the memories have been transmitted and (re)produced have shaped not only how narratives were told but also the content of the memories. The underlying principle for understanding such (re)productions of memory has been drawn from Eyal’s (2004: 10) two forms of the ‘will to remember’. He argued that when the past of great significance to an individual of groups’ identity it is ‘deemed of consequence for the present and hence must be remembered’ (Eyal, 2004: 10). Similarly, Wood (1999) has referred to Halbwachs’ assertion that the chief purpose of historical memory is to generate an awareness of a shared identity through time. Taking Eyal’s (2004) proposition further, 165 the (re)production of such narratives transpires not only from a traditional need to remember the dead, but also from a new obligation not to forget the horrific trials of the Polish nation’s path to independence. Orla-Bukowska (2006: 177) has argued that it is ‘the Second World War which weighs heaviest on and delineates Polish national memory’. (Re)productions of the macabre events of WWII play an important role in transmitting Polish cultural memory, and in maintaining the important narratives of Polish identity. The politics of memory in the public sphere reveals how past events have been linked to contemporary narratives of struggle. It also points to how nations trace ‘the outcomes of particular struggles’ and incorporate them into a collective national narratives (Ashplant et al., 2000: 16). Within private settings, maintaining a diasporic cultural memory of wartime experiences and struggles has been part of the process of continuing the lived experiences of Polish identity as well as maintaining narratives of displacement. The (re)production of macabre cultural memories of WWII within both settings – public and private – contributes to existing narratives of suffering and struggle that are prominent in contemporary discourses of Polish identity.

Heffernan (1995: 295) has argued that the commemoration of war and nation’s war dead takes place within a ‘complex geography’. This geography not only involves the ceremonial rituals of commemoration, but also the (re)negotiation of narratives of war into the national identification of past and present. National remembrance often seeks to unite diverse public and individual memories of the past into collective national memories, shared by an ‘imagined’ community (cf. Anderson, 1991). Hutton (1988: 315) has argued that commemoration is ‘a mnemonic technique for localising collective memory’. The localisation of memories contributes to the formalisation of collective group identity, regardless of the size or composition of the group. As Halbwachs ([1926] 1992: 52) has contended, the reason ‘memories hang together is not that they are contiguous in time, it is rather that they are part of a totality of thoughts common to a group’. Therefore, the purpose and result of remembrance differs between private and public settings.

In this chapter, I argue that macabre cultural memories form an integral and distinctive part of the maintenance of the Polish narrative of struggle, survival and resistance to foreign occupation, in both public and private settings. The chapter is split into two parts. 166 In Part 1, I focus on the (re)production and transmission of cultural memories of Poland’s macabre past in the public sphere. In Part 2, I shift the focus to how these memories are articulated in the private realms of the post WWII Polish migrants, and within and between two subsequent diasporic generations. These memories as narrated by different generational cohorts may be different in content, but as Ashplant et al. (2000: 18) have argued, the articulation of ‘war memories is in part shaped through pre-existing social narratives’. In the Polish case, a pre-existing social narrative emerged during the Russian, Austrian and Prussian occupation when Poland was partitioned. As discussed in Chapter 5, the development of a narrative of resistance materialised through the importance given to the preservation of Poland in the patriotic poetry, literature, art and music produced by Romantic Era émigrés, during that time. The importance of this narrative, which has become incorporated into the contemporary (re)productions of macabre Polish memory, was bolstered by subsequent foreign incursions on Polish soil. Regardless of the settings in which they are (re)produced and transmitted, these narratives form palimpsests that become the collective cultural memories to which individuals, families and nations relate. In contemporary memory discourse, the retelling of cultural memories that centred on WWII experiences has ultimately contributed to the maintenance of a fundamentally macabre aspect of Polish history and identity.

Part 1 The macabre in Polish public places

The localisation of collective cultural memory in the public sphere occurs most commonly through coordinated rituals of remembrance, such as Armistice Day in England and Anzac Day in Australia, and at specific memory sites such as the Cenotaph at Whitehall in London or at Anzac Cove in Gallipoli. In most countries, the commemoration of war occurs at specifically designated national lieux des memoire (sites of memory). In contrast in Poland, Orla-Bukowska (2006: 177) has contended:

In central Warsaw hardly a step can be taken without encountering histories of original edifices on their contemporary replicas, or roll calls of tortured and executed innocents outside prisons.

167 The designation of sites of memory in the everyday Polish landscape is less contrived because of the countless places available for potential commemoration. Both Orla- Bukowska (2006) and Charlesworth (2004) have alluded to the everyday nature of WWII commemoration in the Polish landscape. Memorials such as that shown in Figure 6.1 are commonplace in Warsaw’s Old Town. These memorials are important components in the (re)production of macabre narratives of national significance. Through their placement in the vernacular, they resist forgetting by becoming sites of memory that are part of that same landscape. That is, they are not designated solely as sites of collective commemoration but are everyday layers of the urban façade. They serve to remind us that crimes so gruesome in nature occurred in everyday places – where we now go to shop, work or just walk. This everydayness of memorialisation is what makes the proliferation of memorial sites in Poland so distinctive. These sites are important markers of Polish memory and have been catalogued by one of the three Polish memory institutes, Rada Ochrony Pamici Walk i Mczestwa (ROPWiM) (this Chapter, Section 6.1.1). This process of cataloguing (re)produces Polish cultural memories of WWII by perpetuating and extenuating the narratives of the country’s struggle and suffering at the hands of foreign oppressors, in the vernacular. It makes the occurrence of such memories in the everyday landscape, omnipresent.

In another example, a memorial on the outer wall of Dom lski (Silesian House), commemorates the former Gestapo prison cells on ul. Pomorska 2, Kraków (no. 2 Pomorksa Street) (Figure 6.2). During the fieldwork for this thesis, I walked past this building frequently, as it was near to where I lived. It reminded me of the magnitude of what happened here during WWII, and that one could live so close to a place where Polish people of my grandparents’ ilk were tortured and executed. The memorial at the Gestapo prison depicts the ongoing relevance of the WWII macabre by reminding the passer-by of the events and the exact location where they occurred.

168 Figure 6.1 Example of a memorial plaque on an otherwise ordinary residential building in Warsaw’s Old Town, ‘This place is blessed by the suffering and bloodshed of Poles who fought for freedom 17-10-1943’.

Source: 36-108mm/digital/exp.auto/DD

Figure 6.2 Memorials to Gestapo Headquarters placed side be side on the outer wall of ul. Pomorska, 2, Kraków (note the candle and flowers).

Plaque above reads: Memorial of Gestapo Headquarters on ul. Pomorska 2, Kraków. ‘In this house were the headquarters of the Gestapo in the years 1939-45. The barbaric Hitlerites imprisoned tortured and murdered thousands of Poles’.

Source: 36-108mm/digital/exp.auto/DD

169 The presence of candles and flowers under the memorial testified to the continuation of remembrance at the site and brings the event starkly into the present. Thus, both the diversity and the sheer number of memorial sites in Poland demonstrate that the remembrance of macabre events associated with WWII have not simply been designated to specific dates or locations. The proof of their significance to Polish identity lies in the everydayness of Polish commemoration. The plethora of everyday places and people intimately connected with the past, within a Polish context of WWII remembrance, is unique. The (re)production of this narrative of the macabre forms an intrinsic part of the otherwise ‘ordinary’ landscape. The manifestation of memorialisation in the Polish landscape is decisive in that encounters with the macabre past are virtually unavoidable. Reminders of the country’s turbulent past continuously confront Polish audiences and others with connections to these pasts in public settings.

6.2 Addressing the demands on memory from national and non-national publics

Transmitting macabre historical narratives in the Polish public realm occurs via a multiplicity of avenues. This section attempts to present a montage of these avenues of the dissemination of remembrances and cultural memories. In this thesis, I have identified two different groups that were integral to the process of (re)producing and transmitting cultural memories of the macabre in the public sphere. The first group comprise those orchestrating the cultural memory transmission, or what Withers (1996: 327) termed the ‘mobilising force’ of memory. The second is the transmission audience. The Polish memorial landscape is complicated by the responsibility of Polish organisations for the commemoration of non-Poles who died in Poland during WWII. It is contested by many competing demands from Polish nationals and international victims of WWII, including Jews, Romany, homosexuals, ‘anti-socials’ and Poles abroad.

Both Poles and non-Poles are ‘mobilising forces’ orchestrating the transmission of WWII memories in Poland. Great diversity also exists between the two groups. The Polish impetus for commemoration stems from official public memory institutes and from the Polish public. Poland has two main government administered memory institutes – Instytut Pamici Narodowej and Rada Ochrony Pamici Walk i Mczestwa (the Institute of

170 National Remembrance (IPN) and the Committee for Safeguarding Monuments of Struggle and Martyrdom (ROPWiM)), which I consider later in this Chapter (in Sections 6.2.1 and 6.2.2). These two public memory organisations are largely responsible for preserving the memory of the Polish nation and for the commemoration of Poles who died during WWII. They produce and maintain memory artefacts, such as monuments, war cemeteries, academic and popular publications. They also maintain a collection of court proceedings and historical archives.

While certainly less official and more ethereal, the transferral of cultural memories from the Polish public is the other Polish mobilising force of memory transmission. This force of memory transmission maintains a presence within the everyday Polish landscape. An example of the remembrance of events by an everyday audience is the laying of candles and flowers at commemoration sites (such as those depicted in Figures 6.1 and 6.2). Within these ritual enactments the significance of particular cultural events from the past are brought into the present – they are no longer merely records of history but sites of enacted memory, memorialisation and remembering. Kubik (1994) and Orla-Bukowska (2006) have commented on the commemorative ritual of laying flowers and candles at war memorials and roadside monuments, and at other sites that represent the struggle for Polish autonomy. The placement of flowers on gates of the Lenin Shipyards in Gdask during the Solidarity strikes in the 1980s is one such example. Sites of memory commemorating WWII are particularly significant to Poles because of the intrusion imposed by the war on their freedom, dignity, and their lives. Moreover, as Jedlicki (1999: 226) has attested, ‘there hardly was a single Polish family that had not experienced the occupiers’ [the Nazis] arrogance and ruthlessness’. While personal experiences of Polish families during WWII intersect with how the public preforms commemoration, these narratives are quite simply being (re)produced, transmitted and received because of the widespread traumatic impact of WWII on the Polish public.

Memory transmission as mobilised by non-Poles, is more complicated and involves the remembrance of all victims who died in Poland during WWII. The aggressiveness of the Nazi Final Solution meant that many people from multiple nationalities, religions and social groups died in concentration camps and other detention facilities in Poland. Each 171 group of victims have left certain legacies, and the requirements for their remembrance vary and may also depend on different religious customs. Consequently, a dense and complex memorial landscapeii has been created. Compounding this complexity further are the demands on the same memory sites by the Polish public. Their interpretations and expectations often carry different symbolic meanings to other non-Polish and non- Catholic audiences, such as the descendants of international victims. Nowhere are the competing demands for remembrance more evident than at Auschwitz-Birkenau. Auschwitz-Birkenau is an often-discussed memory landscape that illustrates the complexities of Polish public memory to the extent that any discussion of Polish memory in public spheres would be incomplete without reference to it. At the Polish town of Owicim (Auschwitz in German), the Nazis converted a former Polish army barracks into the now infamous concentration camp. As a large and notoriously macabre WWII memorial site, Auschwitz is a place where contestations of competing memories play out. In The Crosses of Auschwitz, Zubrzycki (2006) has teased out the different and loaded understandings of memory at Auschwitz, by exposing how the words Auschwitz and Owicim have distinct meanings to different victim and national groups. She delineated between Auschwitz, “Auschwitz”, Owicim, and “Owicim”. The words Auschwitz and Owicim (without inverted commas) represent actual physical localities: Auschwitz is the German named concentration camp, and Owicim, the Polish town. Zubrzycki (2006) then looked at the how “Owicim” and “Auschwitz” (with inverted commas) have other loaded meanings and cultural memories embedded within them. “Owicim” for Poles, is the ‘symbol of Polish martyrdom’, and for Jews “Auschwitz” represents ‘the symbol of the Holocaust and now of universal evil’ (Zubrzycki, 2006: 99). In addition, Webber (1992: 9) also contented that for Poles “Owicim” is a symbol of the ‘Nazi oppression of Poland’. Zubrzycki’s distinction has provided a framework for differentiating the multivocality within these terms and how this symbolism is explained by understanding each group’s interpretation of the meanings of Auschwitz.

The transmission of the macabre cultural memories of Auschwitz, and of other concentration camp sites in Poland, is contested internationally. Auschwitz illustrates the competing demands of memory most decisively, because of the differing interpretations of

172 WWII memory and their intersection and culmination in this one location. Consequently, a third public memory institute (along with the IPN and ROPWiM) operates in Poland. The Midzynarodowa Rada Owicimska (the International Auschwitz Council, IAC) comprises international council members. Although the council is international in composition, it also deals with Polish public memory and the commemoration of victims who died in Poland. It operates in an advisory capacity with the Auschwitz Museum, with the goal of advising on:

Specific issues connected with the functioning of the Museum and evaluated exhibitions, publications, films, guidebooks, and all other modes of presenting the former camp (Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum, 2000).

The focus of the following sections is on the methods that the three memory institutes have employed to transmit cultural memories of macabre events from WWII. Because of the variety and multivocality of demands on WWII commemoration, an expedient way to view the functioning of these public memory institutes is through their intended audience. I begin with a focus on solely Polish commemoration, then I discuss Polish and international commemoration, and lastly commemoration that is primarily concerned with international memory representation. I then examine Paszów as a memory site representative of the process of commemorating macabre cultural memories in everyday places in Poland.

6.2.1 The Committee for Safeguarding Monuments of Struggle and Martyrdom (ROPWiM)

The Committee for Safeguarding Monuments of Struggle and Martyrdom (ROPWiM) is a State funded Polish organisation concerned with protecting and preserving the memory of places, events and people associated with Polish struggle, suffering and martyrdom. This role includes the erection and conservation of war memorials, monuments and war cemeteries. When established in 1947 at the beginning of the okres komunizmu of Poland, its initial focus was on the registration and documentation of places and objects of national

173 remembrance, particularly in Warsaw. The focus shifted after the okres komunizmu to encompass memorialisation of struggle and suffering inflicted by not only the Nazis, but also the Soviet regime. The objectives of the committee include:

 the protection of places of struggle and martyrdom of the Polish nation;  the remembrance of factual events associated with battle/warfare;  the organisation of anniversary celebrations of events associated with the struggle and suffering of the Polish nation;  to provide the initiative for popular exhibitions and special programs focusing on places and people associated with the struggle and suffering of the Polish nation; and  to organise and be responsible for places and buildings for national remembrance, particularly war cemeteries in Poland, war cemeteries and memorials overseas, and museums and places of remembrance (ROPWiM, 2005).

ROPWiM’s distinguishing feature is that it is a solely Polish organisation, focusing exclusively on commemorating events from WWII as well as Soviet based actions against the Polish nation. Not only does the ROPWiM ‘safeguard’ Polish memories, but in so doing, it also brings reminders of past events into the contemporary public places. The ROPWiM memorialises sites based on their macabre nature, regardless of the magnitude of the atrocity or event. The ROPWiM has catalogued all memory sites, including for example, the memorial plaques commemorating the Gestapo Prison in Figures 6.1 and 6.2. This approach contrasts with Wagner-Pacifici and Schwartz’s (1991: 379) suggestion that public commemorations portray a ‘positive image of the past’ for public consumption, and with Muzaini and Yeoh’s (2005) assertion that histories are often ‘sanitised’ for public audiences. The objective of commemoration in a Polish context is that the memories of these places, events and people, are maintained because of their macabre nature and because they typify Polish ‘struggle and suffering’. The use of the terms ‘suffering and struggle’ in ROPWiM’s objectives is part of that process of maintaining a nationally significance and historically embedded Messianic narrative. The ROPWiM enact such

174 cultural memory maintenance through the conservation of war memorials, cemeteries and monuments, but also via the publication of the journal Przeszo i Pamic (Remembrance and the Past) and reference guides detailing the remembrance sites of struggling and sufferingiii.

The underlying rationale for the (re)production of macabre narratives aligns with Eyal’s (2004) assertion of the will to remember – these historical events are deemed pertinent because of their importance to present day constructions of Polish identity. The narratives of WWII remain relevant precisely because of their macabre nature. The ROPWiM facilitates the transmission of cultural memories in a Polish context through a combination of constructing and maintaining nationally significant material objects of memory and providing spaces for popular discourse on Polish cultural memory via published literature.

6.2.2 The Institute of National Remembrance (The IPN)

The IPN is Poland’s foremost public organisation dealing with national memory. Its main objectives are the preservation of the memory of the following:

 losses suffered by the Polish nation during WWII and the Soviet period;  the ‘patriotic traditions of fighting against occupants, Nazism and Communism’; and  the ‘citizens’ efforts to fight for an independent Polish State, in defense of freedom and human dignity (Institute of National Remembrance, 2007).

The IPN’s charter states that it is also obliged ‘to investigate crimes against not only Polish nationals but also other nationals of Polish citizenship and other citizens who were harmed in the Polish territories’ (Institute of National Remembrance, 2007). Indeed, a senior official of the IPN interviewed for this thesis stressed the significance of this charter. They stated that the IPN is ‘responsible for preserving the memory of the victims [of WWII]…disregarding the nationality of the victim and disregarding the nationality of the perpetrator’ (Informant Aiv, 2005). In an international capacity, the IPN also benefits

175 from formal cooperation (both bilateral and multi-lateral) with numerous countriesv. Such arrangements enable access to international archives that supplement historical evidence for prosecutions of war criminals (IPN, 2007).

A Polish Parliamentary Act established the IPN in 1989 after several years of public discussion regarding the ‘memory of the heritage of the communist regime’ (Informant A, 2005). It has four statutory arms: the Public Education Office, the Archival Records and the Vetting Officevi, and the Commission of the Prosecution of Crimes against the Polish Nation (referred to hereafter as the Commission). The Commission deals primarily with the prosecution of crimes against the Polish nation and has the responsibility of transmitting the outcomes of prosecutions to the Polish and international public. In addition, the Commission investigates crimes ‘for which there is no statute of limitations, committed against Polish nationals and Polish citizens of other nationalities’ (Institute of National Remembrance, 2007). The Commission was initially established after WWII at which time it focused only on the prosecution of Nazi war crimesvii. This was in line with the propaganda of the Soviet-controlled Polish government, which highlighted the Nazi origin of crimes against Poland while downplaying or suppressing information about Soviet involvement. However, this focus was expanded after the okres komunizmu to include crimes committed by Soviet nationals against the Polish nation or in Poland.

Information regarding the Commission’s reports, investigations and prosecution records are publicly available on the internet and through publications and from the IPN. As the national memory institute, the IPN frequently features in the popular media, chiefly in its capacity as a centre of expertise in the field of Polish memory, but also to provide updates on prosecution cases. Unlike ROPWiM, for whom the transmission of Polish cultural memories occurs primarily through material memory objects, the IPN’s main avenue of transmission is the media, making it a high profile public organisation. As such, it has a duty to consider public opinion about specific events, people and places that are regarded as important markers in Polish history.

The establishment of an organisation such as IPN was long anticipated. It presented Poles with an opportunity to address the plethora of historical but also contemporarily relevant

176 attacks against and grievances of the Polish nation, particularly those shrouded publicly by and during the Soviet regime. However, the establishment of the IPN and the workings of the Commission have not resulted in an opening of the floodgates for Polish retribution. It is an impossible task to prosecute every crime committed against the Polish nation and its people during and after WWII. Great difficulty arises in deciding which crimes the Commission will prosecute, partly because of the perceived prioritisation of atrocities of one crime over another. The complexity of this task is exacerbated by the IPN’s esteemed position and the weight of expectancy of the public with a historically embedded Messianic mindset. This viewpoint positions the Polish nation as the ultimate victim of historical misfortune and it has the propensity to tie the Commission’s attempts to rectify past grievances with the preservation of Polish memory. Compounding this problem is that while the IPN’s key objective is to provide the most accurate historical record possible, about Polish victims from WWII and beyond. However, as an informant from the IPN stated:

We do not have any right, and we do not wish to have [the] right to suggest an official version of the history. We are only one of the institutions that are in the way responsible for showing the right way [towards a more accurate historical record] (Informant A, 2005).

The Commission’s first prosecution case was controversial given the commonly perceived Polish narrative of Poland as the victim. The decision in 2000 to reopen the case of the pogrom at Jedwabne, a town in northeast Poland, was highly contentious and difficultviii for both the IPN and the Polish public. The Jedwabne case concerned the murder of the town’s Jewish population (of approximately 1600 people) by its Polish inhabitants on 10 July 1941. At the time, the town was under German occupation and thus German jurisdiction. From the beginning of the investigation, public rhetoric positioned the Jedwabne case under the rubric of ‘Oczyszczanie pamici’ (cleansing the memory) (Wolentarska-Ochman, 2006: 153). In other words, through the media coverage, Poles were encouraged to enter into a process of (re)examination of their collective memories of victimisation, so that it encompassed victimisation both towards Poles and by Poles during WWII. Thus, the contention of this case was palpable: ‘It was a very painful case, the 177 Jedwabne case, very painful both from moral point of view and human point of view’ (Informant A, 2005). After waiting so many years for the creation of the IPN and the reformation of the Commission, that the first case involved the prosecution of Polish people undoubtedly created public discussion and drama.

The media played a crucial role in influencing public opinion about the case. An informant from the IPN stated, ‘it was even more dramatic because of the mass media and press…The public debate was really militant’ (Informant A, 2005). Wolentarska-Ochman (2006) has commented on the role of the media in creating public discourses about Polish wartime memory. She contended that through its ongoing reports on the case, Gazeta Wyborcza (a leading leftist daily newspaper) for example, had a positive impact on the process of (re)examining Polish collective memory (Wolentarska-Ochman, 2006). She argued that this re-examination was timely considering the impending inclusion of Poland into the European Union (Wolentarska-Ochman, 2006). However, not all media encouraged Poles to approach the Jedwabne case with an open mind. ‘The national highbrow press appealed for feelings of guilt and collective responsibility’ (Wolentarska- Ochman, 2006: 160). Not only did this further alienate the contemporary residents of Jedwabne, but the far right pressix fuelled ultra-nationalist sentiments and sought to assume the role of the defenders of the ‘good name’ of Jedwabne and its residents (Gross, 2006; Wolentarska-Ochman, 2006: 161-162).

While the Commission successfully convicted 12 of the 22 defendants, the IPN’s view was that any sense of achievement should be derived from seeing the Jedwabne case as a gradual progression away from the national narrative of Poles as the enduring victim. Its adoption of and adherence to a morally high standpoint meant that:

through this case IPN changed the idealised view of the history among many Polish – among Polish public opinion – which was very brave of IPN. Thanks to this, a certain point of view the recent history has changed. Finally, Polish people noticed that they were also [involved in] wrong things going on in the history. Even if there were particularities, we have to know it (Informant A, 2005).

178 However, Wolentarska-Ochman (2006: 165) has asserted that the IPN actually had ‘a negative impact on the memory project at Jedwabne’, because it failed ‘to work out an effective public relations strategy to prevent misinterpretations of its communication’, for example by ultra nationalist groups in the national media. Furthermore, contrary to the IPN’s non-political intentions, she contended that the investigation became politicised because IPN assumed the official position of defending Poland to an international audience (Wolentarska-Ochman, 2006).

As a statutory arm of the IPN, the Commission has transmitted macabre cultural memories in a unique way: via the dissemination of knowledge solely through the public realm. In doing so, this has highlighted the inextricable linkage of the memories of events such as Jedwabne with wider discourses of identity politics, cultural ideologies and the politics of retribution. The contemporary relevance of this historical case has manifested in the Polish public sphere as an outcome of public discussion. Such public discourses belie assertions that cultural memories can exist in isolation, away from their historical and contemporary contexts. Rather, they show how a nation’s collective memory becomes entangled with assumptions about past events, especially those of a harrowing and unforgettable nature. In a Polish context, public endorsement of a shared but traumatic past was particularly hampered until the end of the okres komunizmu, when foreign occupiers such as the Soviet regime manipulated history as a means of legitimising their authority. The IPN’s goal is to provide the Polish public with a viewpoint of Polish cultural memory that is independent, but also representative of the history that has been obscured by foreign occupiers. Regardless of the difficulties involved, this is an opportunity to ‘set the record straight’ through the creation and transmission of public discourses regarding those events that have been so emblematic of suffering for Polish people.

6.2.3 The International Auschwitz Council (IAC)

How do you construct Auschwitz as a memorial site which does justice to the dignified memory of so many different groups whose descendents in turn perceive the place in so many different ways? (Webber, 1992: 12)

179 Many scholars have attempted to address this question. The following section adds another perspective to the complex memorial landscape that exists at Auschwitz by focusing on how macabre cultural memories have been (re)produced and transmitted by the International Auschwitz Council (known hereafter as the IAC). My intention is to show that the IAC, as a public organisation, must negotiate a multivocality of competing demands on memory at Auschwitz to ensure that (re)productions are inclusive of all victims’ experiences. By contributing to and facilitating an inclusive public dialogue about the preservation of memory at Auschwitz, the IAC must include the memories of victims and non-victims who have (re)produced narratives of Auschwitz’s macabre pasts. The responsibility for the dissemination of these narratives rests with the Auschwitz Museum and the IAC as its consultative organ.

The Polish Ministry of Culture and National Heritage officially established the IAC in 1990. In 2000, the governmental authority for the IAC was transferred to the Polish Prime Ministers Office from the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage. The Polish Prime Ministers Office established a new 6-year term for IAC members. The IAC describes itself as an advisory and consultative body to the Office of the Polish Prime Minister on ‘matters connected with protecting and utilising the site of Auschwitz Nazi camp and other concentration camps located within the present borders of Poland’ (Auschwitz- Birkenau Memorial and Museum, 2006). The IAC’s membership is representative of the international and multi-faith nature of Auschwitz victims, with twenty-five members from Poland, Israel, The United States of America, Canada, France, Germany and the United Kingdom (Informant Bx, 2005).

The politics of memory play a significant role in the IAC’s ability to administer resolutions on the transmission of macabre narratives to a variety of Polish and international publics. While the IAC is international both in composition and in terms of its audience, it advises to a Polish parliamentary department – the Office of the Polish Prime Minister. Thus, despite the council’s international composition it informs on how memory should be preserved at Auschwitz by the Polish (state-administered) Auschwitz- Birkenau museum. The IAC seeks to facilitate a comprehensive agenda that recognises the different requirements for commemoration of Auschwitz’s international audiences of 180 victims. It is involved in informing decisions regarding the functioning of existing exhibitions at the Auschwitz-Birkenau Museum, the publication of guidebooks and films, and the establishment of new exhibitions and memorials at Auschwitz (Auschwitz- Birkenau Memorial and Museum, 2000). One of the main modes of transmission of IAC’s resolutions are in the form of press releases, which are available under the ‘Latest News’ tab (on the English version) of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum website.

The IAC’s politics of memory arises not only from the mulitvocality of international concerns at Auschwitz, but from the Polish operation of the IAC. It is illustrated by the IAC’s institutional position within Polish government. Because it is under the authority of the Office of the Polish Prime Minister, the IAC can lobby other Ministries on issues of cross-portfolio significance that may involve Auschwitz (Informant B, personal communication, 27/08/2007). The arrangement reflects that issues relating to Auschwitz are wide-ranging and pertinent to other government Ministries such as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of National Education, and the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage. Each of these Ministries may be lobbied by individual members of the IAC or by the Office of the Polish Prime Minister, on issues of international significance such as the ongoing preservation of the exhibit depicting the victims’ hair at Auschwitz. As an Informant from the IAC pointed out, this politics of memory is compounded in a Polish political context because ‘Auschwitz issues relate to Polish foreign [policy] issues because Polish foreign diplomats are regularly lobbied on Auschwitz issues’ (Informant B, 2005). This means that the decision process is not always straightforward and linear – from the IAC to the museum, for instance. Decisions and resolutions made by the council may be influenced, for example, by how topical a proposed memorial is or by specific national or religious groups’ customs for mourning and burial. It is, however, at the discretion of these other Ministries whether or not to utilise the IACs advice (Informant B, 2005). In addition, many of the IAC members themselves make representations for their own (international) institutions, such as the American Holocaust Museum and Yad Vashem, in Israel. Thus, there are many international demands on cultural memory at Auschwitz elicited from different nationalities, religious groups and their political institutions.

181 The IAC is therefore a key decision-making entity in a memory landscape characterised by a multiplicity of international actors each with their own agendas about how memory is (re)produced and transmitted at Auschwitz. The potential for key stakeholders to influence memorialisation at Auschwitz looms large. As the key decision-making body, the IAC has:

a capacity that must also be ‘performed’ if [it is] to extricate itself from the potentially incapacitating grip that a politics of memory can exert (Wood, 1999: 200).

The IAC performs the role of mediating a politics of memory and maintaining the memory of victims at Auschwitz. It provides an example of how a public memory institute must deal with competing demands on memorialisation in one place. Auschwitz’s macabre history has meant that upholding the memory of victims in this place involves negotiating the mulitvocality of both international and multi-faith audiences. However, the infamy of Auschwitz as a macabre place has also led to that necessity for a decision-making body such as the IAC to assist in maintaining the memories of a range of victims. Other macabre sites, such as Paszów, have experienced a different strategy of memory maintenance.

6.2.4 Macabre places: Dis(re)membering at Paszów

Charlesworth (2004) and Charlesworth and Addis (2002) have described processes that have contributed to the memorialisation of Paszów’s macabre past as a former concentration camp. Farmer (1995: 98) has argued that the power of former concentration camps lies in their ‘materiality’ as commemorative sites of ‘immutable evidence [and] unmediated testimony of what happened there’. Yet, there is little remaining material evidence at Paszówxi. There, the process of vegetative succession has covered the former working quarry and Paszów has become an open green space (Figures 6.3 and 6.4). The site lends itself to the array of outdoor activities as described by Charlesworth:

182 The former Paszów camp is certainly the largest unregulated open space in the suburbs of Krakow. The grassed area around the Socialist monument is regularly used for ball games by adults with children. For younger children it is the place of their first walk in a non paved area, their first picnic, the place where they picked flowers to take home…For older children and youth it is the site of rites of passage. For children it is the escape from the adult world, an adventure playground par excellence, with no rules and a landscape to imagine in (Charlesworth, 2004: 307).

Figure 6.3 View of the former quarry at Paszów looking towards ul. H. Kamienskiego in the midground, and the suburb of Podgórze in the background. Soruce: 36-108mm/digital/exp/auto/DD

183

Figure 6.4 View of open space behind the main Socialist-era monument, from ul. Abrahama within the former Paszów concentration camp. Soruce: 36-108mm/digital/exp/auto/DD

Despite its apparent bareness, remembrance of the macabre events of WWII has not been forsaken at Paszów. I argue that the site and its commemorations encourage multiple interpretations of personal and collective memories. Several monuments have been constructed to commemorate victims of the concentration camp. The largest and most conspicuous of these was constructed in 1948 during the okres komunizmu to commemorate all ‘martyrs of Hitler’s genocide’ (Figures 6.5 and 6.6).

184

Figure 6.5 Front of the Socialist-era monument facing ul. H. Kamienskiego Source: 36-108mm/digital/exp/auto/DD

A striking feature of this monument is the large cut across the figures (Figure 6.5). The figures, in mourning stance, are cut from side to side across the front and back of the sculpture. According to Young (1994: 216), the cut is an ancient Jewish funerary motif, signifying ‘life interrupted by death’, which he states has also been adopted into other contemporary Jewish monuments in Poland. Young (1994) has interpreted the cut to symbolise the brokenness of Jewish life and memory in Poland. However, the inscription on the rear of the monument does not specifically allude to Jewish victims: it pays homage to the ‘martyrs murdered by Hitler’s genocide’. The lack of identification of specific victims accords with the Soviet ideology of a commonality of victims in solidarity. Yet the inclusion of what Young has identified as a Jewish motif suggests that the artist was

185 also communicating a specifically Jewish message; a different memory to the official Soviet inscription.

Figure 6.6 Rear of Socialist-era monument, with the Polish inscription ‘W holdzie mczennikon po mordowanzm przez Hitlerowskich ludoboicom a latach 1943-45’ (To pay homage to the martyrs murdered by Hitler’s genocide in the years 1943-1945). Soruce: 36-108mm/digital/exp/auto/DD

Three other smaller monuments have been erected at Paszów. One is for the Jewish victims of Paszów (pictured in Figure 6.7), another for the Jews of Hungarian origin who died at Paszów (Figure 6.8), and another for Polish victims. Together and separately, all the monuments allow multiple remembrances.

186

Figure 6.7 (left) Monument to Hungarian Victims Figure 6.8 (right) Monument to Jewish victims Source: (both) 36-108mm/digital/exp/auto/DD

Landzelius’ (2003) notion of commemorative dis(re)membering is pertinent to the transmission of cultural memories at Paszów. Landzelius’ (2003: 212) wordplay separates ‘re’ from ‘dismembering’ to highlight the inherent materiality of ‘dismembering’ as distinct from the ‘mental and discursive’ associations of re-membering. According to Landzelius (2003: 212) ‘dismembering’ refers ‘to the body, to body parts, to machine parts, and to parts of a building, as well as to social members and membership’. The term suggests that the process of remembering is made up of many (separate) parts (Landzelius, 2003). Put together, these parts can provide a discourse of remembering. The implication of Landzelius’ wordplay is that deconstructing or dismembering the different material forms of remembrance reveals the various member parts, which viewed in isolation of the whole expose the various contextualities of memory. Following Landzelius, further breakdowns of the term ‘dis(re)membering’ expose other ways of thinking about the processes of remembering. It would appear that in Paszów there are two more processes at play: (dis)remembering and dismembering. 187 (Dis)remembering occurs through the processes of attrition of the material markers that once distinguished the site as a concentration camp. Despite Paszów’s macabre history, there has not been a continual management or re-creation of the former material characteristics of the concentration camp, such as at Auschwitz. Apart from the house of the former camp’s commandant, the site has been left bereft of original or reconstructed built structures that would ordinarily signify its macabre past. Though once on the outskirts of Kraków’s urban fringe, the urban vernacular landscape now encroaches on the open space at Paszów. In fact, nowadays the Socialist-era monument (Figure 6.5), with its five figures in mourning, gazes down across ul. H Kamienskiego to ‘Castorama’, Poland’s commercial hardware warehouse, and to the suburb of agiewniki in the distance (Figure 6.9). Yet, regardless of the progression of the everyday around them, these five mourning figures sit strongly and solemnly as symbolic reminders of the macabre history of this place.

(Dis)remembering here is not about forgetting, but embedding the narrative of the macabre into place. (Dis)remembering at Paszów recognises that the incorporation of its macabre history into the present everyday landscape and narrative of place does not mean that the macabre history is disregarded. Rather, commemoration in this form is similar to the memorial wall plaques quietly marking places of death in Warsaw and Kraków (as discussed in this Chapter 6, Section 6.1, Figure 6.1). Like these memorial plaques, Paszów’s position in Kraków’s everyday landscape means that the place’s macabre past is brought into the present through encounters with the everyday.

188

Figure 6.9 The view from the Socialist-era monument at Paszów across ul. H. Kamienskiego to ‘Castorama’ in the foreground. The suburb of agiewniki is in the background. Soruce: 36-108mm/digital/exp/auto/DD

Dismembering at Paszów, on the other hand, is highlighted through the openness and eerie silence of the place, which serves to draw attention to the few commemorative monuments. While the material forms of memory speak to the audiences of pilgrims who do visit the site, dismembering these material forms of commemoration symbolically opens up the landscape at Paszów. Part of the process of remembering at Paszów is recognising how narratives of memory are framed by the apparent emptiness, seclusion and calm at the site. Not only is the vacuity itself a part of the commemorative process, through its suggestion of nihilism, but it has also served to emphasis the disparate parts of the other material commemorations at the site. The commemorative landscape at Paszów also forces its audience to do the memory work. In his study of the photographic representations of two former concentration camp sites, Sobibór in Poland and Ohrdruf in Germany, Baer (2000: 45, original emphasis) has argued that it is the ‘unavailability of referential markers, and not information that could be embedded in historical contexts’ that form integral parts of the memory landscape. Both Sobibór and Ohrdruf are

189 commemoratively bare and Baer (2000: 42) has contended that images of these sites ‘contain no evidence of their historical issues’ and thus rely on ‘the experiences of place in order to commemorate the destruction of experience and memory’. Dismembering commemoration at Paszów occurs through the same process. Openness and nothingness confronts and prompts the visitor to think about what happened there (or not). Paszów becomes a largely blank memory script through the lack of normative commemorative markers. Further exacerbating this blankness for the non-Polish visitor is that all three monuments are inscribed in Polish. There is only one plaque in English (shown in Figure 6.10), containing minimal information and positioned along a side pathway well away from the main Socialist and Jewish monuments.

Figure 6.10 Information plaque with English translation at Paszów Source: 36-108mm/digital/exp/auto/DD

Paszów’s relative bareness means that commemoration occurs through a combination of visitors’ historical knowledge, the experience of the sombre landscape and cultural memories exhibited in the place through memorialisation. As Keil (2005: 490) has argued,

190 Visitors’ experiences at the death camps are mediated, firstly through the expectations they bring with them, but secondly through mimetic forms and processes of representation at the site.

The process of memorialisation at Paszów exposes the intricacies of the (re)production and transmission of macabre cultural memories in the Polish public settings. These nuances relate to the multivocality of (re)productions of cultural memory. The site of Paszów exemplifies the multiple interpretations of Polish cultural memory. It encourages people to bring their own knowledge and memories to the commemoratively bare landscape and perform their own remembrances.

I have analysed how the representation of different publics in the memorialisation process occurs via official memory institutes, which attempt to cautiously negotiate the politics of remembrance of these ‘grievous historical events’. Augmenting the gravity of the memory situation in the Polish public sphere is the exposition of a highly complex web of competing voices and allied demands on public commemorative spaces. Adding further layers of complexity to these memory narratives are the macabre nature of the memories in question, and the infamy of Nazi and Soviet terror during WWII, which has required international as well as Polish commemoration. These macabre narratives are packed and unpacked by everyday audiences in the public sphere, such as those Polish audiences passing by memorial plaques in the urban landscape, and through the encroachment of suburbia on macabre places such as Paszów. This everydayness, which similarly reverberates through the (re)production of these memories by Polish memory institutes, conveys an important narrative. The macabre nature of recent Polish history is not hidden. Rather it is overtly portrayed in the landscape and publicly and frequently discussed by the media. The visibility of cultural memory transmission in public places ensures that reminders of the nation’s past are visible and ever-present. In private places (re)negotiations with cultural memory also occur, during the process of (re)producing and transmitting narratives to subsequent generations within family groups.

191 Part 2 Diasporic negotiations of macabre pasts

Modern war necessarily entails ruptures in the fabric of identity on multiple levels since it engenders death and the personal experience by combatants and others of unimaginable horror, the distortion of patterns of everyday life and suspensions of normal modes of behaviour, the disruption of social, economic, family and gender relations, and profound political and geopolitical change (Finney, 2002: 6)

One of the strengths of cultural memory is its longevity. It remains in the absence and destruction of other material cultural artefacts. In the aftermath of the war, memories were, in many instances all that remained. The cultural memories of war, such as those described above by Finney (2002), are often macabre and involve not only tragedies such as concentration camps, but also the everyday experiences and tribulations of ordinary citizens. For many of the post-WWII Polish migrants in diaspora these memories comprised a fundamental part of how they understand their Polishness. Moreover, because they do not necessarily have the same access to forms of memory (re)production in Polish public spheres (such as those detailed in Part 1). Macabre events also provided the impetus for migration, and as such, they are also often the last memory of a former homeland. Accordingly, these events are critical to understanding how migrants have (re)produced cultural memories as part of the foundation of Polish identity in diaspora. Becker (2005: 105) has argued that, for Halbwachs, not only did memory crystallise within social frameworks, but public events had the propensity to leave a ‘deep impact on those who lived though them’. This is especially so for young people such as the majority of Polish migrants arriving in Australia after WWII, who were beginning to construct adult identities during the war and at the time of their migration (Becker, 2005). For many of the post-WWII participants in this thesis their memories relate to displacement, struggle for survival, and suffering during WWII. Their narratives reflect the cultural memories of the children and adolescents of WWII, but their retelling has occurred in adulthood in the present (cf. Tschuggnall and Welzer, 2002). This schism has the potential to affect both the content and the process of narration of cultural memories, as time and age have allowed for processes of reflection and knowledge accumulation.

192 In this second part of Chapter 6, I explore the cultural memories of macabre events experienced during the war as narrated by the post-WWII migrant cohort. This cohort consisted of those migrants who arrived in Australia after WWII either as Displaced Persons, Ex-Servicepersons or on assisted passages (as detailed in Chapter 3, Section 3.5.2.1). I provide a context to the diversity of post-WWII migrants’ cultural memories (in Section 6.5), by focusing on the (re)production and transmission of cultural memories within the private settings of the family. This focus includes analyses of the descendents of post-WWII Polish migrants in diaspora. Through them, I have sought to examine how cultural memories are (re)told and passed down within the diasporic family. The cultural memories of this Polish diaspora included stories of struggle and survival, active resistance through participation in the Polish army, examples of patriotism and personal pride, and stories of luck. The following two subsections (6.3.1 and 6.3.2) explore these two distinct facets of cultural memory – the narrative content and the process of narration. The content of these narratives often involved stories of struggle, survival and resistance. While not always pleasant to recount, they were retold because of the compulsion of the participants, whose memories were still intensely vivid. Such memories were significant to these participants’ wider discourses of the identity.

6.3 The family as the context of cultural dissemination

Encounters with macabre cultural memories often unfold in private spheres, most commonly as Ashplant et al. (2000: 18) have identified in ‘face-to-face groups, ranging from family and kinship networks and gatherings of old comrades to local communities and interest groups’. Part 2 of this chapter considers how memories are (re)produced to maintain Polish identity in diaspora, more specifically within diasporic family groups of the post-WWII Polish migrants. Yet, the concept of ‘family’ itself has multiple meanings and that are also contested. As Bertaux and Thompson (2005: 2) have noted, ‘families are not neat collective units’, but ‘networks of individuals related by kinship and including two or more generations’. Furthermore, they contend that the family is also a ‘cultural image’, and a unique construct dependent on individual experience (Bertaux and Thompson, 2005: 2). Within a Polish context, the dominant cultural image of the family remains primarily centred on traditional nuclear family structures (immediate

193 grandparents, parents, children and so on). In this thesis, I have used the term family to mean that type of nuclear family structure, this definition was overwhelmingly apparent within the cohort of research participants. Furthermore, it was common that descriptions of the ‘family’ by the research participants in this thesis included grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins. In addition, there were numerous instances where first and second generation post-okres komunizmu migrants had resided with extended family – grandparents and other relatives – while still in Poland.

In this thesis, I have focused solely on the family as a private space for two main reasons. The first reason relates to the analysis of family groups in Halbwachs ([1926] 1992) thesis, ‘The Collective Memory of the Family’. Halbwachs ([1926] 1992) classified the family as a distinct cadres sociaux de la mémoire, a social framework for the construction, transmission and preservation of memories. He posited that the (re)production of memories is an inherently social process, where individuals draw upon different knowledges encountered within their spheres of social contact (Halbwachs, [1926] 1992). Individual memories are then constructed as a culmination of these group encounters and their own knowledges and experiences. The reason that Halbwachs considered the family such an important social group is because it is often our first and most commonly experienced sphere of influence. Each family has a pre-existing cultural narrative, which is inherited by new individuals to the family. As Halbwachs ([1926] 1992: 55) has argued,

no matter how we enter a family – by birth, marriage or some other way – we find ourselves part of a group where our position is determined not by personal feelings but by rules and customs independent of us that existed before us.

As Ashplant et al. (2000) have argued, these pre-existing narratives form cultural templates, which aid in understanding how identity is maintained within the diasporic family. In the Polish diasporic context, the distinguishing feature of this framework is that each family has its own distinct template of cultural memories and experiences, including those of macabre experiences of the WWII, which were brought to Australia by Polish

194 migrants. These distinct templates have been woven together to form histories of the family and have informed family dialogues of identity, specific to that family group alone. As Halbwachs ([1926] 1992: 59) contended, each family has ‘its memories which it alone commemorates, and its secrets that are revealed only to its members’.

The second reason for focusing on families follows on from understanding that they are contextual spheres that enable the construction and maintenance of collective memory and Polish identity. In diasporic communities, the family assumes a clear-cut and distinctive position because it exists outside of the homeland where specific cultural traditions are the norm. In this vein, Fortier (2000: 45) has contended that ‘emigration is the zero moment of collective social growth’, so that the family following migration becomes the centre for the development of diasporic identities as well as the maintenance of existing ones. For many post-WWII Polish migrants, the macabre events of WWII, whether experienced personally or collectively, provided the impetus for emigration. They were events that will forever symbolise a break with discourses of Polishness through dislocation with the homeland. The cultural memories of WWII provided the foundations for narratives of identity of the post-WWII Polish migrants in diaspora. They also provided an inextricable link between the first generation of the Polish diaspora and the homeland through a collective Polish identity, encompassing narratives of suffering, struggle and resistance. Thus in a diasporic context, private settings such as the home becomes sites for cultural maintenancexii. When coupled with the intense and unforgettable circumstances that prompted the exodus from Poland, ‘the family [was] at once distinctly post-national – it displace[d] the nation as the site and frame of memory and ethnic identity’ (Fortier, 2000: 166).

6.4 Reflecting and deflecting the macabre: Narratives and narrations

In narrating cultural memories of macabre wartime events, the post-WWII research participants interviewed for this thesis remembered experiences of struggle, patriotism and luck in their wartime experiences. These cultural memories both reflected macabre events of WWII and were positioned within them. In some instances, participants chose to deflect the narrative away from the more harrowing aspects of the war. This deflection,

195 however, did not negate the significance of the cultural memories of struggle and macabre encounters. Rather it focused attention on participants’ more positive reflections on the themes of survival through struggle, patriotism and luck.

Although variously defined and positioned, struggle was a consistent theme throughout the Polish migrants’ narratives of WWII. Narratives of struggle related to finding food, rebuilding their lives after WWII, and the personal and collective resistances to foreign occupations. The nature of these struggles took place in an atmosphere of the ever-present threat of occupation, war and constant death. I found that the theme of struggle resonated throughout the interviews for two main reasons: first, for migrants, struggling continued for years after the war, including in the early years of settlement in Australia; and second, their displacement from Poland meant that the memories of macabre events were symbolic of experiences and memories of their homeland. Cappelletto (2003) has argued that it is not the specific detail of events that forms the most significant aspect of survivors’ cultural memories; rather, it is the lived experiences of those places that are held in one’s memory. For the Polish migrants I interviewed, migration represented a rupture with their homeland and its relation to their Polish identity. The last lived experiences in Poland were predominately macabre by nature and involved one or more forms of struggle. However, while the (re)articulation of these narratives of struggle was certainly prominent in the post-WWII generations’ narratives, I argue that this was not solely because they were lived experiences. While the interview participants displayed a predilection for narrating memories of struggle, within these narratives there was also a propensity for interweaving other (re)productions founded on their knowledges of collective experiences of macabre events in Poland gained after the fact. These post-WWII knowledges expose the proclivity for intertwining personal cultural memories within wider social frameworks. The following response illustrates the interlacing of narratives of struggle by the participant, their parents and the nation, with the suffering endured for the survival of the Polish nation:

We came to the town we suffered for. If it [had] not be[en] for us, [there would be] no Polish…anymore, [be]cause [the] Germans would

196 have take[n] it away. We have suffered, [my] parents, me and everybody (Respondent 48, 8 June, 2006).

As evident in this quotation, narratives of struggle were also linked to sentiments of patriotism and pride at having resisted foreign occupiers during WWII and maintained Polishness in the face of adversity. Indeed, for many of the post-WWII participants interviewed, struggle was inextricably linked with actual active participation against the Nazi and Soviet occupiers. Participation in acts of resistance reverberated in the memories of the post-WWII respondents as a sense of pride and patriotism at their contribution to maintaining Polish identity.

6.4.1 Narratives of pride through participation

For those participants who fought in the Polish armed forces, patriotism and pride were integral layers of their Polish identities. In an Australian study of the memories of ex- service people, Thomson (1995) has found that the military contribution to their country paved the way for participants to (re)construct their life stories in a positive way. In my thesis, such stories included the personal contributions made by the Polish armed forces to the Allied war effort, and to internal resistance through the Armia Krajowa (the Home Army). The narratives of struggle were present, but were retold so that the pride of military participation became the central theme. These narratives were emblematic of the participants’ personal involvement in acts of resistance, and represented a link back to the well-established narrative of resistance against foreign occupation founded during the partitioned period in Poland (as discussed in Chapter 4, Section 4.2).

A distinguishing feature of these narratives of pride and patriotism was the tendency for accounts of the participant's enlistment, duties and battle experience to be told in a fairly unemotive and factual way. Participants preferred to speak of their military contributions by casting them in a special light, and making reference to the well-organised education and training provided by the army to newly enlisted Polish cadets, as the following excerpts indicate:

197 When we finished [at military] school, we were sent to Italy straight away. The Polish groups [were] surrounded in Italy, and they needed us because they had to communicate with the Americans, the British Troops, Indian Troops, and they straight away send us to the different troops to keep the communication. That was our job (Respondent 51, 12 June, 2006).

Another stated:

We did…a course for cadet officers for 12 months, so that was in 1943… I went from Warsaw Gora Swieto Chrystusy, which is the Holy Cross mountain, to join the group of underground resistance [in 1944] (Respondent 52, 12 June, 2006).

This propensity for focusing on military description proved intriguing because those participants who had enlisted in Armia Andersa (Anders Army) part way through the war had most likely been previously deported to the Soviet Union in the early stages of the war (Chapter 4, Section 4.4). Rather than focusing on the experiences of deportation and their time in detention in the Soviet Union, the post-WWII participants chose to pass over these elements and begin their wartime narrations from their enlistment in the army. A similar trend of recalling narratives of military participation, as opposed to descriptions of arrests and incarcerations, also manifests in the Polish service persons who enlisted in the American, British and Home armies. Poles enlisted in different Allied armies during WWII largely dependent on their location, in either Poland or its occupied territories. The options included joining the Home Army in Poland (Armia Krajowa), being in a Polish Corps under the jurisdiction of the American or British Armed forces, or for those Poles released during the Soviet amnesty in 1941xiii, joining Armia Andersa.

The participants viewed their contribution to Poland’s plight during WWII as of principal importance to their experiences of the war. Their WWII contributions have continued a long tradition of actively resisting foreign occupation (as discussed in Chapter 4, Section 4.2.1). The ex-serviceperson organisations established after WWII in Australia reflected

198 the importance of this narrative even in the Polish diaspora. On a personal level, the patriotic sentiments of the ex-servicepersons factored into their post-migratory (re)negotiations of Polish identity, as the following participant’s response indicates:

I still was very patriotic. After [the] war, when I had a few beers we used to sing [the] national anthem and the Italians were looking at us, and say[ing] what [are] the…Polish singing? They are singing [a] love song? [No], they are singing Polish national anthem. They [are] very patriotic people, they [were] very good fighters, they love their country (Respondent 51, 12 June, 2006).

Such statements reveal that the participants (re)produced cultural memories of the war by focusing on their patriotic role and active resistance. This occurred although all the ex- servicepersons interviewed had married non-Poles, and did not speak Polish in their diasporic home (as detailed in Chapter 5, Section 5.2.2). Not only were their patriotic inclinations evident in their discussion of their military involvement, many ex- servicepersons viewed themselves as lucky to have served in the Polish army as it provided education and a means by which they could personally contribute to the defence of their nation.

6.4.2 How lucky they were? Narratives of luck

Luck seems a strange theme to apply to any wartime experience, but several participants spoke of ‘luck’ when explaining their circumstances during WWII. These narratives of luck related to the post-WWII participants’ differing experiences of occupation during the war, but more specifically, to the ‘lucky’ circumstances that made their experiences of capture and deportation to Germany or the Soviet Union relatively bearable. When recalling these encounters, the post-WWII participants considered themselves fortunate in comparison to the circumstances that befell other people they knew, including close family members, friends and colleagues. However, these narratives of luck were of course retrospective and reflections on their good fortune in comparison to others are much easier after the fact. One participant stated:

199 There are so many memories, but when I think about Germany – war time – you can only think… how lucky I have been. To go through all this…that I was in a camp of roughly 50 Polish people, I think there was just one Ukrainian, there was one Russian, but on the whole I’m not complaining about the treatment that I got there. But as I say, this is luck (Respondent 50, 8 June, 2006).

Similarly, another participant stated:

In Russia, the only thing is that I just managed with that lucky break, instead of going to collective farms I managed to join that expedition …That expedition itself would supply food necessary for me …Thanks to these Mongolian people, they suppl[ied] us with fish and meat and they killed a horse (Respondent 6, 20 July, 2006).

Yet luck was often combined with the themes of patriotism and struggle, pointing to the multifarious nature of wartime experiences and the perceived interplay of activism and fate. For example, one respondent’s ‘lucky break’ in Russia (quoted above) resulted in their quick acceptance into the Polish army:

We were in first class condition still, not having worked in the collective farms, [and] we were simply accepted into the Polish army (Respondent 6, 20 July, 2006).

The aforementioned participant’s narrative of luck related to their employment on a geological survey team in the Soviet Union, which guaranteed food and shelter not received by Poles taken to work in collective farms. Furthermore, the ‘luck’ of securing alternative and more favourable employment meant that when Stalin declared the amnesty for Polish persons in the Soviet Union, this participant was in good physical condition to enlist in the Armia Andersa. Yet, for other participants, ‘luck’ came after a period of considerable struggle and misfortune. One focused on the conditions experienced after deportation to Siberia and repatriation to East Africa:

200 [It] was beautiful…having food. We didn’t have [many] clothes, but they had enough food – a lot of fruit. If you ate fruit you were okay, and they sent us some bread, so we had bread and then fruit and that was enough. After Siberia, we lived like Kings and Queens (Respondent 17, 26 July, 2006).

References to luck did stand out against the wider narratives of macabre wartime experiences. Expressions of luck were certainly part of the post-WWII participants’ cultural memories and formed from a culmination of post-WWII knowledges. But they also formed from comparisons with other migrants’ experiences and because they had managed to avoid their own worst fears, imagined and witnessed over many years. Yet, all these narratives are retrospective. For example, one respondent prefaced his narrative of luck with – ‘my reflection now after so many years’ (Respondent 50, 8 June, 2006). Sorabji (2006: 7) has argued that by focusing on positive features of memory, participants attempted to ‘wipe away the rest’ – the misfortune and in the case of Polish survivors of WWII, the macabre. Soraji’s assertion might suggest for Polish survivors of WWII that a focus on luck or good fortune has been part of a coping mechanism involving the deflection of macabre memories. There were other mechanisms employed by the participants for dealing with trauma during the narration of cultural memories. The methods of narrating macabre experiences also contributed to the (re)production and dissemination of cultural memories.

6.4.3 Narrations of the macabre

The post-WWII generation still holds a clear picture of their experiences in Poland during WWII, at which time they were children or young adolescents. This finding concurred with Bal’s (1999: vii) claim that ‘traumatic memories remain present for the subject with particular vividness and/or totally resist integration’. Similarly, Misztal (2003: 142) has contended that traumatic memories are also ‘intrusive, uncontrollable, persistent and somatic’. In this thesis two distinct responses recurred during the narrations of the macabre by post-WWII migrants: one was typified by a ‘factual’ or stoic narration of the macabre experiences; the other characterised by emotional and somatic responses such as

201 crying, shaking and visible distress. Methods of recounting related directly to participants’ experiences but also to how these experiences have been informed since the events occurred. The narrative analysis of both the processes and content of narration used in this thesis have shed light on how cultural memories have been renegotiated within a particular diaspora and through time. It also exposed the influential role that memory can play in the maintenance of identity, in this case of Polish identity in diaspora in Sydney, Australia. The macabre encounters have been (re)produced and maintained within private diasporic settings, and the following section charts the first type of response to traumatic memories: stoic, detailed narrations.

6.4.3.1 Keeping it together: composure in narrating

Some research respondents in this thesis provided ‘factual’ details of the macabre events they were recalling. In these instances, cultural memories retold were laced with exact dates and numbers remembered from childhood and adolescence. For example, a respondent who was a former concentration camp survivor began a narrative about witnessing the mass murder of Jewish inmates at the camp in this way: ‘It was in 1943, 2nd of November’ (Respondent 46, 8 June, 2006). When I noted the exactness of the date, the participant retorted, ‘No you can’t forget. That’s something – the 2nd of November’ (Respondent 46, 8 June, 2006). The vividness of that event, including the details of date and time, had been remembered because of the event’s significant and macabre nature. Indeed, many participants recalled exact dates 60 years later and many expressed similar sentiments of being unable to forget these details. For example, in concluding a narrative about the witnessing the Warsaw Uprising, one participant testified to the permanence of these macabre memories and stated: ‘You can’t not remember, you can’t forget things like that’ (Respondent 7, 21 July, 2006).

Many male participants and particularly those who had served in the Polish armed forces described their experiences in an emphatic, yet prosaic style. I found this method of narration, while apparently non-traumatic for the participant, personally confronting and puzzling. The content of the narratives themselves, while unimaginable to me, were narrated with meticulous detail and a calm approach focusing on naming towns, military

202 units and operations, while also providing the wider context of the activities of the Allied offensive. This approach is demonstrated in the following excerpts:

They [the Soviet Army] took us in April 1940, [and] transport[ed us] from Biaystock to Kazakhstan. We were 25 kilometres from Moscow when we turned down to Kazakhstan south…[I] remember Moscow [is] here and Kazakhstan somewhere here (points out direction on map) (Respondent 6, 20 July 2006).

This participant’s narrative of deportation focused on the date, distances and locations rather than on the emotions or vehemency felt towards his captors. A similar lack of perturbation at the injustice of being deported was also evident in following participant’s short summation of his own deportation:

I left Poland in 13th of April, 1940. I was arrested by the KGB on that day, and sent by train to Siberia (Respondent 51, 8 June, 2006).

Another participant very calmly recalled her father’s death by gunshot in an impassive account that again focused on factual details rather than emotion or deportation:

We have been evicted [from our] country. We couldn’t take much with us. My father was shot, murdered – we didn’t know [about] it. It was the first Good Friday 1940, it 23rd of March or something like that (Respondent 48, 8 June, 2006).

One participant’s narrative typified the conventional understanding of the macabre nature of WWII. This participant was a prisoner in a concentration camp in Poland for three years during WWII and was almost 30 years old when s/he witnessed the mass execution of Jewish inmates in the camp at the closing stages of the war. Characterising this participant’s narration was an unnerving stoicism that propelled the reality and horrifying nature of these events into the room where we were sitting. While the narrative itself was

203 unnerving, the stoic process of narration seemed to augment the force of the traumatic event described:

We don’t know what the trenches [were] for, and then we know on the 2nd of November (1944) what they [were] for. They took 100 [persons]… put them in front of that [trench], machine pistol, and the people all dropped down, and another and another. They start 2nd of November after 8 o’clock and finish 3rd of November, about 2 [in the] afternoon. And after we learned that there were 33000 of Jews [were] killed… [in] nearly little bit more than one day. And when they put them [in] from time to time, the trench was full. They took the lime and put the lime, as a disinfectant and after, next group, next group and when they fill up [the trench], they got another group of inmates, like Polish, Russians, whatever, to cover them up and next person, next person. We have to stay all day on the roll [standing in the yard]. They didn’t let us got to barracks, or anywhere, they didn’t give us any food, nothing, we had [to stand in rows of] five, block after block. We have to stay from 6 o’clock – because roll call was at 6 – they start after 8, from 6 o’clock to the next day to 2 o’clock in the afternoon. We have to stay there day and night and watch, because [the] trench was only a few metres from the fence (Respondent 46, 8 June, 2006).

The potency of this narrative was unforgettable. I have repeatedly questioned how individuals can live their lives after such an experience. Sorabji (2006) has acknowledged the difficulty in capturing the full complexity of a participant’s traumatic narratives. Indeed, the horrors of the previous narrative were amplified by the numb potency of the method of narration, and they exemplify this complexity. Sorabji (2006: 7) has also contended that the process of narrating memories is evidence of the participant ‘trying to work on and with his [sic] memories rather than being fully compelled by them’. The cultural memories narrated in a stoic manner are part of the key to uncovering how these participants (re)position their macabre experiences into contemporary discourses of Polish identity. For this participant, the method of narration implied some resolution about the 204 macabre events of the past; this level of composure was part of the participant’s dealing with their own history and trauma. As Sorabji (2006: 7) has argued, such a method highlights the ‘individual and self-consciously reflective nature’ of memory management techniques. By analysing the retelling of cultural memories using a stoic and factual narrative approach, the process of narration is revealed as another aspect of the memory itself, yet it remains separate from the content of the memory (Cappelletto, 2003). Thus, an examination of the methods employed in the narration of distressing events from WWII reveals how participants deal with traumatic memories. The examples shed some light on how these macabre experiences factor into the lives of post-WWII migrants. For example, remembering details of the experience (dates/places/times) has become an important part of the process, which suggests that participants have chosen to focus on details, rather than horror of their experiences. At another level, this affirmation may be a testament to their ability to provide an accurate record of their own survival. It also shows that there is no orthodox method of narrating cultural memories. For some participants the stoic approach seemed to provide some comfort in the recounting of macabre experiences. For others, retelling brought back the trauma of a wartime childhood.

6.4.3.2 Ventures into the traumatic

On this narrative journey provided by post-WWII survivors, I frequently ventured into realms of trauma, not only through encounters with disturbing content, but also through a process of confronting trauma while interviewing. Narration of traumatic experiences has the capacity to emphasise the complexities of retelling and remembering macabre events. In this thesis, those participants who became visibly upset when recalling WWII experiences were all women who had suffered deportation, the death of family members, and starvation. When recalling these memories the women cried, became distraught and frequently stumbled over their words. These narrations were also characterised by a focus on visual images (Cappelletto, 2003), which when recalled, and produced somatic responses. The visual images in the following excerpts focus on death and trauma; they also exemplify how the narratives were pieced together. The participants were distressed while narrating these stories:

205 Everything was locked and… no one [was] on the street. The Germans were on the route, you know shooting if they see anything move. When they came, my mother grabbed me, grabbed me on the hand, and the other friend was with her. And there was lots of troops killing things – people – and I was after [this experience] I said gosh… [be]cause I was afraid of dead people, because you [are] fright[ened], because I didn’t want to step on them (Respondent 7, 2 July, 2006).

Another recalled her experiences in Russia after deportation:

We came back… without nothing, hungry, and [we just ate] grass. It is a very sad story. And you know my sister died, and ten days [after] we knew that we were going from Russia. And that time I was so so weak, I couldn’t even open my eyes, cause it was so long without food, I got [an] attack [of] malaria (Respondent 25, 9 August, 2006).

Another participant recalled the experience of being deloused in a transit camp:

When we got there [to Persia from Russia] we stayed in the tents and it was very very hot there and I remember they just stripped us down [pause, crying] that was normal. They cut our hair off, because people had lice. We didn’t have any food for a long time, we didn’t have any clothes so we were dirty…it was very rough, for women especially (Respondent 17, 26 July, 2006).

When I urged them to take a break or stop each participant instead continued to narrate. To me this demonstrated intent, and a necessity to continue to take responsibility for re- telling their story – to complete the narration. Inowlocki (2005: 142) has found that in some instances participants chose to narrate traumatic events over other less harrowing narratives because these formed a ‘central theme in their life story’. In this thesis, the previously mentioned quotations attest to this propensity to choose to narrate the traumatic events. One participant chose to narrate her experience of the Warsaw Uprising, without

206 my prompting. Towards the completion of their interview, the participant asked why I had not asked about the Warsaw Uprising: ‘You didn’t ask me [about] the Powstanie Warszawskie (The Warsaw Uprising)’ (Respondent 7, 21 July, 2006). Though already distraught, the participant voluntarily narrated this harrowing childhood experience of hiding in basements, seeing the death and devastation on the street, and the evacuation of the remaining population of Warsaw to the Pruszków transit camp. This participant chose to narrate this experience because her wartime memory was incomplete without it and also because the Warsaw Uprising was the ultimate symbol of Polish collective resistance, of which she was a witness.

The meaning of the narrations of trauma, and the distress they caused, is manifold. The participants told stories of personal experiences, which they positioned within the wider collective memory of Polish experiences during the war. In a similar vein to the stoic and factual narrations, the somatic responses that occurred during the recollection of traumatic images – and the particularly strong visual images – engendered recognition of a separate part of the narrative related to the process of narrating rather than to the content. The more traumatic narrations of cultural memories point to the effectiveness of recalling visual images in maintaining memory. In the three traumatic narrations previously quoted, each woman recalled a specific visual image – dead people in the street, the death of a sister, and being stripped down – and it was these images which caused the distress and crying. These images have been defined as ‘flashbulb memories’, which Schacter (1996) has argued have the propensity to be accurately preserved and retained because of their traumatic content. While the potency of certain image-based memories may increase their propensity for (re)production through narrative, that these memories are intrinsic parts of the life stories and personal experiences of post-WWII migrants positions them as integral components in maintaining linkages with Polish identity. Hence, it is these kinds of memories of macabre events that are often passed down to subsequent generations because they are emblematic of how individuals suffered and struggled for Polish identity. They become the direct connection to the homeland, and are often what is maintained and continued within the diasporic community.

207 6.5 (Dis)continuities: Generational (re)production and transmission of macabre histories

The transmission of cultural memories relating to macabre experiences of WWII is of importance to the maintenance of discourses of, and connections to, Polish identity through generations of the family. Misztal (2003) has argued that a family’s cohesion and continuity is ensured only when it jointly (re)produces and maintains its memory. However, as seen in the previous chapter (Chapter 5), the (re)production and transmission of cultural memories through generations is not a simple or singular process. In this thesis I have identified several factors complicating the continuity of a family narrative of Polish identity for the post-WWII generation: displacement resulting from WWII; traumatic experiences during WWII; the need to (re)construct Polish identity in diaspora; and the capability (or not) to maintain ‘a living chain of memory’ through generations (Misztal, 2003: 19). In this section I examine how these complications influence the (re)production and transmission of cultural memories by post-WWII migrants to the second and third generational cohorts (interview groups 2 and 3, respectively). This analysis takes place in a diasporic context, which positions emigration as a point of rupture in the life stories of migrants and creates a (dis)continuity of identity (re)productions within a solely Polish diasporic milieu. My intention with the use of ‘(dis)continuity’ is to highlight that continuity of memory narratives occurs in many forms including the discontinuity of memories between generations. While the two generational units studied in this thesis (the second and third generations) were not within the same family groups, participants were asked specifically about (re)production and transmission of cultural memories within their families. Narratives of macabre wartime experiences therefore exemplify the continuity of the post-WWII migrants’ experiences through diasporic generations.

The cultural memories recalled by these diasporic generations represented (dis)continuities in the memory discourse. Such (dis)continuity occurred because of the loss of knowledge through generations, resulting from the post-WWII migrants not passing on memories relating to their wartime experiences. As such, some participants – particularly the third generation – knew few details about their grandparents’ experiences:

208 I’m not really sure what Dad’s Dad did during the war, but I know that his family had members that were in the Polish army as soldiers. I think there was a General maybe. I’m not really sure whether they had some roles within the actual Polish army (Respondent 46X, 24 January, 2007).

Another stated:

They were working in concentration camps and that’s about it…that’s as much as I know (Respondent 47X, 24 January, 2007).

Tschuggnall and Welzer (2002: 138) have acknowledged that in oral transmission of memories ‘it is near to impossible to determine what in fact is the original “narrative”’. While there were apparent incongruencies in some narratives, Young (1990: 32) has argued against evaluating the ‘historical veracity’ of narrative testimonials. Furthermore, he contended that differing testimonial accounts of macabre wartime events should be considered as indicative of the different meanings and significance of those events to survivors and that,

Whatever ‘fictions’ emerge in the survivor’s accounts are not deviations from the ‘truth’ but are part of the truth in any particular version (Young, 1990: 32).

To heed Young’s advice, the intrinsic value of these narratives is that they are representative of how the post-WWII generation experienced macabre events. The retelling of these narratives, regardless of obvious discontinuities, also exemplifies how subsequent generations take up, (re)produce and factor the older generations’ cultural memories into their own understandings of Polish heritage and identity. Although the third generation had little knowledge of their grandparents’ wartime experiences and of the finer details of their migration, this implies that such information may not have been important to their constructions of Polish heritage. Yet, (dis)continuity in the narratives taken up by younger generations also arises because cultural memories in some cases were

209 simply not disseminated by older generations. Just under half of the second generation participants interviewed and all but one third generation participant stated that their parents or grandparents were either unwilling to discuss their wartime experiences, or that they had heard very little about this topic, as the following responses demonstrate:

My grandmother won’t talk about the war. It’s just a closed subject (Respondent 39, 6 September, 2006).

Another third generation participant stated:

No they didn’t want to talk about it too much (Respondent 43X, 11 November, 2006).

While another participant concurred:

Well, he [the father] didn’t sort of specifically say what happened but he said life was very hard. He had to work very hard otherwise he’d be punished or whatever. I’m not sure of the consequences and he doesn’t really want to tell me about it (Respondent 75, 12 July, 2006).

There were a variety of reasons posited by second and third generation participants as to why the post-WWII cohort were unwilling to pass on their wartime memories. The strongest reported motivation for this (dis)continuity of knowledge was that the elder generation simply did not want to talk about their experiences because either the narratives were too traumatic – for both narrator and the listener – or that their silence represented a symbolic attempt to move on and forget. The latter was clear in the following second generation participant’s response:

They kind of adapted to Australia, took Australia on board as their home, and they really didn’t want to discuss anything prior to that. They didn’t want to discuss their so-called heritage, cause their heritage was, I suppose, stopped when the war started. And after that, that was

210 the end of everything, nothing mattered to them – just being alive (Respondent 23, 6 August, 2006)’.

Considering the importance of these wartime experiences to the first generation, these silences present frustrating yet revealing elements in understanding how the maintenance of Polish identity – particularly the important narratives of suffering and struggle witnessed during the war – unfolded through diasporic generations. In this group of second and third generation participants, these silences seemed to be a barrier constructed by the post-WWII cohort to protect the younger generations from what they deemed unnecessary exposure to trauma and knowledge of the macabre. Indeed, most second and third generation participants experiencing such barriers understood this as the rationale behind enforced silences, as shown in the following responses:

My grandmother didn’t want to talk about it...whenever that sort of topic headed down that path, probably I can remember her saying to my grandfather. They’re kids – they don’t need to know about this (Respondent 39, 6 September, 2006).

Similarly, a second generation participant stated:

They did close the door. I think [there are] too many sad memories that they don’t want their children or grandchildren to even know about…what they saw (Respondent 23, 6 August, 2006).

Another participant recalled:

I don’t think he [the father] wanted us to be upset by the stories of his experiences…things he told us about being in the camp, being hungry (Respondent 41, 10 September, 2006).

In spite of these apparent barriers of (dis)continuity, other cultural memories were retold by the post-WWII generation as evinced by some of second and third generation

211 participants’ responses. These narratives corresponded with the themes of struggle, patriotism in military participation and luck, as evident in the post WWII narratives. The theme of struggle was articulated in relation to the parents’ or grandparents’ experiences in Poland – in the home, hiding from German officers and in finding food – but also in Germany with reference to their deportation to labour camps:

Mum used say that they’d be hiding in piwnicy [the basement] – which is…underground – and they could hear the planes roaring across, and Dad [would say that he was] starving for days and hiding in the fields eating pig’s food (Respondent 43X, 11 November, 2006).

Another said:

He’s told me that during the war he was taken away by the Nazis and he was sent to work for a farmer (Respondent 75, 12 July, 2006)

And another stated:

They were taken right at the beginning of the war, so they weren’t really in Poland for most of it, they were in Germany (Respondent 39, 6 September, 2006).

Again, commonly interwoven with narratives of deportation and work in labour camps was the theme of luck, emphasising that it had been important for the post-WWII generation to identify, and identify with, their good fortune at having survived the war, by way of chance and circumstance. For example, Respondent 39 went onto say:

On many occasions they stated they were lucky that [on] the farm [where] they were working, people treated them very well. But they also relayed that a lot of their friends that they spoke to were given to people that didn’t treat them well. So they have often said that they

212 were fortunate that that was the case (Respondent 39, 6 September, 2006).

Macabre narratives often featured references to (lucky) narrow escapes with death:

I remember Dad saying he was in the line on the ninth position. German officers used to call ten [Polish] officers out every morning and shoot the tenth one, and Dad was in the ninth position three times (Respondent 72, 10 July, 2006).

Thus, the (re)production of narratives of survival through struggle and luck by the second and third generation implies that barriers were overcome, and when narratives were retold these themes were important for the first generation to convey. Indeed, the internalisation of this narrative of luck by one third generation participant illustrated how the theme of luck was then rearticulated into their own discourse of identity: ‘I think it just makes us realise how much more lucky we are compared to ….our grandparents’ (Respondent 47X, 24 January, 2006).

Intertwined with the (re)production of cultural memories were the themes of heroism and cunning. Yet these narratives were not necessarily linked with participation in the Polish armed forces, as was the case with those memories retold by the post-WWII cohort. Only three second-generation and two third-generation participants had older relatives who were ex-servicepersons. Thus, the nature of the heroic deeds most commonly narrated and remembered were those that involved outwitting and causing trouble for the German Army. The following excerpts demonstrate this theme of heroism and how it was also linked to themes of patriotism:

My grandfather went around blowing things up. He was part of the resistance and the underground. So yeah, he was forever causing the Germans grief. And look he had a very strong belief in Poland and the right of Poland to exist (Respondent 39, 6 September, 2006).

213 Another stated:

Dad was saying that his Dad and his Granddad were fighting when his Dad and brother were in Poland, at 14. They were like making Molotov’s and destroying tanks, and then they got captured (Respondent 47X, 24 January, 2007).

Another second generation participant recalled:

He was waiting for his train and a guy came up to him and said ‘You are Polish?’, and they started talking and this guy was a spy, a Polish spy that wanted information about what he had seen in his travels (Respondent 75, 12 July, 2006).

The (re)production and transmission of these cultural memories to younger generations verify the importance of the continuation and maintenance of narratives of resistance through diasporic generations. The fact that these narratives of trickery and heroism were both transmitted by the post-WWII generation and then remembered by the second and third generation cohorts is testament to their captivating and interesting content. Tschuggnall and Welzer (2002: 139) have contended that,

No matter how different these stories may be regarding the people and the tricks involved, first and foremost, they find common ground in the fact that they demonstrate the inventiveness and the quick-wittedness of their protagonists.

Tschuggnall and Welzer (2002) contented that effective narrative transmission requires the narrator to be alert and responsive to the listener’s needs. This contention is readily applicable to the nature of the cultural memories (re)produced by the generational migrant cohorts in this thesis as it was stories of trickery and cunning that were most eagerly (re)told and quickly recalled. However, as I have argued, the diasporic experience also adds an additional layer of complexity to the maintenance of cultural memories. Because

214 the post-WWII generation had (re)produced cultural memories in the isolation from their homeland, they needed to not only maintain these memories but also continue Polish identity in diaspora. The post-WWII cohort’s (re)productions of memory focused on their exposure to macabre wartime events, resulting in the prevalence of narratives of struggle, survival, luck and patriotism. These are important themes within historical and contemporary discourses of Polish identity. Evident in this thesis was a movement away, by the post-WWII generation, from the passing down of cultural memories that focused exclusively on the macabre nature of the events they experienced – even though these were an innate part of their how they (re)configured their own memories (during the interview process). The intent of this shift was to shield the younger generation from the unnecessary exposure to the gruesome nature of their experiences. An additional rationale was that it is possibly easier to narrate these macabre experiences to the interviewer – a stranger – than to a family member. Replacing the cultural memories of macabre events were those narratives focusing on survival, regardless of their articulation under the guise of struggle, patriotism, heroism or luck.

While it would seem that while both generational cohorts had some memory of their parents or grandparents’ wartime experiences, these were unlikely to be passed on to subsequent diasporic generations because of a lack of knowledge (resulting directly from the barriers against transmitting the macabre memories). This also indicates that such cultural memories may not have been deemed important to Polish heritage, which was perceived to be able to be maintained through the practice of traditions (Chapter 5, Section 5.3.2).

6.6 Conclusion

This chapter has detailed the (re)production and transmission of cultural memories that deal with macabre historical experiences in two distinct settings. In both settings the narrative has focused on Poland’s macabre experiences during WWII and how the subsequent (re)productions and transmissions of these cultural memories have taken different forms. This chapter has built on the themes of struggle, suffering and resistance established in the public memorialisation of Romantic Era personalities in Poland and the

215 diasporic (re)negotiations of language discussed in Chapter 5. It adds another layer to the academic discourses of Polish cultural memory as maintained in the Polish public sphere and through the generational cohorts of the migrant diaspora. Compounding the complexity of (re)producing memories of macabre events within the public memory landscape has been the multivocality of competing demands for memory emanating from both Polish and non-Polish sources. In their public (re)productions and transmissions of cultural memory, the Polish memory institutes (ROPWiM, IPN and IAC) have exposed the macabre past as an essential part of understandings of Poland’s struggle to autonomy. These macabre cultural memories are positioned as part of everyday discourse and in everyday landscapes. Similarly, the post-WWII migrants have utilised different aspects of their macabre experiences to maintain these particular cultural memories in diaspora. In many cases, however, they have not transferred the macabre histories to younger generations. Instead, the narratives recalled by these generational cohorts have focused on a central narrative of survival using the themes of patriotism, luck and struggle. These (re)negotiations with macabre histories demonstrated that cultural memories of WWII feature prominently in how Polish identity has been maintained across a spectrum of public and private settings.

i Indeed the documentation of places associated with Nazi attributed killings have been catalogued nation- wide in acute detail. See for example Rada OPWIM (1979) ‘Obozy hitlerowskie na ziemiach Polskich 1939- 1945’, Warszawa, Pastowe Wzdawnictwo Naukowe’ (Nazi camps on Polish Soil, 1939-1945). ii There is obvious contention here about the classification of Polish non-Jews and Polish Jews. This division is both inherently difficult to decipher and disputed. As the intention of this thesis is to deal primarily with the Polish identities of non-Jewish Poles (as explained in Chapter 1) the division of these categories in this thesis remains subjective and open to interpretation. iii These include for example; Przewodnik po upamitnionych miejscach walk i mczestwa lata wojny 1939- 1945 (Guidebook of remembrance places of struggle and suffering from the war 1939-1945), and Obozy Hitlerowskie na ziemiach Polskich 1939-1945 (Nazi camps on Polish Soil 1939-1945). iv Informant A was a senior official at the IPN, Warsaw. v IPN has bi-lateral co-operation with Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungry, Romania, Slovakia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, the Russian Federation, Ukraine and Yugoslavia, Denmark, Germany, Great Britain, France, Israel and the United States. vi The Biuro Lustracyjne (The Vetting Office) was established in 2007. vii In 1945 the Chief Commission for the Examination of German Crimes in Poland was established, but it was renamed in 1949 to the Chief Commission for the Examination of Hitlerite Crimes in Poland (IPN, 2007).

216 viii This case has a long and detailed history beginning with the first investigation by the Chief Commission for the Examination of Hitlerite Crimes 1941. For further details on the prosecution of the case and the pogrom itself, see; Gross, J.T., (2001) Neighbours: the destruction of the Jewish community in Jedwabne, Poland, Princeton, Princeton University Press; Gross, J.T (2006) Fear: Anti-Semitism in Poland After Auschwitz, England, Random House; IPN (2003) Beginning of the Search in the Jedwabne Site, Warszawa, IPN; IPN (2003) Finding of a Bullet Jacket at the Jedwabne Investigation Site¸ Warszawa, IPN; IPM (2003) Official Statement of the Institute of National Remembrance, Warszawa, IPN; IPN (2003) Joint Official Statement of Professor Leon Kieres and Rabbi Jackob Baker, Warszawa, IPN. ix Wolentarska-Ochman (2006) has included Tygodnik Gos (Today’s Voice), Nasza Polska (Our Poland), Myl Polska (Polish Thought) and Nasz Dziennik (Our Daily), in her definition of far right press. x Informant B is a member of the International Auschwitz Council. xi The only building structure to survive the liquidation of the camp in 1945 was the house of the camp’s former commandant, Amon Goeth. xii As discussed in Chapter 5, in addition to the family acting as a site of cultural maintenance in diaspora, the establishment of cultural community infrastructure also aided the maintenance of Polish identity in Australia. However, in the context of this chapter I have sought to shift solely to the role of the family in order to assess the generational passing down of these macabre narratives. xiii The Soviet Union granted an amnesty to all Poles in captivity in the Soviet Union after the Nazis attacked Moscow. This amnesty was necessary because the Soviet Union had never formally declared war on Poland, and thus the deported Polish civilians were not classified as Prisoners of War.

217 Chapter 7 – Shifting hegemonies and the maintenance of cultural memories

A revolution that does not produce a new space has not realised its full potential; indeed, it has failed in that it has not changed life itself, but has merely changed ideological superstructures, institutions and political apparatuses. A social transformation, to be truly revolutionary in character, must manifest a creative capacity in its effects on daily life, on language and on space – though its impact need not occur at the same rate, or with equal force, in each of these areas (Lefebvre, 1991: 54) (Azaryahu, 1997: 481).

Since 1793 changing regimes of power have been an ongoing condition of the Polish historical record. These regimes have included: Tsarist Russia, the Prussian and Austro- Hungarian Empires (1793-1918); the Nazi occupation under National Socialism (1939- 1945); and the Soviet Union (1939-1989). Most recently the fall of the Soviet regime saw the restoration of an autonomous Polish Republic, the current Rzeczpospolita Polska, after nearly fifty years of foreign occupation. All the foreign regimes sought to strengthen their authority over the local Polish populations by asserting their ideologies in the everyday public landscape. This process involved championing a divergent national discourse at the expense of locally remembered events, people and places. Yet while attempts were made to saturate the public landscape with semiotic markers of the new dominant ideology, the Polish population did not necessarily adopt these ‘new’ hegemonic narratives. Accordingly, ‘the dynamics of memory cannot be understood without taking into account the categories of repression, suppression and power’ (Brockmeier, 2002: 10).

In this chapter, I discuss two methods employed by hegemonic regimes that influenced the (re)production and transmission of cultural memories in both public and private spheres. One method involves how hegemonic powers have shaped public places by installing new semiotic memory markers in the everyday landscape that accord with and materialise the regime’s officially sanctioned history. This process is evident in the changes that were made to street names in the public landscape in Kraków, the establishment of May Day in the ritual calendar, and the use of propaganda to shape the public displays of the Soviet-

218 installed Polish memory. The second method used by hegemonic regimes to influence cultural memory was to suppress the existing Polish memories in the public sphere. References deemed unsupportive of regimes’ ideologies were removed from Polish public places. One outcome of public suppression was that these locally remembered historical narratives were spirited to private spheres, such as the home, where they were maintained in antagonism to the dominant regime’s discourse. While the Nazi and Soviet regimes both attempted to construct an ‘official’i version of history in the public sphere, this history competed with the many experiential narratives of Polish people. The data generated from interviews with the post-okres komunizmu migrant cohort and its second generation highlight how the narration of cultural memories in private spheres differed to publicly portrayed memory as hegemonies shifted. I argue that a further two factors have aided the maintenance of Polish identity in private spheres during the occupation by hegemonic powers. First, Polish memories were actively maintained because they were not represented in the publicly portrayed hegemonic narratives. Second, they were nurtured because these personally experienced memories were actively besieged during occupation. The force of this repression compelled and motivated Poles to maintain these memories in private spheres and pass them onto subsequent generations.

With the decline of each regime, the opportunity for material public commemoration re- emerged, and meant that the burden of responsibility for the (re)production and transmission of important cultural memories shifted back, albeit partially, to the public forum. For example, after the okres komunizmu a process of (re)negotiating and memorialising cultural memories that had been previously secreted to private spheres, emerged in the countries of the former Soviet Union. The relative recency of the dissolution of the Soviet Union has ensured that the (re)negotiation of cultural memories and national identity has been a continued subject of academic research. Such literature has primarily focused on material (re)articulations of memory in the everyday landscape enabled by renewed possibilities for public memory discourse (Argenbright, 1999; Foote et al., 2000; Forest and Johnson, 2002; Jezernik, 1998; Stenning, 2005; Tokluoglu, 2005; Young and Light, 2001). In Poland, regime changes have led to public questioning of the hegemonic versions of Polish history and public constructions of Polish identity, as well

219 as the symbolic and material replacement of Soviet instituted commemorative holidays and street names (Orla-Bukowska, 2006). Public memory institutes such as the Institute for National Remembrance and the International Auschwitz Council were established, creating public forums for discursive dialogue between Poles and amongst the international community about the remembrance and commemoration of wartime macabre atrocities. The previous claims of Soviet memory, which sought to categorise all victims of WWII as victims of Nazism (as evident on the inscription of the Soviet-era monument at Paszów, Chapter 6, Figure 6.5) were at the forefront of the (re)negotiation and (re)construction of Polish memory after the okres komunizmu.

In the first section of this chapter discussing the public sphere (Section 7.1), I detail how place markers in the everyday landscape, primarily street and town square names, were changed by successive regimes in Kraków’s landscape to imbue hegemonic ideologies in the public sphere. Following that, I detail instances of the incorporation of calendar rituals into the urban streetscape, and discuss the participants’ responses to the tools of propaganda used in the media. In doing so, I demonstrate how the street names examples are part of a wider process of inculcating a new hegemonic ideology. In the chapter’s second section (Section 7.2), I trace how the public suppression of Polish cultural memory by the Soviet regime has affected the nature of memory maintenance in private spheres. I detail how the Soviet regime used history education to suppress the Polish cultural memories of events such as the Katy massacre that jeopardised the legitimacy of the regime. In the final part of Section 7.2, I examine how Poles have engaged with a process of (re)negotiating their cultural memory after the okres komunizmu. This process included the (re)naming of the many semiotic makers in the everyday landscape that were formerly used as means of cementing the authority of the Nazi and Soviet regimes.

7.1 Semiotic memory markers in the public sphere

In Kraków in the 20th Century, successive hegemonies rebadged the streetscape extensively to suit and advance their ideologies. These hegemonies also adopted commemorative rituals into the calendar. These changes to street names and calendar days are semiotic markers exemplifying broader hegemonic efforts to inculcate a new

220 discourse into Polish society. By altering the landscape and the calendar, hegemonies intimately integrated their ideology into Poles’ everyday lives.

7.1.1 Changes to the streetscape by shifting hegemonies

As Kong and Law (2002: 16) have argued, hegemonies aim to impose control not by overt coercion but by creating a sense of naturalness and normality with ubiquitous and unquestioned narratives of a nation’s past. The street and calendar changes by hegemonic regimes are the attempted “normality” and the “everyday” of such propaganda that also extend to other realms such as the media. In Section 7.1.3, I have quoted the diasporic reactions to this propaganda to illustrate how Poles identified and resisted such attempts to infiltrate ideology into their lives.

Street names, and place names more generally, are an innate part of the everyday landscape, and influence how citizens routinely encounter semiotic reminders of cultural events, people and places. For example, in any city one might walk along a street, have coffee in a town square, arrange a meeting or visit a gallery or museum in a historical building. The street, town square and building could be named after a figure of national importance such as a war hero, or a battlefield or a traditional ritual. Romanucci-Ross (1995: 77) has also argued that ‘various historical events are remembered in the plan or layout of the city (or piazzas in small towns and villages) and its streets, buildings, and monuments’. It is in these everyday places that we (consciously or unconsciously) encounter the semiotic intentions of hegemony because street names are ‘ostensibly visible, quintessentially mundane, and seemingly obvious’ (Azaryahu, 1996: 311). Hayden (1995) has similarly contended that the cognitive remembrance of street names is part of a purposeful exploitation of places for social memory, taking advantage of the everydayness of street names. Unlike commemorative monuments and other material markers of national symbolism in the vernacular, street names and place names ‘have an immediate practical reality for the populace’ as spatial markers in the city (Gill, 2005: 481). So the potency of street names as (re)producers and transmitters of memory in public places lies in ‘their ability to make a version of history an inseparable element of

221 reality as it is constantly constructed, experienced and perceived on a daily basis’ (Azaryahu, 1996: 321).

Hegemonies utilise street names for two main purposes. The first is symbolic: they are representative of the nationalist ideals of the ruling hegemony. The second is more practical: they are spatial semiotic markers (Azaryahu, 1996). A new regime seeks to assert its own version of national identity in public landscapes ‘through the creation of an urban landscape which demonstrates and affirms the values and ideology of the regime’ (Light et al., 2002: 135). The successful transference of ideologies to the memory landscape involves ‘signification’ using semiotic markers and ‘domination’ by the hegemonic regime, which holds the power to authorise changes to the vernacular landscape (Baker, 1992: 4). Furthermore, Baker (1992: 4) argued that the key characteristics of ideology in the landscape are associated with a ‘quest for order’, ‘an assertion of authority’, and a projection of ‘totalisation’. These characteristics are evident in the changes to street and places names in Kraków by various regimes of power. In addition to purporting a new ideology, the intention is also to erase cultural reminders of former regimes’ ideologies.

In this section, I have examined the shifting semiotics of street and place names in Kraków under four different governments and hegemonic powers – Polish, Nazi, Soviet and Polish again – on five maps of the city centreii (from 1934, 1943, 1964, 1985 and 1996) (Table 7.1). The map from 1943 shows changes instituted during the Nazi occupation of Kraków. Most street names during this occupation were changed in accordance with the incorporation of the city into the Nazi’s Government General. As such, the majority of these changes were less concerned with imposing names or places connected with Nazi ideology than impressing a city structure reminiscent of a major German city – exemplified by the adoption of ‘Westring’, ‘Ostrïng’ and ‘Außenring’ for Kraków’s major ring roads and ‘Rathaus Platz’ for the Town Hall Square (Table 7.2 and 7.3 explain the names of streets and town squares, respectively). The exception is the substitution of ‘Rynek Gówny’ with ‘Adolf Hitler Platz’, providing the strongest possible reminder of the occupation of the city. In studying central Budapest, Light et al. (2002: 142) similarly concluded that the naming of streets with Soviet connotations meant that 222 residents ‘would have little opportunity for doubt about the nature of the state’ in which they lived.

The (re)naming of streets in Kraków under the Soviet regime served several purposes. The first broad intention was to ‘demonstrate that Communism was deeply embedded in the country’s history’ (Light et al., 2002: 137). A second objective was to institute a new collective and national history through the perpetuation of narratives of class struggle, by commemorating Soviet battle sites and personalities, and by creating street names that represented significant days in the Soviet commemorative calendar. Young and Light (2001: 944) have argued that ‘the re-writing of history sought to emphasise (or invent) long-standing links with the USSR’.

Table 7.1 Street names changes in Kraków City Centre Polish Nazi Occupation Polish communist/ Polish Soviet Occupation Date of 1934 1943 1964/1985 1996 Map Street ul. J.Dunajewskiego Westring 1. Maja ul. J. Dunajewskiego Name ul. J.Pisudskiego Universitetstr. Manifest Lipcowego ul. J.Pisudskiego Changes ul.Starowilna Alte Weichselstr Bohaterów ul.Starowilna Stalingradu ul.Andrzeja Ostrïng Westerplatte Westerplatte Potockiego ul. M. Zyblikiewicza ul. M. Zyblikiewicza Bitwy Pod Lenino ul. M. Zyblikiewicza ul. w. Gerturdy Gertrudenstr Ludwika ul. w. Gerturdy Warynskiego ul. w. Tomasza Thomas Ludwika Solskiego ul. w. Tomasza ul. Radziwioska Radziwioska Mikoaja Reja ul. Radziwioska Al. Z. Krasiskiego, Außenring Al. Z. Krasiskiego, Al. Z. Krasiskiego, Al. A. Micikiewicza, Al. A. Micikiewicza, Al. A. Micikiewicza, and and and Al. J. Sowackiego Al. J. Sowackiego Al. J. Sowackiego Town pl. w. Wszystkich Rathaus Pl. Pl. Wiosny Ludów pl. w. Wszystkich Square witych witych Name Rynek Glówny Adolf Hitler Platz Rynek Glówny Rynek Glówny Changes

Sources: (Rogalski, 1934), (Bearbietet und herausgegeben vom Statdthauptmann de Stadt Krakau Stadtmessungsamt (Town Planning Department), 1943), (Pastwowe Przedsibiorstwo Wydawnictwo Kartograficznych (State Cartographic Publishing House), 1964), (Kraków Tourist Map publisher unknown, 1985), (Polskie Przedsibiorstwo Wydawnictwo Kartograficzynch im. Eugenlusza Romera SA (The Eugenlusza Romera Polish Cartographic Publishing House), 1996).

223 Table 7.2 Explanation of Street Names

Street Name Changes Explanation of Street Name ul. J.Dunajewskiego Julian Dunajewski (1821-1907) Dean of Jagiellonian University and Finance Minister for Hapsburg Government Westring Western ring of the city 1.Maja May Day or Workers Day, a designated Public Holiday in the Polish (1st of May) People’s Republic ul. J.Pisudskiego Marshall Józef Pisudski (1867-1935) First Chief-of State of the Second Polish Republic (1918-1922), First President of the Republic of Poland (1922-1923), Chief of Armed Forces and Prime Minister (1926-1928, and 1930). In his youth, he was arrested twice by Tsarist authorities, imprisoned and deported to Siberia. His father fought in the January Uprising against the Russians. Universitetstr. University Street (Jagiellonian University lies at the eastern end of the street) Manifest Lipcowego (July July Manifesto or the Manifesto of the Polish committee of National Manifesto) Liberation (PKWN) issued on 22 July 1944 at Chem in eastern Poland. Broadly, the manifesto outlined provisional social, political and economic reforms to be installed by a Soviet-led government in Poland, in opposition to the Polish government in London in exile. ul.Starowilna Starowislna Street Alte Weichselstr Old Wiechselt Street Bohaterów Stalingradu To the Heroes of the Battle of Stalingrad ul.Andrzeja Potockiego Count Andrzej Potocki (1861-1908) Member of Polish nobility (szlachta) and Viceroy of Galicia (1903-1908) Ostrïng Eastern ring of the city Westerplatte Polish peninsula and fort near northern port city of Gdask where WWII began. ul. M. Zyblikiewicza Mikoaj Zyblikiewicz (1823-1887) President of Kraków (1874-1881) Bitwy Pod Lenino Commemorates the Battle of Lenino on the 12 and 13th October 1943. The Soviet 33rd Army was joined on the Soviet Western Front by the 1st Tadeusz Kociuszko Infantry Division under General Berling. ul. w. Gerturdy Saint Gertrude (1256-1302) Patron Saint of Nuns and Travellers Ludwika Waryskiego Ludwik Waryski (1856-1889) Founded Poland’s first Socialist magazine and regarded as Poland’s first Marxist. In 1885, he was captured and sentenced by Tsarist authorities and subsequently died in prison. ul. w. Tomasza Saint Thomas

Ludwika Solskiego Ludwik Solski (1855-1954) Polish actor and director. Patron of the Ludwik Solski Academy for the Dramatic Arts in Kraków established in 1946. ul. Radziwioska Named after renowned magnate family Radziwi Mikoaja Reja Mikoaj Rej (1505-1569) Polish writer and poet Al. Z. Krasiskiego, Zygmunt Krasiski (1812-1859), Adam Mickiewicz (1798-1855), and Al. A. Micikiewicza, and Juliusz Sowacki (1809-1849) are the three bards of Polish literature and Al. J. Sowackiego poetry from the Romantic Era. Außenring Outer ring of the city

224 Table 7.3 Explanation of Town Square Names

Town Square Name Changes Explanation of Town Square name pl. w. Wszystkich witych All Saints Day Square Rathaus Pl. Town Hall Square pl. Wiosny Ludów Springtime of Nations (1848) Square Rynek Glówny Main Town Square Adolf Hitler Platz Adolf Hitler Square

After WWII and the end of Nazi occupation of Kraków, the city’s street names did not automatically revert to their pre-war Polish Republic names. Instead, the newly installed Soviet regime sought to cement their authority in the public landscape through an array of changes designed to remove traces of Krakow’s Polish republican past and invent a new tradition (cf. De Soto, 1996). So the Soviet Era maps (1964 and 1985) show two main processes at play. One concerns the removal of certain streets names, ‘an act of decommemoration of a particular event or person’ (Light et al., 2002: 136). The second relates to the (re)placement of these street names with names connected to the Soviet regime. Following from Light et al., (2002), I have utilised the term ‘(de)commemoration’ to draw attention to the duality of processes at play in the use of public places for commemoration. The term highlights both processes involved in (re)producing a regime’s narratives: the removal of references to the former regime and the installation of new hegemonic commemorations. An additional informal process of commemoration occurs because occupied publics do not necessarily meekly accept a regime’s new narrative as their own. In the Polish city of ódz, for example, the local population resisted the Soviet re-naming of streets by continuing to refer to them by their original Polish names (Azaryahu, 1996). Therefore, ‘(de)commemoration’ alludes to a parallel process of commemoration of the original street names that can occur as a form of resistance to new regimes and their changes.

During the okres komunizmu, two types of street names in Kraków’s city centre were (de)commemorated: those with religious nomenclature and those named after Polish nobility. In the first instance, two streets and a town square named after religious figures (ul. w. Gerturdy, ul. w. Tomasza and pl. w. Wszystkich witych) were targeted. In contrast, Light et al. (2002) have found that in Bucharest, the Soviet regime generally did

225 not rename such streets, despite the banning of religious teaching. Therefore in Kraków the renaming of these streets is anomalous, particularly given that other religiously named streets in the Old Town were not changed. The Soviet intervention may have been an attempt to dilute the strength of religion in the landscape, as adherence to religious practices was stronger in Poland than in other Soviet satellite states.

In the second category of (de)commemoration, references to Polish nobility (as in ul.Andrzeja Potockiego and ul. Radziwioska) were changed in accordance with the Socialist ideology of championing the worker over the privileged (who in Poland were the szlachta and magnates). Light et al. (2002) have reported that a similar process occurred in Bucharest, where of the 39 streets named after Romanian royal family members, 24 were rebadged following the declaration of the People’s Republic of Romania in 1948.

Through Kraków’s public landscape, the hegemonic Soviet regime also attempted to invent traditions by superimposing historical links with the USSR. Changing the name of ul. M. Zyblikiewicza to ul. Bitwy Pod Lenino sought to create a purposeful link of commonality between Polish and Russian forces during WWII (Figure 7.2 explains street name changes). By choosing the Battle of Lenino from the plethora of potential Soviet battlefronts, attention was drawn to the involvement of the Polish battalion under General Berlingiii. Thus, an apparently carefully chosen event was used to establish a contemporary official narrative. This narrative depicted the friendly collaboration between Polish and Soviet forces in fighting the common enemy of Nazi Germany, notwithstanding that ‘the battle involved sending the Poles to the frontlines as cannon fodder’ (Orla-Bukowska, 2006: 186). This case is also an example of selective and hegemonic forgetting. (In this act of commemoration Polish and Soviet cooperation, the Soviet regime also overlooked another pact of collaboration during WWII: the Molotov- Ribbentrop Pact between Russia and Germany (as discussed in Chapter 4, Note xii. P.110). In another case, the change from ul. w. Gerturdy to ul. Ludwika Warynskiego likewise sought to emphasise a longstanding existence of Polish Socialism. The commemoration of a Polish Socialist exemplified the three chief toponymic implications of changing place names identified by Yeoh (1996: 299). First, important past public figures were honoured. Second, celebrating a noted Socialist asserted a national 226 (hegemonic) identity. Third, the ideology of Sovietism was invested in the landscape through the change of street names. Defending the workers and common persons’ struggle against aristocracy was an essential part of this ideology. By utilising Waryski, a Socialist who died at the hands of Tsarist Russian authorities, the Soviets were able to emphasise that the ‘struggles of men like Waryski aroused hatred of industrialists and other exploiters’, and shore up support for their ideology in the vernacular landscape (Ferro, 2003: 256). All these examples typify Azaryahu’s (1997: 481) assertion that changes to names can transform ‘history into a feature of the natural order of things’ and conceal its contrived character.

In the case of ul. Andrzeja Potockiego, not only was the street (re)named by both Nazi and Soviet occupiers, it is the only example where the street name remained the same after the okres komunizmu. Polish authorities chose to keep the name given by the Soviet regime – ul.Westerplatte. The construction of war memorials in Soviet-occupied Europe after WWII was dominated by a common pedagogic narrative that highlighted the failures of the Nazi regime (Judt, 1992). As the site of the official commencement of WWII, Westerplatte is therefore pertinent for the continuation of this anti-Nazi and Soviet constructed narrative. For Poles however, Westerplatte is deeply entrenched in cultural memory not simply as the place where WWII began, but as a symbolic site of suffering and the struggle of the Polish nation through Nazi occupation. By maintaining the name ‘ul. Westerplatte’, Poles have ensured that the cultural memories of WWII and associated narratives of striving for independence remain conspicuous in Kraków’s everyday landscape. The example demonstrates that the use of street names to display nationally important cultural memories in the public sphere is not restricted to foreign regimes. The autonomous Polish government has also used street names to construct and maintain their own post-Soviet narratives.

7.1.2 Broader memory markers: Commemorative rituals in the calendar and streetscape

Street names were also changed to emphasise important dates in the Soviet commemorative calendar and continue the building of a historical narrative of Polish-

227 Socialist associations. Labour Day, or May Day (wita Pierwszego Maja or the 1st of May celebration), was established as a state-sponsored holiday during the okres komunizmu. It is an example of how the Soviet regime instituted ritual celebrations into the local calendar and everyday landscape as a means of cementing their power (Polleta, 2004). During the okres komunizmu, May Day was widely celebrated with concerts, parades and government-sponsored fanfare. It was an important point of reference in the Soviet calendar (Kaftan, 2007; Noyes and Abrahams, 1999).

The incorporation of the street name ul. 1 Maja (1st of May Street) into the streetscape sought to strengthen the importance of May Day in both the Polish public sphere and the Polish national consciousness and memory. A central placement along one section of the ring road around the Planty was chosen for this task. During the German occupation of WWII, ul. J.Dunajewskiego had been renamed to Westring, which became ul.1 Maja during the Soviet occupation. Ul. 1 Maja provided a constant and everyday reminder of the ritual action of May Day in the calendar year through its designation as a ‘defined commemorative space’ (Gough, 2004: 237-238). While ul.1 Maja was changed back to its pre-WWII name, ul. J.Dunajewskiego, after the okres komunizmu, May Day is the only Soviet-instituted public holiday to retain a place in the Polish post-Soviet calendar. Poletta (2004) has argued that the effectiveness of an instituted ritual lies in whether it is rooted in the lived practice of communities. This ‘lived practice’ was recollected in diasporic communities as remote from Poland as Australia, where several post-okres komunizmu participants recalled May Day Parades as their earliest Polish memory. In this group there was a consensus that the May Day parade and its associated festivities were a ‘fun’ and memorable experience, for themselves as children:

The sort of national tradition at that time was 1st of May big parade, so for kids it was fun (Respondent 60, 25 June, 2006).

Another stated:

1st May parades, like when I was a kid they were much more fun than when I was grown up (Respondent 18, 26 July, 2006).

228 Another participant responded:

I suppose it was so great…I lived in a small town…It was an unusual town because we had a lot of factories, so it was population of about 10 000 people, about nine really important factories there…So when it came to the first of May, all about Swieta Pierwszego Maja [May Day], it was all so, like bigger the better (Respondent 68, 1 July, 2006).

Yet many participants also indicated that their experiences and opinions changed as they grew older:

When I went to the primary school it sort of started getting into the march, just a pure march and I started getting bored (Respondent 18, 26 July, 2006).

Another said:

There was pressure to take part in the 1st May marches and so at school sometimes I didn’t like to go to these marches…It was compulsory, so at primary school I was always going, but later on when I went to high school and then to the uni, we were kind of less controlled, because we were outside of our closest environment. So if I didn’t go there wasn’t a problem. But this wasn’t a political [response on my part] (Respondent 66, 1 July, 2006).

In contrast, another participant took part in a pro-Solidarity protest held against the May Day parade:

I’m not sure if you know about the 1st of May. It was a day where everybody was pushed to go for the parade, but no-one was really keen to go, because everybody knew that it was like pro this communist party. And because we knew that it will be checked if we are there…

229 from the class in the high school the idea came…let’s put [on] the black clothes – the whole class was [in] black, and we also had the flags. So one was white and red, Polish colours – and…half of them or maybe even more that half were Red, which were just, you know, pro communist party. And once we…wound [down] the flags, so that the red ones were not shown, only the white and red, and we were going, I looked at the tribunal, at these VIPs – communist VIPs – and I saw the surprise on their faces. So at least we could give a little bit of protest (Respondent 1, 14 July, 2006).

This participant’s actions illustrate another Polish act of resistance to cultural repression. Kaftan (2007: 303) has also found that one reaction was to utilise this calendar ritual of May Day – ‘imposed on citizens by the state’ – to protest Soviet occupation rather than to celebrate propagandised workers rights. Yet many participants remembered the day fondly and this shows that calendar rituals can be both ‘confrontational and complementary’ to the intentions of a regime (Etzioni, 2004: 16-17). In this thesis, the participants displayed both attitudes to May Day: interventions into the commemorative calendar by a regime can create a ‘positive history’ but also can emphasise detrimentally the hegemony’s dominance and lack of credibility.

7.1.3 Other forums of propaganda

Apart from the institution of calendar rituals, the Soviet regime utilised many other forms of propaganda to bolster the influence of their ideology. To ensure that propaganda reached a maximum audience, the Soviet regime used street names changes as a primary method of indoctrinating their ideology in the everyday landscape. The conversion of Universitetstr. to ul. Manifest Lipcowego (July Manifesto) is another example of how the Soviet regime sought to reinforce its dominance (Figure 7.2 explains the street name changes). The July Manifesto supported the regime’s claims that the Polish nation had emerged as a true Socialist entity after WWII rather than having endured a Soviet invasion. This street name change was part of the regime’s efforts to ‘turn the landscape into a world structured by the legitimising myths and symbols of the regime’ (Gill, 2005:

230 481) – in this case that there was a longstanding existence and support for Polish Socialists before WWII. Another calendar ritual, Manifesto Day, also served a political purpose. Celebrated on 22 July with an official state sponsored holiday, Manifesto Day was abolished following the return of a democratic Polish government in 1989. Both the street name and the former official holiday were forms of propaganda used by the former Soviet regime to assert its ideology in the Polish public landscape.

Propaganda in the media, particularly through radio and television, was also used to bombard the occupied public with daily reminders of the regime’s dogma. In this thesis, the responses of the post-okres komunizmu interview participants demonstrate that the Soviet regime’s use of the media as a conduit for propaganda was not always effective, and in fact was actively resisted. The majority of post-okres komunizmu participants recalled a memory of some form of Soviet propaganda, though there was a diversity of responses regarding its effectiveness, intrusiveness and indeed uselessness in influencing their daily lives:

[We] have been brainwashed from the early age, even if you didn’t pay any attention to what they were saying …When you were 15, you [watched] the TV, which only had two channels and was showing constantly…the leader of the communist party and talk for ten hours non-stop about nothing, and it is so boring…Even if the TV was on you didn’t listen [to] what this was saying, you just completely switched off…This was the part of daily life and you didn’t really take any notice…We were able to criticise, but not officially. We were all criticising, constantly about how they were doing stuff (Respondent 19, 2 August, 2006).

While acknowledging the intrusiveness of propaganda, this participant has pointed to its uselessness: ‘you just completely switch off’. Another participant referred to the process of learning to ignore propaganda:

231 Because [the propaganda] was so aggressive, it was so funny that you know you started ignoring it…It’s shocking…because [there was] so much propaganda, you come to this point that you stop [paying attention]. I started ignoring all this information, I didn’t watch TV, I didn’t read newspapers (Respondent 11, 21 July, 2006).

Another participant discerned that the propaganda was both ubiquitous and ludicrous, but also highlighted that, despite its lack of credibility, criticism of propaganda took place in the home:

Well, the propaganda we were all laughing at it. I never took anything of that seriously…because of the family upbringing and everyone was saying what they think about what’s happening, but of course only in the very closed circle [of the family] (Respondent 58, 21 June, 2006).

These participants’ comments highlight that while propaganda was ineffective, encounters with it in the public were taken into the private spheres for family discussion and criticism. One respondent did suggest that on another level, the propaganda may have been effective because ‘brainwashing’ occurred from a very young age when children and adolescents were less able to distinguish misinformation. Another participant reflected:

‘I think when you are the subject of propaganda its very difficult to stay clear of it, very very difficult, and it will change your mindset even without you realising that’ (Respondent 61, 25 June, 2006).

The efficacy of propaganda in the media and changes to the public landscape may best be understood by analysing how they were also (re)negotiated and discussed in private spheres. Encounters with propaganda were largely viewed by the post-okres komunizmu participants as an unavoidable part of daily life, but also recognised as part of a purposeful strategy to bombard the public everyday spaces with Soviet ideology. Therefore the propaganda rarely had the desired effect of the unwitting uptake of the ideological messages. As one participant reflected, these changes to the public landscape were only

232 superficial and therefore did not change the way people identified with their own past experiences:

Memorabilia, statues and things like that, and changing streets and all these changes in Poland, they were very much, at least some of them superficial, like they are on the surface, they don’t go deep enough (Respondent 61, 25 June, 2006).

As Poletta (2004) has argued, to effectively institute calendar rituals they must become part of ‘the lived practice of the community’. The responses from the post-okres komunizmu participants suggest that some people chose to ‘switch off’ from the propaganda and others actively resisted it. Clearly, the propaganda was not seamlessly integrated into the personal narratives of the interview participants in spite of the manifestation of hegemonic ideology in the vernacular streetscape and commemorative calendar. Rather, these changes were discussed and (de)constructed within private spheres such as the home and within the family. The family became a private setting of resistance to hegemonic propaganda, but similarly it became a site for the maintenance of cultural memories of events and personalities that had been selectively renamed, forgotten or suppressed during the Nazi and Soviet regimes. The contestation between the public and private spheres of memory constitutes a politics of remembering.

7.2 Public suppression, private maintenance

The politics of remembering is a complex process, which includes of negotiation around, for instance, ‘who gets to mourn, in what way and with what political outcomes’ (Edkins, 2003: 135, original emphasis). In the previous chapter (Chapter 6) I detailed how Polish memory institutions negotiated a politics of memory about macabre sites of WWII that involved the consideration of narratives from both Polish and international audiences. In this chapter, I have examined the negotiation of a politics of memory as manipulated by a hegemonic regime. This (re)negotiation involved championing dominant ideologies and suppressing local memories that might have undermined the authority of the Soviet regime. As acknowledged by Edkins (2003), the processes of commemoration are fraught

233 with uneven power differentials, and memory has been mobilised to serve certain political purposes. The ‘fixing’ and mobilisation of particular cultural memories in public spheres has served to cement corresponding political agendas. Changing street names are one example of the reassertion of power in the memory landscape (Boyarin, 1994; Edkins, 2003; Hay et al., 2004).

As discussed in this chapter, the suppression and censorship of Polish identity is an integral part of the process of authoritarian control (Section 7.1). However, the suppression of Polish memories is not a straightforward process leading to the complete displacement of a subjugated nation’s collective memory. Rather, as I have demonstrated, suppression inflames and provokes remembering within private spheres, because these places were often free from censorship and reprisal. As a result of the post-WWII Soviet occupation of Poland, the family as a social framework (cf. Halbwachs, [1926] 1992) became especially important as a separate sphere for the remembrance and maintenance for Polish culture and identity. The (re)production of memories featuring the more macabre events associated with Soviet and Nazi occupations shifted into private spheres. However, as Till (1999: 265) has explained, ‘communist societies were not structured by the Western dualism of public/private spheres, but rather by state/family arenas’. Thus, the composition and content of private/family memories differed considerably from the state’s version of history. In private locations and trusted spheres, such as within the family, ‘open discussion took place behind closes doors (and at personal risk) with family members over the kitchen tables’ (Orla-Bukowska, 2006; Till, 1999: 265). During the okres komunizmu in Poland (1945-1989), the home existed as a distinct and trusted setting, where the family maintained publicly suppressed cultural memories, and corrected the distorted histories of the hegemonic regime.

In this section (Section 7.2), I have utilised the responses of the post-okres komunizmu participants (interview Group 4) to explore the content of publicly suppressed memories and the process of (re)articulating distorted histories within the family. This group experienced suppression of historical narratives and cultural memories first hand in Poland. From the data generated during research interviews, I identified two key processes that prevented and complicated the unfettered (re)production and transmission 234 of Polish cultural memories. First, history education in schools was skewed to a Soviet perspective (as elaborated in Section 7.2.1). Second, entire events involving Soviet aggression against the Polish nation were omitted from the education syllabus (as detailed in Section 7.2.2). The suppression and selective forgetting of historical events were both part of the process of distorting the locally remembered historical narrative, as well as distinct attempt to control public and private acts of remembering.

7.2.1 Hegemonic (re)configurations of historical narratives

Children will already have heard about the past from radio, the television or at home…It is our task to enrich, complete and correct what they are told at homeiv (Ferro, 2003: 250).

The Soviet version of Polish history after WWII in effect involved the erasure of both the historically embedded and the recently enacted Polish-Russian antagonisms from public discourse. Ferro (2003) has contended that the Soviet regime sought to expunge references to: Soviet involvement against the Polish nation during WWII, the Russian partitioning of Poland, and uprisings against the Russians during the partitioned period. That the Soviet Union had changed alliances part way through WWII was also excluded from the historical syllabus. The suppression of these events enabled the Soviet regime to blame the Nazis for all Polish calamities during WWII (though during the okres komunizmu blame was also later attributed to the capitalist Allied nations). The regime sought to promote its own Socialist ideology as victorious and ideal at a time when the destruction and devastation of the war still scarred the Polish landscape. With the aim of creating its own version of history, the Soviet regime used formal education as a means to supplant the prevalence of Polish memories and experiences of WWII discussed at home. During the okres komunizmu, the Soviet regime treated schools as public places fit for ideological shaping:

[The] communist government had a key area of control and one of the key area[s] of control was education. So through education they had control of the whole system, so [the] whole history has been rewritten (Respondent 12, 22 July, 2006). 235 It is apparent that the Soviet regime was well aware of the potential for children to be exposed to alternative histories in the private sphere of the home. Indeed, all but three post-okres komunizmu participants noted that they had learned different histories in the home to those taught at school, which pointed to different paths of memory (re)production, transmission and maintenance in private and public settings during the okres komunizmu. Participants recalled their parents correcting historical misrepresentations learnt at school. In addition, several participants specifically referred to their father’s role in ensuring that they knew and understood the Polish version of history:

They were correcting [the history]…It was done in a sensitive way… in such a way that it was something that you don’t normally talk about publicly – “so keep it to yourself”. But the situation is not exactly as it says in the books…it was definitely done within one’s family (Respondent 4, 17 July, 2006).

Another stated:

I think history was always explained to me at home, so whatever we read, we didn’t take it seriously (Respondent 11, 21 July, 2006).

While another participant responded:

Obviously living under communism the history was very twisted and presented [in a] different way… So my father was telling me how it was …telling us everything. The history was twisted basically (Respondent 33X, 21 August, 2006).

Similarly, another said:

My father particularly was very conscious that we were taught the right history …His awareness of what we lost was much more clear than my

236 mother. He read to us not just Polish little children books, but Polish classics, which taught us [to be] aware about Polish struggle for independence (Respondent 55, 15 June, 2006).

The role of the father is noteworthy given that in similar instances other post-WWII and post-okres komunizmu participants asserted that cultural maintenance in the home predominantly occurred via maternal transmission (as I have documented in Chapter 5, Section 5.2.3). The interview data suggested that while it was a maternal responsibility to ensure the ongoing transmission of cultural identities associated with language and traditions, it was the sometimes paternal responsibly to clarify and correct references to Poland’s history.

The caution that parents exercised when correcting or supplementing the historical knowledge that their children had learnt at school extended to when they chose to intervene. Most post-okres komunizmu participants recognised that their parents had only sought to correct their historical knowledge when they considered the child mature enough to deal with the implications of knowing this alternative history. For example, one participant commented:

[In] primary [school]… even if you are 10 or 12 you don’t know [about an alternative history]…And probably your parents don’t want [you] to listen to their conversations [and know] what they are talking about, because this can have some [negative] effect. Because kid[s] go around and [publicly] say things that they shouldn’t and stuff they can’t repeat (Respondent 19, 2 August, 2006).

Another participant stated:

Our parents were very careful not to tell us about it [the Polish version of history] until we were mature enough to understand that you immediately forget it, in terms of not talking about it in public, because then they could be in trouble (Respondent 58, 21 June 2006).

237 Another responded:

My father…knew that my brothers were sort of a bit ‘I know better [than the teacher] and I will [be] cool’. He didn’t want them to get in trouble [and] that’s why he probably didn’t talk with us about the politics [during the okres komunizmu]. Once it was allowed, he talk[ed about it]. But [before that] my brothers were sort of: if teacher says one thing and he knows otherwise, we’ll get up and say it. So, to protect them my father wouldn’t tell them (Respondent 18, 26 July, 2006).

Beyond implying that there was a general fear of reprisal by the Soviet-led Polish government, participants did not explicitly specify the ramifications of children publicly divulging knowledge about the Polish history they had learnt at home. One participant dissented from all these perspectives, however, saying that the restriction of historical knowledge to the home was not due to fear of repression but because additional information was simply not available publicly: ‘You just wouldn’t be able to get any information, but no-one would put you in prison for that’ (Respondent 60, 25 June, 2006). The private maintenance of cultural memories concerning Soviet aggression and attacks against Poles gained importance because of the inaccessibility of public information about these events during the okres komunizmu. Events deemed by Poles to be integral to their wartime struggle, such as the deportation and disappearance of one and a half million Poles at the beginning of WWII to the Soviet Union, were publicly suppressed from a Soviet perspective to shore up support for their regime. Nonetheless, it is evident that alternative histories were taught at home, with the intention of maintaining ‘Polish’ records of these events. The public misinformation about the case of the Katy Massacre is a renowned example.

7.2.2 Remembrances of Katy in the home

The denial of responsibility for the massacre of Polish soldiers at Katy by the Soviet regime (as discussed in Chapter 4, Section 4.4) exemplifies how the public suppression of knowledge by a dominant hegemony pushed the maintenance of cultural memories into

238 private spheres. Yet, the public censorship of discussion about Katy also had a degree of success in suppressing private knowledge. Cultural memories of Katy did however survive in spite of public suppression, because Polish families had personally lost family members and friends in the massacre and kept the memory of this event alive. These memories were also maintained because the Polish Katy narrative was completely different from – and suppressed by – the official Soviet (and Polish government’s) version of events. The suppression of public discourses concerning Katy meant that many of the victims’ families had no information about lost loved ones, either officially or informally. The denial of responsibility for the Katy massacre persisted through the okres komunizmu, despite the findings of international and neutral experts that suggested the Soviet regime had been responsible for the Polish deaths (see for example: Karbowski, 2002).

The effect of the suppression of knowledge of the Katy massacre meant that two distinct groups existed – those who knew about Katy and those who did not. Eight of the 14 post-okres komunizmu participants (Interview Group 4) were aware of the Katy event before they migrated to Australia. The remaining six participants found out about Katy only after Gorbachev admitted Soviet responsibility in 1990. The participants who knew about the event thought everyone had known. Those who had been unaware thought in retrospect that almost everyone must have been unaware. Thus, each group thought that their knowledge (or ignorance) of the event was standard. The quotations in Figure 7.1 illustrate these contrasting positions.

These two states – of either knowing or not knowing about Katy – highlight the impact of the public censorship on the maintenance of personal narratives of the event. Those who were aware of Katy were unable to publicly discuss the knowledge learned at home, and so the spread of knowledge was stifled.

239

Examples from respondents who knew about Katy Everybody knew about it… At home we were [told about] what happened in Katy (Respondent 11, 21 July, 2006).

I knew about it [Katy]. Everyone knew and this was like officially [it] didn’t happen. And then everyone was saying you know this happened and the Polish officers were killed and Polish intelligence [too]. This was always like [in the] years that Russia was our greatest friend/greatest enemy (Respondent 19, 2 August, 2006).

Examples from respondents who did not know about Katy I learn[t] about Katy…in [the] ‘90s in Solidarity, when people started to talk about it (Respondent 68, 1 July, 2006).

[Katy] wasn’t told at all. Like because we didn’t read outside [Poland]…Maybe my parents didn’t know about Katy (Respondent 18, 26 July, 2006).

But Katy was not something that was talked about in the early 70s, not many people knew about. I think it…was exposed later, cause I’ve learnt about it while living in Australia (Respondent 4, 17 July, 2006).

Figure 7.1 Respondents' knowledge of the Katy massacre

Not all knowledge about Katy (or other publicly suppressed historical events) emanated from the family. Other sources included Wolna Europa (Radio Free Europe), clandestine historical texts and even the voices of courageous schoolteachers. Participants often mentioned that their parents listened to Wolna Europa and that this was a source for alternative histories to the hegemonic narrative. Knowledge gained from Wolna Europa was built on through personal experiences and discussed, (re)produced and transmitted within the family. Several participants also acknowledged the courageousness of their history teachers, who went against official policy and taught about Katy at school. These participants noted that their teachers were ‘old’ or nearing retirement, and so they were not afraid of losing their jobs:

Unofficially, some teachers took the challenge [and]…said couple of words, but obviously this issue was actually very commonly known amongst the people in society, but was [not part of] the Polish history book (Respondent 12, 22 July, 2006).

240 Another recalled:

I also had a fantastic history teacher who told us about Katy…during the history lessons. But he was much much older (Respondent 19, 2 August, 2006).

Another participant responded:

I remember even today I was in secondary [school]…Year 11. Our teacher of history told us about Katy. He told us in such a way that he didn’t say everything. However, he told us in such a way that he protected himself, saying that it might not be true, however we should know about it that such things happened (Respondent 11, 21 July, 2006).

The importance of maintaining private narratives of Katy developed and persisted throughout the okres komunizmu due to several important circumstances. Katy was a defining event of Soviet aggression against the Polish people and the Polish nation. The execution of the Polish officers achieved the aim of robbing the remaining Polish army of significant numbers of intelligence and other officers. Among these officers there were also teachers, civil servants, businessmen, doctors and scientists, who had been called up as part of the reserve forces (Davies, 2005b). Following their detention by Soviet forces in 1939, the Poles were allowed to correspond with their families for eight months (Davies, 2005b), whereupon their correspondence abruptly ceased. German officers discovered their bodies in 1943. Not only did the soldiers’ families know that it was the Soviet forces who had detained the Poles, but they also knew which territories had been controlled by Soviet and German armies at that stage of the war. Consequently, Poles were very suspicious of Soviet attempts to blame the German army for the deaths. Yet many Poles were more concerned that the Allies went to great lengths to avoid the Katy issue, even after international experts had determined that the Soviet army and not the Wermacht had been responsible (Karbowski, 2002).

241 Precisely because of Katy’s taboo status both internationally and in Poland, there emerged an additional obligation to remember the event within spheres where it could be spoken about and remembered. Katy became, and still is, an important part of Polish cultural memory because it exemplifies Soviet aggression and dominance, the suffering and struggle of the Polish nation, and the long term suppression by foreign oppressors of the narrative of suffering and struggle. By maintaining memories of Katy in private spheres, the important narratives of Polish identity survived until they could be publicly recognised.

7.2.3 Memorialisation after the okres komunizmu

After the okres komunizmu, Poles undertook a process of (re)negotiating the hegemonic narratives of Polish history. This process involved the uncovering of repressed Polish memories that had been safeguarded in private spheres. Poles were finally able to wield these private narratives and publicly question how their recent and WWII history should be publicly memorialised. While Poles engaged in a process of rectifying the Soviet installed history, the goals of this re-working of history should only be viewed as a part of a movement ‘towards truth’ about Polish history, and not as an alternate ‘absolute knowledge’ (Bevan, 2006: 17). Thus, there is a partiality in attempting to (re)create ‘official records’ of history, because events were experienced and are interpreted differently. For example, the rise of public discourse about the massacre at Katy after the okres komunizmu would have had different affects depending on the participants’ personal experience of suppression in Poland and their knowledge of the event. For instance, one participant reflected:

We don’t know anything. It was, at the time when I was growing up to about 15 years old, the Russians and Polish were the best friends (Respondent 68, 1 July, 2006).

The sudden acquisition of knowledge about Katy facilitated a public and personal retrospect about the society they had lived in. The Soviet acknowledgement of responsibility for the massacre at Katy, in 1990, opened up two distinct realms of public

242 commemoration, one providing the opportunity for public discussion about the massacre, and the other enabling its memorialisation in the memory landscape. The IPN and the IAC are examples of the establishment of public forums where discussion about the (re)production and transmission of Polish cultural memory could take place (Chapter 6, Sections 6.1.2 and 6.1.3). The Katy Cross is an example of the second type of public commemoration, where memorialisation has taken a material form.

7.2.3.1 The Katy Cross

The public memorialisation of the Katy massacre represented a long awaited opportunity to officially mourn the victims, name the perpetrators, and openly rectify the clouded history for all Poles regardless of their previous knowledge (or ignorance) of the event. During the 1980s, there was a strong desire for public recognition of Katy, which a monument(s) would provide. A generation of Poles had only been able to discuss this macabre event within the home. Katy was one of many symbolic issues that workers campaigned for during the emergence of the Solidarity strikes in the Gdask shipyards: ‘People have been waiting for a monument to 15 000 Polish soldiers murdered by the Soviet government in Katy’ (Kubik, 1994: 186). However, towards the end of the Soviet influence in Polish politics and in the midst of Solidarno and Martial Law – five years before Gorbachev’s formal admission of Soviet responsibility – the Soviet-led Polish government unveiled a new Katy monument in Warsaw with an inscription denoting that the murdered were victims of Nazism (Karbowski, 2002).

In 1990, 60 years after the massacre, a simple wooden cross was built in Kraków. Like the monuments to Romantic Era personalities in the Planty (Chapter 5, Section 5.2.1), the cross was placed in a busy central pedestrian thoroughfare, in this case at the foot of the Wawel Castle and at the intersection of ul. Grodzka and ul. w. Idziegov (Figure 7.2 and Chapter 3, Figure 3.2).

243

Figure 7.2 (left) Katy Cross, Kraków. (right) Inscription plaque at the base of the cross, listing places of Soviet terror against Polish nationals Source: 36-108mm/digital.exp.auto/DD

The small triangular space in front of the Katy Cross is a highly traversed area, both by tourists on their way to the Wawel castle but also by locals who walk past on their daily business. The small plaque at the base of the cross lists places of Soviet aggression against Polish people and the Polish nation. Despite the monument’s central location these place names would be of little significance to the non-Polish passer by, such as

244 tourists because the information provided is only in Polish. This attribute of the plaque indicates that the (re)production of memory in this case targeted only a Polish audience.

The inscription plaque lists places where Poles suffered and died under Soviet occupation. Katy, Kozielsk, Ostaszków and Starobielsk are all locations in the former Soviet Union where Polish officers were murdered en masse. At Workuta, Dunbas, Sybin (Siberia) and Lubianka, all in the Soviet Union, Poles were imprisoned in internment camps during WWII. Lubianka is the infamous Soviet prison in Moscow. The third grouping – Wronki, Rawicz, Mokotów and Montelupich – refers to prisons in Poland used during WWII by the Nazis, and utilised by the Soviet Secret Service (NKVD) after the war. The final category – Pozna, Gdask, Gdynia, Szczecin, KWK Wujek, Lubin and Nowa Huta – comprises of places of Soviet intervention notably against Polish uprisings, strikes and revolts held in resistance to Soviet occupation and the Polish government. The addition of the plaque transforms the significance of the monument from solely commemorating Katy to representing all Polish suffering at the hands of the Soviet regime. The Katy Cross therefore plays a crucial role in the public commemorative landscape.

The monument also contributes to the Polish narrative of suffering and struggle through its form. The cross is a widely recognised symbol of Christianity and of suffering and crucifixion. Kubik (1994) has argued that in Poland the symbol of the cross has three additional meanings. First, ‘it was a sign of defiance toward the Communist regime’, which was secular (Kubik, 1994: 189). Second, ‘it was metaphor of national martyrdom’ (Kubik, 1994: 189). And third, ‘it was a symbol of Poland as the Messiah of nations’ (Kubik, 1994: 189). By using a cross to memorialise the Katy massacre, the audience is provided with a context in which to remember this macabre event – within the historical narrative of Polish suffering and Messianism. The cross holds the memory of the victims of Katy, as well as the memory of Poland’s tribulations against its Soviet oppressors.

7.2.3.2 The shift of ‘memory-work’ in diaspora

The materiality of the Katy Cross has the potential to both detract and strengthen transmission of the monument’s narrative in different realms of memory. As Johnson

245 (2002: 296) has noted, ‘the materiality of a particular site of memory sometimes masks the material social relations undergirding its production’. Although the monument to Katy may stand in the landscape as a simple wooden cross, it is representative of complex and multifaceted narratives. These narratives encompass the often-divergent histories that constitute Polish cultural memories maintained over the years in both public and private spheres. In the public sphere, the symbolism and narrative of Katy Cross may be overlooked by a non-Polish audience, for whom the cross allows only a glimpse of its significance in a highly memorialised landscape (Orla-Bukowska, 2006). For certain Polish audiences the Katy Cross publicly reinforces the narrative of Soviet-inflicted suffering understood and felt on a scale broader than just by the Katy tragedy itself.

Yet the memorial of the Katy cross has had a more complex effect on remembrance in private spheres. The post-okres komunizmu respondents who were interviewed for this thesis were accustomed to maintaining suppressed historical narratives in private spheres during Poland’s occupation. However, the opportunity to publicly materialise these narratives after the okres komunizmu has diminished the obligation for the private transmissions of Katy memories. The monuments now perform the memory-work. Wiedmer (1999) has explored this interplay of memorialisation and forgetting. She has suggested that when ‘we encourage monuments to do our memory-work for us, we become that much more forgetful’ (Wiedmer, 1999: 36). With the ‘memory-work’ in the post-okres komunizmu era shifting and being increasingly articulated in monuments, memorials and museums, the prevalence of transmissions in private settings has diminished. Whereas in Poland the family group was located in the home and characterised by the Soviet state/family binary (cf. Till, 1999), following migration to Australia this binary changed. After migration, the diasporic family was characterised by a public/private duality. This change meant that the same (or similar) memories were able to be (re)produced both publicly and privately, effectively reducing the burden of private sphere ‘memory-work’. Moreover, the character of the private settings of memory (re)production and transmission was evident in how the second generation participants (of the post-okres komunizmu migrants) narrated their parents’ experiences under Soviet occupation.

246 The ability to memorialise Katy after the okres komunizmu, and the movement of the memory-work from private to public settings has had implications for the continuance of these narratives in the home and in the family. This outcome was confirmed by the limited knowledges recalled about Katy amongst second generation participants (interview Group 5). Half of this second generation post-okres komunizmu cohort was born in Australia and half in Poland. The oldest participant of this group was six years old at the time of migration. This age grouping suggests that the socialisation of this cohort occurred largely after migration to Australia (Burnley, 1986) (this is detailed in Chapter 3, Endnote iv). Only six of the 14 second generation participants knew about Katy. Of these participants, two indicated that they had learnt about Katy during school history lessons and not from home. The remaining eight participants had no, or only vague knowledge of the massacre. While this might suggest that Katy has not been considered an important cultural memory to pass on, three post-okres komunismu participants stressed the difficulty in disseminating knowledge of their experiences during the Soviet occupation. They acknowledged this difficulty despite the importance of these narratives to their own discourses of Polish identity, as the following excerpts indicate:

No I don’t say its not important – it’s very important – but I don’t think that they would be able to understand it. It’s just a completely different world, it’s just like reading Kafka. It was probably [a] distorted picture of humanity (Respondent 11, 21 July, 2006).

Another stated:

The whole communist era is such an abuse of human rights, but they can’t understand. It’s almost impossible to translate, to explain to my daughter…the stupidity of things that happened there. It was, like, surreal. We lived in it, so we adapted, but if you just went, thrown into it, you couldn’t understand anything, cause everything was on two levels at least: the official level and the sort of popular level. So people would say one thing here and a completely different thing there, and

247 you really have to find out – to understand what’s happening – to know which one is correct (Respondent 58, 21 June, 2006).

In a similar vein, another participant stated:

[Living there] we can interpret [the] certain situation very, very differently, because we are exposed to people’s behaviour in different circumstances. We know how the system, from [the] inside, know how the system is working. So it’s not like living from the books (Respondent 12, 22 July, 2006).

So these post-okres komunizmu participants considered their lives in Poland to be unimaginable and incomprehensible for their children to understand. They asserted that their experiences were now (re)produced and transmitted within entirely different contexts. The original setting in Poland was entirely unfamiliar and unable to be related to their children. Consequently, their memories took on different meanings for the second generation. For example, while eight of the 14 second generation participants had recalled some memory of their parents’ experiences during the okres komunizmu, these memories were fragmented. They mostly centred on their parents’ experiences of learning a distorted history at school, low wages, unregulated working conditions and queuing for ration card supplies. That bleak picture of Poland during the okres komunizmu constructed by the second generation participants is incomplete for at least two reasons. First, their parents may simply not have explained their experiences. Second, the children may not have comprehended the peculiarity of life under the Soviet regime, and thus only taken up some aspects of their parents’ stories. For example, the following responses demonstrate how these second generation participants have (re)constructed pictures of their parents’ lives in Poland during the okres komunizmu:

[I know] just that it was hard, very hard. It was very hard to support yourself as a family, because of the low pay and working conditions (Respondent 31, 18 August, 2006).

248 Another participant stated:

You’re just laughing at [the past] cause it [was] just so different. Like you couldn’t imagine waiting in line for toilet paper, or waiting in line in the morning just to get furniture. No one understands that (Respondent 26, 10 August, 2006).

Another responded:

Mum never really [had] positive things to say about Poland. It’s a very love/hate relationship. I only ever remember negative stories from my Mum (Respondent 20, 2 August, 2006).

Similarly, this participant recalled:

He told us about how you had to queue at four in the morning on Saturday for your rations, cause they gave you cards, and people were paying other people to line up for them, and you spent all day lining up and normally when you got to the front everything had run out anyway. And that was one of his memories I guess, [and] generally that people were poor (Respondent 29, 17 August, 2006).

Another said:

They don’t actually talk about what they got taught [at school], but they say that they were allowed to learn certain things, like the Polish uprising and other stuff like that (Respondent 42, 11 September, 2006).

There was a pervading negativity in the way these second generation post-okres komunizmu participants recalled cultural memories of their parents’ experiences in Poland. This negativity reflects the difficulty, as articulated by the post-okres komunizmu migrants, in the possibility of their children comprehending daily life under foreign

249 occupation. The responses of the post-okres komunizmu participants have illustrated that the movement of the memory-work to the diasporic setting has been somewhat detrimental to the continuance of certain Polish cultural memories.

7.3 Conclusion

This chapter has detailed the numerous influences of shifting hegemonies of power on Polish cultural memory in both public and private spheres. Because of a history of different hegemonies in Poland, the home was mobilised as a forum for the maintenance of publicly suppressed cultural memories. The home became a site for the (re)production and transmission within the family of those cultural memories unable to be publicly commemorated in material form or discussed in open dialogue. During the okres komunizmu, the focus of these private settings’ memories was on maintaining a memory of acts of Soviet aggression. Such memories were shrouded in public settings because their content was deemed detrimental to the ongoing authority of the pro-Soviet regime in Poland. Street names were changed, new commemorative calendar rituals instituted and propaganda was used to saturate the public spheres with references to an alternate Soviet history. The suppression of cultural memories about Katy and the bowdlerisation of the historical narratives taught to children at school are two examples of attempts by the pro- Soviet regime to alter the collective Polish cultural memory. Yet the public suppression of cultural memories also had the unintended effect of strengthening and notarising certain events such as the Katy massacre, thus ensuring the continuance of narratives throughout the entire period of the hegemony’s dominance.

The period after the okres komunizmu has afforded Poland the opportunity to (re)negotiate the installed hegemonic historical narratives. These (re)negotiations have seen the movement of memories previously (re)produced and transmitted only in private family settings into the public domain. Cultural memory was materialised in monuments to victims of Soviet aggression such as the Katy cross, but also through the establishment of national memory institutions that have stimulated open dialogue about Poland’s macabre past and its remembrance. There is a commonality amongst these cultural memories (re)produced in different settings and through time. The cultural memories culminate

250 around a shared discourse of the Polish struggle for survival and the fight for freedom from foreign oppressors. Thus while this chapter has shown how changing hegemonies of power add a further layer of complexity to the maintenance of narratives of Polish identity during periods of occupation, it explicated further the existence of a common framework of Polish cultural memory (re)production and transmission.

i In using the term ‘official’ history, I am aware of the inability of any ruling power to create and all- encompassing historical narrative. However, the creation of such a dominant narrative was the main intention of both the Soviet and Nazi regimes. ii The definition of Kraków city centre is taken as meaning Centrum Krakowa, with the Main Town Square at the city centre. Using this Town square as the midpoint, the limits of the Kraków city centre extend 1.05km to the east, 1.2km to the west, 1.9km south and 1.4km north. iii In addition, there was further contention surrounding General Berling’s command of a Polish army contingent under Russian jurisdiction. Effectively because this Polish contingent was part of the Russian Army it was in opposition to the Armia Krajowa (the Home Army) under the jurisdiction of the Polish government-in-exile in London. iv Ferro has taken this is quotation from a Polish history textbook for primary school children, ‘Realizacja zadan na lekcjach historii w szkole podstawowej’ (On realising the correct version of history to teach primary school children). v Ul. Grodzka forms an important part of the tourist route (The Royal Way) from the main square to the Wawel Castle.

251 Chapter 8 – Conclusions

This thesis has been concerned with how cultural memories have been operationalised in the maintenance of Polish identity. I have examined how cultural memories have been articulated through time and in two distinct settings – in public spheres in Poland and within the Polish diaspora in Australia. The content of these (re)productions of cultural memory in public and private settings has been markedly different, especially until the recent return of Polish autonomy in 1989. These differences developed in reaction to attempts by successive foreign occupiers to publicly suppress Polish identity. I have shown that those cultural memories recalled by the Polish diaspora, and those portrayed and discussed in public spheres in Poland, have coalesced around shared and collective themes. These themes have been expressed as narratives of resistance and struggle against the dissolution of Polishness.

In this concluding chapter, I synthesise the (re)production and transmission of cultural memories with the maintenance of Polish identity through Poland’s turbulent history of foreign occupation and cultural suppression. This chapter begins with a synopsis of Polish history, from the burgeoning of the partitioned period through to modern day Poland. In this synopsis, I summarise how the case studies of this thesis show that in spite of a tumultuous history, Polish identity maintenance has been variously enacted. Thereafter this chapter has two main objectives. After providing an overview of the preceding chapters (Section 8.1), I provide a summary of the key findings of this thesis and explain how the original aims were investigated (Section 8.2). Then in Section 8.3, I speculate on the continuance of Polish cultural memories, founded on narratives of resistance and struggle, in the autonomous Poland of today and in diaspora in Australia.

In this thesis, I have explained how as a direct consequence of the partitioning of Poland by the Austrian, Russian and Prussian empires, narratives of resistance to foreign occupation burgeoned during the 18th and 19th centuries (Chapter 4). During the 123 year period without a formal Polish State, Poles, led by the Romantic Era émigrés, cultivated a mindset of resistance. Such resistance relied on maintaining a renegade Polish identity,

252 expressed in clandestine Polish cultural performances, such as language, until autonomy was reinstated. Under the partitions, Polish resistance assumed various forms (Chapter 4, Sections 4.2.1, 4.2.2 and 4.2.3). These included participation in armed uprisings and insurrections and the production of patriotic literature, poetry, art and music. These acts of resistance to the suppression of Polish identity continued to remain relevant to Poles after autonomy was reinstated in 1918.

One consequence of the longevity of the partitioned period was that narratives of resistance and struggle became firmly entrenched in the Polish psyche. The words of the national anthem, for example, still recall the march of Dbrowski’s legions out of Italy and towards Poland, on the quest for Polish autonomy. Furthermore, the instigators of notable and patriotic acts of resistance, such as Mickiewicz and Sowacki, have been commemorated in public landscapes (Chapter 5, Section 5.1). The commemoration of the Romantics in the Planty, in Kraków, is representative of the symbolic and collective act of gratitude for their contribution to the Polish struggle for independence. The messages of resistance and struggle hidden in the Planty monuments, and in the breadth of patriotic Romantic Era cultural artefacts, have also served as reminders of cultural memories to subsequent generations of Poles.

This thesis has examined how the macabre events of WWII have been remembered in Polish cultural memory (Chapter 6). During WWII, Poland lost 6 028 000 people (based on the population within its pre-war borders) (Davies, 2005b). The memories of those who died, and the aggression of the foreign occupiers, have been indelibly etched into Polish cultural memory (as discussed in Chapter 6). Within Polish history, WWII has been constructed as the definitive event of Polish suffering and struggle against its Nazi and Soviet adversaries. Polish narratives of struggle and resistance to foreign occupation were reinforced and strengthened through this very macabre period of Polish history. Acts of resistance again fuelled the hope of an end to Polish suffering, and ensured that Polish identity was maintained.

The survivors who emigrated also maintained cultural memories of WWII. In the Polish diaspora in Australia, the macabre events of the war have been remembered by the post-

253 WWII migrants because these events were their last experiences of their homeland, and had prompted their migration. While for the post-WWII migrants these cultural memories of the macabre were positioned as integral to their own constructions of Polishness, these memories were not necessarily passed down to subsequent generations. Partly to shield the younger generations from unnecessary exposure to the stories of their macabre experiences, in some instances the post-WWII migrants did not transmit their wartime cultural memories. Rather, articulations of Polishness, by the post-WWII migrants in diaspora, commonly focused on the (re)creation of Polish speaking places and the continuance of certain cultural practices. The discontinuity of cultural memory (re)production and transmission of macabre histories has meant that the second and third generations recalled differing and fragmented knowledges about their family’s experiences during the war. The discontinuity has also influenced the types of Polish cultural memories being maintained by the diasporic generations. Such discontinuity was exemplified by the continuation of cultural practices, of Christmas Eve and Easter, for example, rather than a perpetuation of narratives concerning their parents’ or grandparents’ wartime experiences.

Poland’s misfortune continued after WWII. The Soviets occupied Poland from the end of WWII until 1989. During that time, various attempts were made by the Soviet regime and the pro-Soviet Polish government to suppress Polish identity and culture. For example, the public landscape was invested with semiotic memory markers to accord with and shore up support for the Soviet hegemony, while simultaneously suppressing Polish identity (Chapter 7). I have traced how Poles reacted to this public cultural suppression: they resisted by spiriting Polish cultural memories into private spheres. Thus, the narrative of struggle and resistance during the okres komunizmu was in part continued through the safeguarding of Polish identities in the home. Yet, the nature of private sphere identity maintenance for post-okres komunizmu migrants changed upon their migration to Australia. It changed because these migrants felt that they no longer needed to (re)produce and transmit cultural memories concerning events of Soviet aggression towards Poles (and Polish history more generally) in private spheres. Public commemoration and open discussion of these events was possible in Australia.

254 Furthermore, soon public commemoration also became possible in Poland, with the return of autonomy in 1989. Accordingly, after the okres komunizmu, the burden of memory- work in Poland and in the diaspora in Australia began to shift back to the Polish public sphere. This shift was exemplified in the diaspora by the memories recalled by the second generation of the post-okres komunizmu migrants, and most notably in their lack of detailed knowledge about the Katy massacre. Compared to the post-WWII migrants, the post-okres komunizmu cohort arrived in Australia with different sets of Polish identities. They had experienced different forms of foreign occupation and cultural suppression to the post-WWII migrants. Their articulations of identity maintenance focused on continuing their lives in Australia as they would have in Poland. These cultural enactments involved speaking Polish in the home and to their children, and maintaining cultural traditions.

The overall aim of this thesis was to theorise how (re)productions and transmissions of cultural memories have been used to maintain Polish identity. I have charted how, through Polish history, Polish identity maintenance has been operationalised, in antagonistic circumstances, to continue the cultural identifications and practices of Polishness, both in Poland and in diaspora. My motivation for such analyses has stemmed partly from personal experience. I have listened to the cultural memories – such as stories about Poland – from my own grandparents. I have partaken in the processes of (re)negotiating my Polish identity in diaspora. Yet, my motivations also extended beyond these experiences in Australia. I also wanted to uncover how Polish cultural memories, more generally, had been integral to the maintenance of Polish identity, even in the absence of a formal Polish State and in the presence of occupiers whose ambitions were to subsume Poland and its people. Poland’s tumultuous history has been a definitive ‘mobilising force’ (cf. Withers, 1996) in the maintenance of memories of Polish identity. These cultural memories, of a history of occupation and cultural suppression, have been fundamental to how remembrances of Polishness have been articulated in the different research settings in this thesis.

255 8.1 Thesis Summary

In Chapter 1, I introduced the thesis topic with a brief outline of Polish history that highlighted its historical plight and its quest to attain autonomy and maintain identity. I also outlined the theoretical conceptualisations of cultural memories. I argued that the longevity and multifarious nature of cultural memories meant that they were an effective means of studying Polish identity maintenance. Indeed my overall thesis aim was to theorise cultural memory as a method of identity maintenance. I listed four additional specific thesis aims, which have drawn on the following key themes of this research: the historical contextualisation of collective narratives of struggle and resistance; Polish language maintenance; the influence of macabre histories; and the influence of shifting hegemonies of power. The remainder of the introductory chapter had two key tasks. One was to position the thesis within geographical discourses of identity. This positioning has meant that throughout the thesis, identity has been theorised as multiply interpreted, constructed and fluid through time and across different settings. The other key task was to provide a vignette of the influences of my positionality in this research. The discussion of my positionality was expanded in the methodology chapter (Chapter 3).

Chapter 2 reviewed the various theoretical influences that have informed the thematic conceptualisations of identity and cultural memory in this thesis. The positioning of the thesis within human geography has enabled me to draw on the ideas and outcomes of the cultural turn. For example, notions of identity have been conceptualised as plural, partial, fluid and fractured (Brah, 1996; Hall, 1997). Another cultural turn outcome, informing the broader thematic of this thesis, has been the expansion of geographical enquiry to include a diversity of transdisciplinary trajectories (Cosgrove and Jackson, 1987). I explained how this thesis had been positioned at the nexus of three disciplinary trajectories of human geography: identity studies, multicultural studies and post-Socialist geographies. I also drew on transdisciplinary literatures to explain how cultural memory has been theorised in wider academic discourse.

In Chapter 2 I also discussed previous studies on cultural memories. I reviewed the nascent body of geographical literature concerned with the articulations of memory in

256 public settings, particularly those emanating from a post-Socialist perspective. I considered how diaspora, as a setting for private memory work, has been theorised in both geographical and multicultural studies. I identified a gap in literature on the Polish diaspora in Australia, which included a lack of research on all of the migrant vintages and generational cohorts, as well as a distinct absence of research on the third generation cohort of post-WWII migrants.

In Chapter 3 I detailed the methodologies employed in this thesis and introduced the field settings. I used a mixed methods approach to generate data about the (re)productions and transmissions of cultural memories, in the two field settings and through time. The combination of qualitative methods facilitated analyses that were cognizant of and appropriate to the diverse nature of cultural memory articulations in both field settings. I detailed my positionality and the situated knowledges of Polishness I brought to this thesis.

While Chapter 1 provided a brief historical outline of Poland to introduce the thesis thematic, Chapter 4 expanded this analysis to investigate the first specific aim of the thesis. This aim related to the identification of historically embedded narratives of resistance to foreign occupations and cultural suppression. As such, I provided a chronological background to the specific sets of historical, social and political processes that facilitated the development of this distinctly Polish narrative of resistance While this narrative of resistance developed during the partitioning of Poland in the 18th Century, it continued to inform acts of identity maintenance throughout the prolonged period of foreign occupation in the 19th and 20th centuries. The recurrence of Polish calamities in the 20th Century meant that acts of resistance and their corollary narratives of identity maintenance remained pertinent to generations of Poles experiencing foreign rule, during and after WWII.

In Chapters 5 to 7 I focused analyses on how Polish identity maintenance has been operationalised in the different case studies of this thesis. Within these three thematic discussion chapters, I addressed the second specific aim of this thesis by examining how Polish identity has been maintained and shaped in the Polish and Australian research

257 settings. In Chapter 5 I explored the thesis’ third specific aim: how Polishness has been imagined and re-imagined using the Polish language and symbolism to maintain Polish identity, in public and private settings. For example, during the partitioned period, the continuing use of the Polish language was a vital component in the maintenance of Polish identities in the absence of a formal Polish State, particularly while the vernacular language was actively suppressed. In both research settings, the Polish language constituted both the means of (re)producing cultural memories and the cultural memories themselves. The transmission of these cultural memories differed according to the setting. In the public sphere, I detailed the commemoration of the Polish Romantic Era artists who communicated narratives of patriotism, resistance and struggle through a variety of art forms including, literature, poetry, music and painting. These narratives are transmitted through monuments depicting the Romantics in the Planty, in Kraków. Their location and the visual form of remembrance draw attention to the symbolism used in the monuments and the hidden messages they have conveyed.

In private settings, in Australia, the maintenance of Polish identity in diaspora was initially predicated on the continuing use of the Polish language and customs. To preserve these, two types of Polish-speaking places were constructed by the post-WWII migrants. These were cultural infrastructure such as community clubs, and the diasporic home. I found that each wave of Polish migrants used these spaces differently. These differences were the outcomes of dissimilar forms of cultural and identity suppression experienced by both waves of Polish migrants before their migration. I have argued that pre-migration conditions affected the intensity with which cultural maintenance was operationalised through the (re)production and transmission of cultural memories to subsequent generations. Yet, the importance of maintaining language to continue identity in diaspora was emphasised by the post-WWII and post-okres komunizmu interview participants. However, there was a decline in the prevalence of Polish-speaking participants through the diasporic generations. I also found that processes of identity construction and maintenance for the generational groups signalled a movement away from the importance of maintaining the Polish language. I have argued, however, that while the incidence of Polish language speaking is in decline in Australia, this has not necessarily equated to a

258 parallel decline in identifications with Polishness, because identities are diversely interpreted and fluid through diasporic generations. Thus, I have shown that identifications with Polishness in diaspora have shifted from being reliant foremost on the maintenance of language. They are now constructed through the practice of (albeit somewhat hybridised) cultural traditions, such as Wigilia, the Christmas Eve tradition.

Chapters 6 and 7 addressed the fourth specific thesis aim, which involved an examination of how Poland’s shifting hegemonies of power and its macabre past have informed methods of identity maintenance. Chapter 6 focused specifically on how cultural memories of WWII have been (re)produced and transmitted. The destructive force of the Nazi and Soviet occupiers has positioned the war within Polish cultural memory as ‘the nation’s most horrific tragedy’ (Orla-Bukowska, 2006: 177). Maintaining a memory of this tragedy has been central to constructions of Polish identity based on the Polish struggle for survival. In private settings, the post-WWII Polish migrants have responded to this macabre past with various (re)productions and transmissions of their experiences. Their remembrances include narratives of luck, patriotism and struggle, which have variously reflected or deflected the macabre content of their memories. Indeed, the diversity of narrative transmissions has been evident in the second and third generations’ recollections of their parents’ or grandparents’ WWII experiences. The transmission of memories of the macabre to diasporic generations required the verbalisation of personal experiences of suffering. The inherent trauma of macabre experiences was brought to light in the process of narrating (through the virtual re-living) of these memories. In some instances, the post-WWII generation had chosen not to narrate their wartime experiences to their children or grandchildren. This deflection of the macabre in private settings contrasts to the way cultural memories of WWII have been portrayed in the public sphere.

In spite of the macabre nature of some memories of WWII they were not excluded from the public sphere in Poland. Rather they were manifest in everyday public landscapes and built structures. In addition, three public memory institutes now safeguard these remembrances and ensure that they constitute a prominent part of collective public discourse (Chapter 6, Sections 6.2.1, 6.2.2 and 6.2.3). As such, remembrances of WWII

259 in the Polish public sphere have acted as overt reminders of the country’s tribulations and its path to autonomy.

Despite an Allied victory at the end of WWII, Poland endured a new era of foreign subjugation, by the Soviet Union. The newly installed regime prohibited the public commemoration of Polish cultural memories. Chapter 7 examined this suppression of Polish identity by the Soviet regime. The Soviet-led Polish government changed street names, instituted new calendar rituals and taught a fiercely pro-Soviet narrative of Polish history in schools. Furthermore, narratives that sought to memorialise Polish victims of Soviet aggression during the war were publicly forbidden. The most prominent example of this repression was the Soviet denial of responsibility for the Katy massacre. I argued that public suppression actually had the result of strengthening the resolve of Poles to maintain their identities in the private sphere of the home, and through the family in Poland. Thus, the effects of hegemonic domination were clear in the methods and spheres of identity maintenance. Instead of collective public commemoration of significant wartime tragedies such as Katy, these memories were purposefully preserved in the family.

………….

In the following section, I synthesise the findings from these thesis chapters within the theoretical frameworks of cultural memory (addressed in Chapter 2). I elucidate two key theoretical contributions to academic discourses on identity maintenance. One contribution concerns the efficacy of exploring cultural memories in the study of identity maintenance. The other relates to the uncovering of new knowledges about Polish identities, as articulated through time and across two distinct settings, to Anglophone geography.

8.2 Theoretical contributions: Exploring cultural memories to study identity

Halbwachs ([1926] 1992) posited that remembering is an innately social process. He contended that individual remembrances are contextualised by collective group

260 experiences (Halbwachs, [1926] 1992). I have applied Halbwachs’ theory of social frameworks of memory to the remembrances of Polishness examined in this thesis. These social frameworks have not prescribed so much what has been remembered, but have highlighted how these remembrances have been informed by wider collective and national narratives. In this thesis, two social frameworks were predominant in informing cultural memory (re)production and transmission. The first social group was the collectivised Polish nation. Collective Polish identity has been founded on the various pathways and tribulations of Poles in the maintenance of Polishness. Past struggles for autonomy have been internalised and portrayed as shared and recognisable narratives of Polish identity. The public articulations of Polish memory detailed in this thesis have commemorated these shared narratives through the depiction in public places of defining moments in Polish national history. Those cultural memories portrayed in the public sphere are testament to the ability of Poles to maintain identity in spite of adversity. Thus, collective national narratives of struggle and resistance to foreign occupation have provided the contexts through which individual memories can be recalled. The narrations of the post- WWII and post-okres komunizmu migrants show how individual experiences have been positioned within these wider narratives of national suffering. The influence of collective national narratives was particularly evident in the response of one post-WWII participant who recalled her struggle for survival and the maintenance of Polish identity during WWII by stating ‘we have suffered for it’ (Respondent 48, 8 June 2006). Moreover, the overt positioning of the Planty monuments and their commemoration to those Romantics who inaugurated a tradition of resistance has prominently situated narratives of resistance in the public sphere. In this public and everyday landscape, these narratives represent the collective experiences of Poles in struggling for autonomy.

The second social framework was the Polish family. While the family as a distinct social framework for remembrance is not a uniquely Polish construct, the Polish family has been a significant contributor to the continuation of Polish identity during times of foreign occupation and cultural suppression. For example, in Chapter 7, I discussed how the Soviet public suppression of the Katy massacre had lasting consequences for the families who did and those who did not know about Katy. Without access to public knowledge of

261 Katy, the (re)production and transmission of this narrative in many families never existed. For those families who did know about Katy, these narratives were continued because the family provided a site for the continuance of memories about Katy. This example of the differing knowledges of Katy exemplifies how the family has acted as a crucial framework for remembrance during foreign occupations, but was still vulnerable to censorship.

Another main theoretical concern of this thesis has been the incorporation of Poland’s macabre past into ongoing and contemporary constructions of Polish identity. Polish history since the 18th Century has been characterised by successive invasions and periods of foreign occupation. As this thesis has explicated, this history has resulted in an enduring mindset of resistance, but also a deeply entrenched memory of Polish suffering through these occupations. A historically constructed Messianic narrative – of Poland as the perpetual victim in European power struggles and its potential saviour – has resonated throughout Poland’s tribulations during WWII and the okres komunizmu. Renan (1882) contended that memories of sacrifice and suffering are integral elements in the continuation of collective national narratives. His contention has been readily applicable to the various shapes of cultural memory (re)production discussed in this thesis, both by the Poles in diaspora in Australia and through the materialisation of memory in the public sphere in Poland.

A national consciousness of Poland’s historical struggle has manifested in the public landscape. The placement of memorial plaques notarising places where Poles died during WWII is but one example of how narratives of the past and of suffering have been prominent in the vernacular. This positioning has meant that everyday audiences are now confronted with reminders of Poland’s macabre past in public settings. Adding to these reminders are the (re)productions and transmissions of memory enacted by the public memory institutes. These institutes work ensures that Poland’s macabre past remains in contemporary public dialogue. Following Eyal (2004), Poland’s past – its macabre history – has been remembered because it has been consequential to identity constructions in the present. These memories of the macabre persist because they have become etched in Polish memory as pathways to Polish autonomy. 262 A history of occupation has also shaped and informed how Polish identity maintenance occurs in diaspora. This thesis has emphasised the necessity of understanding the pre- migration conditions in the study of identity maintenance, including experiences of cultural suppression, occupation and war. The contexts of migration were notably different for the two main waves of Polish migration to Australia. These differences were apparent in the cultural memories of migrants and the methods of identity maintenance they employed. The contexts of migration underlined how each wave of migration collectively perceived potential threats to the continuation of their Polish identities in diaspora. For the post-WWII migrants, for example, their pasts in Poland had been fractured and disrupted by war, and their Polish identities directly and violently threatened. Following their arrival in Australia, they established Polish-speaking spaces to practice cultural traditions and commemorate the past. The post-WWII cohort’s remembrances of Polishness in Australia were the (re)creations of the life they had been denied in Poland.

8.3 Fading contexts: Continuing the narrative of resistance and struggle?

As I have demonstrated in this thesis, articulations of cultural memory have varied across settings and through time. In Poland, different occupying hegemonies have affected how and where Polish identity has occurred. When Polishness could not be memorialised in public settings, it was spirited into private spheres. Narratives of struggle and resistance were hidden in the public landscapes in monuments, as well as being encapsulated through the Polish language, in literature and poetry. In this thesis, I have identified and described an overarching narrative of Poles in continual opposition to their foreign occupiers. This narrative has continued to inform constructions of Polish identities because contemporary populations of Poles, both in Poland and in diaspora in Australia, have directly experienced life under foreign occupation.

Recently, Poland celebrated the 60th anniversary of the end of WWII. In 2009, 20 years will have passed since the return of autonomy in Poland. These milestones mark the increasing distance since the last occupations of Poland. While I have argued that the memories of the two most recent occupations are still vivid and are an indispensable part

263 of current constructions of Polish identity, in the remainder of this chapter (and thesis) I query how such narratives will continue to remain significant to future generations of Poles – especially, and increasingly, to those without any personal experience of foreign occupation.

In the Polish diaspora in Australia, and particularly among the descendants of the two migrant vintages, Polish identity is already in transformation. Indeed, the diasporic condition has accelerated the attrition of many aspects of Polish identities. Yet, I have shown that the diasporic state has also influenced the types of Polish identities being constructed and continued. For the third generation participants of the post-WWII migrants, for example, a sense of Polishness was not based on speaking Polish, nor did they demonstrate an awareness of the historical significance of Polish narratives of struggle and suffering. Rather, Polishness for this generation was increasingly interpreted through the traditional celebrations of Polish Christmas Eve and through experiences with their Polish grandparents. The increasing age of the post-WWII generation means that this latter linkage – ‘the living chain of memory’ back to Poland – will soon be absent (Misztal, 2003: 19). In the diasporic context, this will be momentous because it effectively severs the living connection to Poland for post-WWII descendents. Without the post-WWII migrants, many memories narrated by this generation about their personal experiences, may not be retold. The loss of my Polish grandfather during this PhD candidature has led me to reflect on and lament my lack of knowledge about his life in Poland. While undertaking the fieldwork for this thesis with the Polish diaspora, and during the analyses, it was apparent that further research concerned with uncovering and recording the experiences and memories of the post-WWII Polish migrants is needed (urgently).

Unlike many other diasporas founded in Australia after WWII, the Polish diaspora had a second large influx of migrants in the 1980s and 1990s. These post-okres komunizmu migrants expressed the difficulty of narrating to their children their experiences under the Soviet regime in Poland. Indeed, many of the second generation children of this migrant vintage had particularly negative views of the Poland in which their parents had lived. Yet the second generation participants did not directly link these conditions to the wider 264 contexts of Polish struggle and resistance. As Assmann (1995: 127) has argued, ‘memory offers no fixed point which would bind it to the ever expanding past in the passing of time’. In other words, because cultural memories have been multifariously (re)produced and transmitted between migrant waves and generations, no single cultural memory of Polishness can tie together the diverse members of the Polish diaspora, or ensure its continuing maintenance. The increasing generational distance from (and potential loss of) the living connections to Poland have meant that cultural memories such as narratives of struggle and resistance, have decreased in importance in diaspora, as generational groups gradually (re)position their Polishness elsewhere. Furthermore, Smith and Jackson (1999) contended that the nature and importance of collective narratives of identity in diaspora change through time and diversify according to individual experiences. Such changes are evident in the diasporic generations of both Polish migrant vintages. Indeed, these changes highlight a broader scope for further research focusing on the (re)articulations of Polish identities through third and subsequent generations of Polish migrants. The potential of such research reaches further in Australia’s multicultural society, especially considering the increasing generational distance of the multiple ethno-cultural groups who arrived in Australia after WWII. In addition, this research could be applied to more recent migrants and their second generations to understand the passage of cultural memory and identity maintenance in another diasporic Australia context.

While generational distance has been a clear factor informing changing articulations of Polishness in the diaspora, another key factor has been the current state of autonomy in Poland. Throughout the 20th Century, the importance of maintaining collective narratives of identity was amplified by three periods of foreign occupation in Poland. Until 1918, Poland was still under partition by Russia, Austria and Prussia. Between 1939 and 1945, the Nazi and Soviet regimes occupied and devastated the Polish nation during WWII. After WWII, the Soviet regime, with the initial support of the Allied governments, remained in Poland until 1989. These long periods of foreign occupation and cultural suppression energised collective narratives of Polish identity, because Polish identities were positioned in antagonism to the foreign occupiers. Polish identity became synonymous with the fight for autonomy. Cultural memories that emphasised the

265 collective struggle of the nation were germane to all Poles living, or who have lived, under occupation.

As I discussed in Chapter 7, since the return to full autonomy, Poles have been engaged in a process of (re)negotiating the hegemonic memories imposed by the various former regimes. This transitional period has involved a shift in the onus of memory-work from the private sphere into the public. Formerly suppressed Polish memories have now been publicly commemorated, both in material form and through the facilitation of public discourses by the memory institutes. According to Wiedmer (1999), material forms of memory encourage forgetting because monuments perform the memory work for us. In the context of an autonomous Poland, Wiedmer’s contention looms large, especially considering the aging post-WWII generation and the emergence of a new generation of Poles too young to have experienced the Soviet regime. Further research with younger generations of Poles in Poland could examine how a lack of experiential knowledge of foreign occupation will affect the continuing pertinence of narratives of struggle and resistance and alter the collective sense of Polish identity.

In this thesis, I have shown how cultural memories have informed methods of identity maintenance, in different settings and across time. That a sense of Polishness has survived through Poland’s tumultuous and macabre past exemplifies the utility of analyses that interrogate cultural memories as a means of maintaining identity. Poles, both in Poland and in diaspora, have remembered Polishness with a resolute dedication to maintaining Polish identity.

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289 APPENDIX A

HISTORICAL MAPS OF KRAKÓW

290