Subtitle:

Acta Poloniae Historica T. 116 (2017), Studies

Contributor:

Hartzell, James : Ed. ; Institute of History of the Polish Academy of Sciences ; Polish National Historical Committee

Publisher:

Instytut Historii Polskiej Akademii Nauk

Place of publishing:

Warszawa

Description:

p. 301-331 ; 23 cm

Type of object:

Journal/Article

Abstract:

This article discusses the moral dimension of history writing in the opposition milieus during the last decade of the Polish People’s Republic (PRL). It focuses on the works of two dissident historians who dealt with untold or contested aspects of Polish contemporary history: Krystyna Kersten and Jerzy Holzer. First, the essay describes the narratives about the values and experiences shared in the PRL context by people belonging simultaneously to the intelligentsia, opposition dissidence, and academia (professional historians), with a special emphasis on the discovery and search for the truth under positivistic premises. Secondly, it analyses the counterfactual questions posed by Kersten and Holzer in their bestseller underground books about post-war politics and the trade union Solidarity’s legal period, respectively. The reflections that these two scholars developed about pasts-that-didn’t-take-place provided a complementary ethical component to their discourses concerning decision-making processes and Polish society’s political agency. The idea of losing, the ultimate inevitability of defeat, and the way that defeat was faced in two different moments of Poland’s recent history are tackled by Kersten and Holzer with an educational goal: to explain to readers that, however minute the range of choice is, ethics, together with remembrance, plays an important role in social consciousness and empowerment, and hence can make a crucial difference in the long run.

References:

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Stobiecki Rafał, Historiografia PRL. Ani dobra, ani mądra, ani piękna… ale skomplikowana. Studia i szkice (Warszawa, 2007).
Stråth Bo (ed.), Myth and Memory in the Construction of Community. Historical Patterns in Europe and Beyond (Brussels, 2000).
Törnquist-Plewa Barbara, The Wheel of Polish Fortune. Myths in Polish Collective Consciousness during the First Years of Solidarity (Lund, 1992).
Wawrzyniak Joanna, ‘History and Memory: The Social Frames of Contemporary Polish Historiography’, Acta Poloniae Historica, 103 (2011), 127–46.

Relation:

Acta Poloniae Historica

Volume:

116

Start page:

301

End page:

331

Detailed Resource Type:

Article : original article

Format:

application/pdf

Resource Identifier:

oai:rcin.org.pl:68573 ; 0001-6829 ; 10.12775/APH.2017.116.11

Source:

IH PAN, sygn. A.295/116 Podr. ; IH PAN, sygn. A.296/116 ; click here to follow the link

Language:

eng

Rights:

Creative Commons Attribution BY-ND 4.0 license

Terms of use:

Copyright-protected material. [CC BY-ND 4.0] May be used within the scope specified in Creative Commons Attribution BY-ND 4.0 license, full text available at: ; -

Digitizing institution:

Institute of History of the Polish Academy of Sciences

Original in:

Library of the Institute of History PAS

Projects co-financed by:

-

Access:

Open