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The module studies a Central European country which in many ways is typical of other countries in the region (and can therefore be regarded as a case study) but which has also played an important role in shaping the course of European history. The module contextualises Poland within Europe and the world, as well as deconstructing ‘Poland’ to examine its multiple and competing identities. Throughout, we highlight the different Polands of ‘Poland’. This is one of the features which will make the module distinctive.Ìý

The module opens with an introductory lecture by Richard Butterwick-Pawlikowski on Polish history from the Middle Ages to the beginning of the twentieth century, emphasising in particular the strength, richness and adaptability of the idea of liberty over the centuries and the continuity in Polish literary and visual culture since the late Middle Ages, but also the ways in which the 'Polands' of old differed in their territorial, ethnic, social and religious composition from the compact and apparently homogenized Poland that emerged from the Second World War. The following three weeks, by Anne White consist of lectures/discussions about Polish society and politics from 1900 to the present (1900-1945; 1945-1989; 1989-2022). These explore the topics of political parties and ideologies, civil society, war and the Holocaust; economic development and social class; gender; religion; and regional and ethnic minorities.ÌýÌý

ÌýIn Weeks 5-9, SSEES Polish studies lecturers from different disciplines offer in-depth lectures on specific areas of expertise; each lecture is followed by a student-led seminar.Ìý The choice of topics will vary from year to year depending on each lecturer’s availability. When a particular topic is not offered in a specific year, it will be discussed (if only briefly) in Anne White’s lectures. The topics are:ÌýÌý

• Poland’s eastern borderlands (Kresy) in culture and history (looking at the ‘Kresy’ myth in Polish cultural memory from Romanticism to the present, postcolonial approaches to Polish culture, border shifts/migration, and linking these to the post World War II ‘recovered territories’ in western Poland) (Uilleam Blacker)Ìý

• Holocaust memory and memory of Jewish Poland (Uilleam Blacker)Ìý

• ‘Human Rights in Poland’. This would cover Polish relationship with the ECHR, the history of home-grown human rights institutions (e.g. Fundacja Helsinska) and highlight some most controversial ECtHR jurisprudence against Poland (e.g. Al-Nashiri, on the so-called ‘Polish CIA prisons’) and their wider geo-political and social implications (Agnieszka Kubal)Ìý

• Gender and sexuality (Richard Mole)Ìý

• The rise of populism (Richard Mole)Ìý

• Polish architecture and cities post-1945 (MichaÅ‚ Murawski)Ìý

• Migration to and from Poland; Poles living abroad (Anne White)Ìý

• Informal practices and relations (Anne White)Ìý

• Polish Jewish Literature (Katarzyna Zechenter)Ìý

Introductory reading: Norman Davies and Roger Moorhouse, Microcosm: Portrait of a Central European City (London: Jonathan Cape, 2002) No knowledge of Polish language is necessary to take this module.Ìý