wa.amu.edu.pl A DAM M ICKIEWICZ U NIVERSITY IN P OZNAŃ Faculty of English Collective memory, collective identity and urban landscape: Poznań regional online media and their readers Małgorzata Fabiszak, WA UAM and Anna Weronika Brzezińska, IEiAK UAM

2 Study academic context “Collective memory, collective identity and urban landscape: A case study of Poznan” Grant number 2013/09/B/HS6/00374 financed by the National Science Centre The project is conducted in a collaboration between Faculty of English, AMU and Institute of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology, AMU

Collective memory, collective identity and urban landscape: A case study of Poznan Research Questions: (1)How does changing city landscape (in particular liquidation of cemeteries) affect local knowledge, collective memory and identity? (2)Is it generation specific? (3) Are there differences in the representation of local identity and collective memory by the news media, city elites and grassroots citizens? 3

Collective memory, collective identity and urban landscape: A case study of Poznan Types of data: (1)information websites, city blogs and below the line comments (2)local newspapers (3)interviews with the city elites (4)focus interviews with four generations of Poznanians born in the 1930s, 1950s, 1970s and 1990s. 4

Socio-historical context of the present study 5

Historical Background Poznan and Wielkopolska region under Prussian rule 1807 esttablishing of the oldest exisiting Poznan Cemetery of the St Adalbert parish Wielkopolska Uprising Poznan and Wielkopolska incorporated into the III Reich as Warthegau –expulsions of Poles 38,000 from Poznan, 630,000 from Warthegau –1940 German plans to develop the city, liquidation of cemeteries in the city centre –1944 Allied bombings 1945 Poznan liberated / captured by the Red Army 1950s liquidation of cemeteries by the Polish administration 6

The ethnic composition of Poznan [ Topolski 1988-, Trzeciakowska – Trzeciakowski 1982 ] 7

Research questions (1)How the image of collective memory of the past religious/ethnic variation created by city media differ or coincide with that created by the grassroots website readers? (2)What effect do the urban landscape variables such as the denomination of the cemetery (Jewish, Protestant, Catholic) or its administrative status (liquidated or closed) have on their discursive representation by the media and the grassroots readers of these websites? 8

Keyword: cemetery cemetery as a feature of the urban landscape uniting the private memory with the official war cemeteries at Citadel Cemetery of the Distinguished Wielkopolska Citizens Jezyce Cemetery Miłostowo Cemetery Górczyn Catholic Parish Cemetery 9

Us and our graves Poznan Corpus (Wielkopolska) insurgents soldiers family and friends (bliscy) Cegielski’s [Distinguished] [Wielkopolska Citizens] Polish National Corpus tzadik (pos. 7) soldiers mass soldiers the killed insurgents (pos. 71) 10

The community of soldiers Infor websites and blogs Cemetery of the Distinguished Wielkopolska Citizens Wielkopolska Insurgents Polish, Soviet and German soldiers Comments German soldiers vs. occupants, invaders, Nazi bandits who murdered Polish civilians vs. these boys had parents, sisters, brothers, girlfriends liberating vs. occupation by the Soviet army 11

Keyword analysis Media Citadel St. Adalbert soldiers (commemoration) ceremonies Wielkopolska Insurgents Distinguished Wielkopolska Citizens Comments grave robbers (hieny cmentarne) occupants soldiers Grandpa Grandma camps Nazi (hitlerowskie) 12

Palimpsest of memory Citadel Cemetery local memory –Wielkopolska Insurgents –Victims of Zabikowo and Fort VII KZL –June 1956 victims national memory –the Citadel volunteers –the Red Army soldiers –the British Commonwealth airmen Jezyce cemetery local memory –graves of 19 th c. community workers: Wawrzyniak national memory –mass graves of the victims of Luftwaffe bombing in September 1939 –soldiers of September 1939 –January insurgent: Grzymała-Prądzyński 13

Us vs. Them: the otherness of Poznan Jews Europeanness assimilation to German culture Lasara Abramowitsch Raiman –Jewish or Russian the commemoration of Akiva Eger 14

Re-framing of memory reconstruction vs. last trace, last preserved/remaining fragment of the JC ( Skupin’s memorial to the Polish Workers Party victims of WWII > victims of

Interdiscursivity Re-use of gravestones 16

Conclusions (1)commentaries more varied, with stronger, emotional language and phrases from the communist historical discourse (2)the otherness of Wielkopolska in the Warsaw oriented dominant historical narrative (3)the otherness of the Poznan Jews (4)the community of soldiers (post- transformation) 17

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