Overview

In a time of national introspection regarding the country's involvement in the persecution of Jews, Poland has begun to reimagine spaces of and for Jewishness in the Polish landscape, not as a form of nostalgia but as a way to encourage the pluralization of contemporary society. The essays in this book explore issues of the restoration, restitution, memorializing, and tourism that have brought present inhabitants into contact with initiatives to revive Jewish sites. They reveal that an emergent Jewish presence in both urban and rural landscapes exists in conflict and collaboration with other remembered minorities, engaging in complex negotiations with local, regional, national, and international groups and interests. With its emphasis on spaces and built environments, this volume illuminates the role of the material world in the complex encounter with the Jewish past in contemporary Poland.

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9780253015037

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Reviews

What immediately strikes the reader of this book is its unique focus on space as an analytical category, particularly as it is modified by various modes of construction and transnationalism It is impressive for the overall consistency of the chapters and the range of parochial discourses (Jewish, Polish, memory-studies, theoretical) that are interwoven by the authors, offering opportunities for readers from a variety of disciplines to learn something new. Oren Stier, Florida International University--Oren Stier, Florida International University

Erica Lehrer requested removal of this blurb on our website: What immediately strikes the reader of this book is its unique focus on space as an analytical category, particularly as it is modified by various modes of construction and transnationalism... It is impressive for the overall consistency of the chapters and the range of parochial discourses (Jewish, Polish, memory-studies, theoretical) that are interwoven by the authors, offering opportunities for readers from a variety of disciplines to learn something new.Oren Stier, Florida International University A fascinating reading of a palimpsest of death, devastation and revival of the Jewish world in East Central Europe. This volume brings to light an array of concrete developments occurring in Poland since the sweeping systemic change in the region: the reconstruction of the annihilated Jewish world takes place on the ruins of the communist utopia. This much-needed initiative surveys reconstructive and reconciliatory processes (such as the creation of the Polin, the first museum dedicated to the history of Polish Jewry, the revitalization of Cracow's Jewish quarter and the ongoing restoration of Polish synagogues, as well as mental maps of nostalgia and memorization) and gives the reader a renewed sense of hope. As a discursive harbinger of the changes, this volume is both constructive in its ethical stance and constructivist in its approach to the cultural and material dimensions of that lost Jewish world. -Boena Shallcross, University of Chicago [T]he authors' understanding of the Jewishness of 'Jewish space' encompasses the plurality of Jewish expression. As the editors note, their approach seeks 'to break out of predetermined, normative views of Jewishness to explore how history and identity inform each other, raise questions about difference and solidarity, and recognize that Jewish culture is shaped in a field of interactions with other cultures.' From the vantage point of Poland, the editors see their work as part of a national discourse, looking to the construction of a new, post-communist Polish identity. -Literary Review of Canada Jewish Space in Contemporary Poland evokes a revolution - the word is not too strong - in the possibilities, new goals, and shifting facts on the ground associated with Jewish history and lives in Poland today. -Canadian Jewish News There has been a surge of interest in the history and lives of Polish Jews by Polish Gentiles and the descendants of Holocaust survivors in recent decades... This collection offers deep insights into and thoughtful analysis of this fascinating phenomenon. Highly recommended. -Choice The diversity and uniqueness of examples presented in 'Jewish Space in Contemporary Poland' make this book a significant contribution to Polish-Jewish memory studies. -Pol-Int [This] collection is an important step toward deeper and clearer understanding of what Poland's Jewish spaces were, are, and may yet become. -H-SAE

What immediately strikes the reader of this book is its unique focus on space as an analytical category, particularly as it is modified by various modes of construction and transnationalism It is impressive for the overall consistency of the chapters and the range of parochial discourses (Jewish, Polish, memory-studies, theoretical) that are interwoven by the authors, offering opportunities for readers from a variety of disciplines to learn something new. Oren Stier, Florida International University

Author Information

Erica Lehrer is Associate Professor in the History and Sociology/Anthropology Departments at Concordia University in Montreal, Canada, where she also holds the Canada Research Chair in Post-Conflict Memory, Ethnography, and Museology. Michael Meng is Assistant Professor in the Department of History at Clemson University, South Carolina.

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