Description
Book SynopsisPhilo-Semitic Violence: Poland’s Jewish Past in New Polish Narratives addresses the growing popularity of philo-Semitic violence in Poland between the 2000 revelation of Polish participation in the Holocaust and the 2015 authoritarian turn. Janicka and Zukowski examine phenomena termed a “new opening in Polish-Jewish relations,” which stems from sociocultural change and the posthumous inclusion of those subjected to anti-Semitic violence. The authors investigate the terms and conditions of this inclusion whose object is an imagined collective Jewish figure.
Different creators and media, same friendly intentions, same warm reception beyond class and political cleavages, regardless of gender and age. The made-to-measure Jewish figure confirms and legitimizes the majority narrative – especially about Polish stances and behaviors during the Holocaust. Enabled by this, philo-Semitic feelings indulge the dominant group in Baudrillard’s retrospective hallucinations. The consequence: aggression toward anyone who dares to interrupt the narcissistic self-staging.
This book exposes the Polish ethnoreligious identity regime that privileges the concern for the collective image over reality. The authors’ inquiry shows how patterns of exclusion and violence are reproduced when anti-Semitism – with its Christian sources and community-building function – is not openly problematized, reassessed, and rejected in light of its consequences and the basic principle of equal rights.
Trade ReviewA wonderful and original book by two of the most gifted Poland's cultural critics.
-- Jan T. Gross, Princeton University
Table of ContentsIntroduction: Philo-Semitic Violence
Elżbieta Janicka, Tomasz Żukowski
Chapter I: Interception of a Document: Po-lin by Jolanta Dylewska (2008)
Elżbieta Janicka, Tomasz Żukowski
Chapter II: Correction of the Reality: Reenacting the Destruction of the Będzin Ghetto (2010)
Tomasz Żukowski
Chapter III: The Object and Subject of Nostalgia: I Miss You, Jew and The Burning Barn by Rafał Betlejewski (2010)
Tomasz Żukowski
Chapter IV: Purification through Separation: The Commemoration of the Warsaw Ghetto Bridge
(1996, 2007-2011)
Elżbieta Janicka
Chapter V: A Freudian Slip: The Keret House at Żelazna Street in Warsaw (2012)
Elżbieta Janicka
