The “Reunified” Drohobych and the “Recovered” Legnica: A Comparative Perspective on Official Urban Histories under Communist Rule (1945-1989/91)
The Second World War ended for both Drohobych and Legnica with a change of “political owners.” Drohobych, which in the interwar period had belonged to the Second Polish Republic, now became part of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic within the Soviet Union, while Legnica, previously a German city, was transferred to the socialist Poland. Alongside political authority, the populations of both cities also changed. In Drohobych, a substantial part of the Jewish population was murdered or left the city during the Holocaust. Most Poles were forced to leave what had become a Soviet city, which was subsequently populated by people deported as a result of Operation “Vistula,” residents of surrounding villages, and migrants from other regions of the Ukrainian SSR. At the same time, Polish expellees from the East arrived in Legnica, as the German population was leaving. The new “political owners” of these cities produced new historical narratives intended to legitimize their presence and to create new appropriate models of identity. Thus, Drohobycz was to become Drohobych, and Liegnitz – Legnica, while local inhabitants were to become, respectively, Ukrainian Soviet citizens and Poles of a new socialist homeland.
My project aims to examine in a comparative perspective the strategies through which official historical narratives and images of Drohobych and Legnica were constructed within new regimes of power and their discursive frameworks. Addressing this topic makes it possible to problematise and reconsider several important contexts: (1) the role of the new Ukrainian Soviet/Polish communist authorities in historicising newly acquired territories within authorised national narratives and in constructing appropriate modes of Ukrainian/Polish national identities; (2) the strategies of historical narratives’ and urban images’ construction in the new territories of the Ukrainian SSR and the socialist Poland, including both commonalities and differences; (3) who were the creators of these new historical narratives. Ultimately, the comparative approach is a major advantage of this study, since it enables an analysis of the construction of narratives and images of Drohobych and Legnica as manifestations of a single phenomenon: the historicization of newly annexed territories driven by new discourses of power.
Notably, in both cases scholars have tended to focus on regional capitals, such as Lviv or Wrocław, or on entire regions, whereas the study of historical narrative construction within contemporary discourses of power in smaller cities remains marginal. I am convinced that shifting scholarly attention towards smaller cities would make it possible to trace the significance of local agency and the presence of local specificities, despite the existence of a general Soviet script (not only for Soviet countries). My research seeks to address this gap by concentrating on Drohobych and Legnica. In addition, a comparative approach will allow me to identify shared patterns and substantial differences, offering a more nuanced understanding of the mechanisms of historical policy in both countries, shaped by local contexts.
Betsko, Yurii. Publitsystyka Omeliana Kovcha v konteksti intelektualnoi dyskusii shchodo obriadovo-pastoralnoho zhyttia hreko-katolykiv [The Publicistic Writings of Omelian Kovch in the Context of the Intellectual Discussion on the Liturgical and Pastoral Life of Greek Catholics). Bachelor's thesis, Ukrainian Catholic University, 2024. In Ukrainian.