Dr Lidia Jurek

September 2012 - February 2013
Mail: jurek.lidia(at)gmail(dot)com

Lidia Jurek has been a fellow at the Imre Kertész Kolleg since September 2012. She graduated with an M.A. in history from Łódź University in 2006 and received her PhD from the European University Institute in Florence, at the Department of History and Civilization, in 2010. In 2011 she was an intern at the European Commission, Brussels, where she was working for the Active European Remembrance Programme. The programme is supporting projects of historical interest, linked to National Socialism and Stalinism. Additionally, it seeks to organize networking meetings of European organizations, renowned in the field of remembrance.

Research project at the Kolleg

During her fellowship at the Kolleg, Lidia Jurek will be working on the project 'The memory of the Gulag in Eastern Europe: concealment, recuperation, Europeanization'. The common regional experience of living in fantasy realities (Wydra) in the Soviet bloc prevented the trauma of the deportees to Siberia from settling in the official public memory. The project analyses the extent to which this communist policy was successful. It looks at the vicissitudes of the memory of the Gulag: from its prohibition after 1945 and parallel clandestine or émigré commemorations through the 'liberation' of memory in 1989 to the post-EU accession phase. Observing the distinction between professional academic, political, media and witnesses' discourses, often mingled, the project analyses how the memory of the Gulag has been surfacing from its tabooed status to one of the crucial and controversial memory issues of the European Union.

Main areas of research

Social and intellectual history of Eastern Europe
Cultural transfer
Comparative history of nationalism
Memory studies

Positions/ Memberships

The Polish Studies Association
Otwarta Rzeczpospolita

Monographs

'Polish Risorgimento'. Visions of the modern Polish nation and their Italian foundations, (Peter Lang forthcoming 2012) Eastern European Culture, Politics and Societies Series.

Articles

Drawing up the boundaries of the endless empty steppe - the recuperation of memory of the Gulag in Eastern Europe, in: European Memories: The Eastern Perspective, ed. by M. Pakier, J. Wawrzyniak (Berghahn Books forthcoming 2013).

Un entusiasmo in declino: un nuovo sguardo sulla percezione del Risorgimento in Polonia (1848-1871), "Diacronie. Studi di Storia Contemporanea" 2011, no. 5 Italie 'altre'. Immagini e comunità italiane all'estero, pp. 1-20.

The communicative dimension of violence: Polish legions in Italy as an instrument of appeal to 'Europe' (1848-49), in: Studia z Historii Społeczno-Gospodarczej XIX i XX wieku, ed. by Wiesław Puś, Łódź 2011.

The Italian Role in the Construction of the Concept "Pole-Catholic", "East European Politics and Societies" 2010 vol. 24, no. 2.

A Completely Different 1968 "Dekadentzya. A Literary Journal from Poland" 2010, vol. 2.

Polska świadomość narodowa kształtowana w opozycji do włoskiego Risorgimento (na przykładzie publicystyki ultramontanów 1848-1871), "Przegląd Polonijny" 2008, vol. 34, no. 3-4.

Z badań nad inteligencją Łodzi przełomu XIX i XX wieku, "Acta Universitatis Lodziensis. Folia Historica" 2008, vol. 83.

Reviews

Genealogies of Memory in Central and Eastern Europe - Theories and Methods, conference report "H-Soz-Kult" 2012.

Marc Ferro, Resentment in History, "European Review of History: Revue europeenne d'histoire" 2012, vol. 19, no. 2.

John A. Merchant, The Impact of Irish-Ireland on Young Poland, 1890-1919, "Nationalities Papers" 2010 vol. 38, no. 3.

Susan Barton, Healthy living in the Alps. The origins of winter tourism in Switzerland, 1860-1914, "European Review of History: Revue europeenne d'histoire" 2010, vol. 17, no 4.

Joanna Wiszniewicz, Życie przecięte. Opowieści pokolenia Marca, "Canadian Slavonic Papers" 2009, vol. 51, no. 4.