Poland is a tenacious survivor-state: it was wiped off the map in 1795, resurrected after the First World War, apparently annihilated again in the Second World War, and reduced to satellite status of the Soviet Union after 1945. Yet it emerged in the vanguard of resistance to the USSR in the 1980s, albeit as a much more homogeneous entity than it had been in its multi-ethnic past. This book outlines Poland's turbulent and complex history, from its medieval Christian origins to the reassertion of that Christian and European heritage after forty-five years of communism. It describes Poland's transformation since 1989, and explains how Poland navigated its way into a new Commonwealth of Nations in the European Union. Recent years have witnessed significant changes within Poland, Eastern Europe and the wider world. This new edition reflects on these changes, and examines the current issues facing a Poland which some would accuse of being out of touch with 'European values'.
In the bloody twentieth-century battles over Central Europe's borderlands, Upper Silesians stand out for resisting pressure to become loyal Germans or Poles. This work traces nationalist activists' efforts to divide Upper Silesian communities, which were bound by their Catholic faith and bilingualism, into two 'imagined' nations. These efforts, which ranged from the 1848 Revolution to the aftermath of the Second World War, are charted by Brendan Karch through the local newspapers, youth and leisure groups, neighborhood parades, priestly sermons, and electoral outcomes. As locals weathered increasing political turmoil and violence in the German-Polish contest over their homeland, many crafted a national ambiguity that allowed them to pass as members of either nation. In prioritizing family, homeland, village, class, or other social ties above national belonging, a majority of Upper Silesians adopted an instrumental stance towards nationalism. The result was a feedback loop between natio
Jedrzej Kitowicz was a parish priest in central Poland with a military and worldly past. In his later years, after putting the affairs of his parish in order, he composed a colorful chronicle of all a
This book is an engaging explanation of the complicated history of Poland, one of the least well known countries in Europe.• Includes a timeline of significant events in the history of Poland provides
An Irish Independent book of the year. Did the Versailles Peace Treaty cause World War II?The Versailles Peace Treaty - the pact that ended World War I between the German empire and the Allies - has
This volume is made up of essays in first presented as papers at the conference held in May 2015 at the POLIN museum of the history of Polish Jews in Warsaw is divided into two sections. The first dea
For nearly a century, it has been a commonplace of Central European history that there were no Jews in medieval Prussia-the result, supposedly, of the ruling Teutonic Order's attempts to create a pure
This book analyses the role of social networks in the process of migration. Based on stories of Polish Jews who migrated between Poland and Palestine in the 1920s, the author presents all stages of th
The Duchy of Warsaw, 1807-1815 is the first academic history of the state established by Napoleon in pre-partitioned Poland at the turn of the 19th century. The book examines the political, social and
"The union of Poland and Lithuania was ruled by the Jagiellon royal house from 1385-1572, after which a political transition to an elective monarchy was undertaken. This book studies the political tra
"From 1919 to 1989, the borderland of Upper Silesia, one of Central Europe's most important industrial regions, was at the center of a conflict between Germany and Poland. In their interaction with--a
"Jussi Jalonen's On Behalf of the Emperor, On Behalf of the Fatherland approaches the Russian suppression of the Polish Uprising in 1830-1831 from a new transnational perspective. The Russian mobiliza
Tygielski explores the role that Italian immigrants played in the Early Modern Polish-Lithuanian state and society, and compares it to Italian emigration to other countries, especially France. He cons
Since its beginnings, Poland has been a moving target, geographically as well as demographically, and the very definition of who is a Pole has been in flux. In the late medieval and early modern perio
Historian Gross reflects on aspects of his native Poland during the 20th century. He covers his intellectual journey into the hidden Polish past, themes for a social history of war experience and coll
