Interview | Urban Media Archive

Social Anthropology of filling the Void: Poland and Ukraine after World War II

The central concept of the research project is «social void», a phenomenon that was characteristic of Central and Eastern Europe during and immediately after World War II as a result of mass ethnic cleansing, political revolutions, forced displacement and migration. The project focuses both on the material dimension of post-war social change (e.g. acquisition of property) and the subjective sphere of social practices and relationships. His goal was to examine the processes of replacing the missing elements of social life with local communities of Poland and Ukraine. The interviews conducted as part of the project show how the void was filled after the social groups (e.g. landowners, wealthy peasants), representatives of ethnic communities (Jews, Poles, Ukrainians) and professional groups (e.g. shoemakers, pharmacists, doctors, or more broadly – craftsmen, intelligence) were evicted by the war and post-war changes. The analysis concerns changes in the ownership structure, economic dysfunction, transformations of social and cultural practices, as well as changes in relations and social norms. The conversations archived at the Center were recorded in a dozen of locations in Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk and Ternopil regions by an interdisciplinary team of Polish-Ukrainian researchers. The research was carried out in small towns and villages, combining the methodology of microhistory and biographic interview as part of oral history. In total, almost 150 interviews were collected in Ukraine, of which 40 are currently available in UStories collection. The conversations recorded in Poland as part of this bilateral study are preserved in Warsaw at Archiwum Historii Mówionej. The project coordinator is Anna Wylegała, a researcher at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences. Project is financed by the National Humanities Development Program, registration number 12H 13 0584 82. Galyna Bodnar worked with the materials before their publication.

Female, born 1930

An interview with a native and permanent resident of the village Kuriany, now Berezhany district. From the pre-war period, the woman recalled education at school and teachers; she also vaguely recalled interethnic cohabitation.

Female, born 1930

An interview with a native and permanent resident of the village Lany of Peremyshlyany district. When a teenager, the woman studied at school in Bibrka and thus recalls the ghetto and shootings of Jews in the town.

Female, born 1937

An interview with a native and permanent resident of the village Utikhovychi of Peremyshlyany district. Considering the woman’s age, the conversation was mainly concerned with the end of the war and the post-war years under the Soviet government.

Female, born 1927

An interview with a native resident of the village Kuriany of Berezhany district, whose father was killed by the Ukrainian nationalist underground.

Female, born 1930

An interview with a native resident of the village Koropets, Monastyrysk district, contains the history of the local landlord’s family and the mental map of the town.

Female, born 1932

An interview with a woman born in Lviv, a permanent resident of the village Hlibiv, Husiatyn district, has the description of the interethnic relationships and migrations.

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Social Anthropology of filling the Void: Poland and Ukraine after World War II