Speaker: Karolina Drozdowska (Trondheim)
Chair: Clemens Räthel (Greifswald)
Since the enlargement of the European Union in 2004 and opening of the EEA borders for citizens of the new member countries, Poles have become the largest national minority in Norway. This triggered an intense process of not only economical but also cultural exchange between the two countries, and an increase of interest for Norway in Poland and vice versa. No wonder that Polish immigrants and the country they came from soon began to be depicted in the works of Norwegian culture, also literature. Today, twenty years after 2004, we can begin to reflect on this process and draw the first conclusions. In my lecture, I will attempt to answer the questions of how Poles and Poland have been depicted, represented, constructed and imagined in the Norwegian literature past 2004, with a special focus on popular prose written and published during the last ten years. I will also reverse the questions and take a look at imagining Norway in Polish literature published at the same time. The main theoretical inspirations for my talk will be Przemysław Czapliński’s concept of the “interrupted map” and the notion of Western Orientalism targeting Eastern Europe.
Thursdays, 18.15–19.45
Rubenowstr. 1, Lecture Hall 1
University of Greifswald
For online participation, please write to: balticsea-eventsuni-greifswaldde
Organisation: Antje Kempe & Clemens Räthel