Kamila Baraniecka-Olszewska – författare

This book explores the consequences of the latest political shifts in Central Eastern Europe: the rise of right-wing parties and, among other things, politics becoming more invested in history. These phenomena coincide and overlap with the democratisation of history by turning the past into a hot topic, persistently present in the public sphere and often evoking strong emotions. Ethnographic research (conducted in 2012-2016) focusing on how World War II reenactors experience the past serves as the basis to analyse the ways in which the group uses the widespread, often institutionalised interest in history to – on the one hand – become involved in debates on World War II and the remembrance thereof, and – on the other – to authentically experience this past. The volume therefore analyses how physical the process of creating and experiencing grassroots visions of the past is, and how these visions interact with the public discourse about the past. Reenactors’ ability to marry the often-contradictory orders of historical truth, authenticity, and representation is explored. Moreover, Baraniecka-Olszewska analyses how the reenactors overcome various obstacles on their way towards authentic experiences, performing history through their bodies.

This book explores the consequences of the latest political shifts in Central Eastern Europe: the rise of right-wing parties and, among other things, politics becoming more invested in history. These phenomena coincide and overlap with the democratisation of history by turning the past into a hot topic, persistently present in the public sphere and often evoking strong emotions. Ethnographic research (conducted in 2012-2016) focusing on how World War II reenactors experience the past serves as the basis to analyse the ways in which the group uses the widespread, often institutionalised interest in history to – on the one hand – become involved in debates on World War II and the remembrance thereof, and – on the other – to authentically experience this past. The volume therefore analyses how physical the process of creating and experiencing grassroots visions of the past is, and how these visions interact with the public discourse about the past. Reenactors’ ability to marry the often-contradictory orders of historical truth, authenticity, and representation is explored. Moreover, Baraniecka-Olszewska analyses how the reenactors overcome various obstacles on their way towards authentic experiences, performing history through their bodies.

Ambient History presents the role urban fabric plays in constructing the wartime history of Warsaw. It focuses on history embedded in matter and details the practices followed by municipal institutions, artists and historical reenactors who pull history out of the background through their actions.The book offers a new perspective on the material history of the city. It presents the concept of ambient history – history hidden in the background, in the landscape – waiting to be utilised by individuals coming into contact with the fabric of the city. It draws on anthropological considerations of history which embrace non-academic methods of conceptualising the past and processes of democratising history. The book has two principal objectives. One is to give theoretical grounding to the term ‘ambient history’, which facilitates the conceptualisation of material history and the role experiencing it plays in the process of constructing history. The other is to try and determine the limits of the heuristic potential of posthumanist reflection on materiality in reference to research focused on the making of history.Therefore, the book is valuable reading for researchers studying non-academic methods of curating history: scholars investigating materiality and things, anthropologists of history, scholars of heritage studies, experts in urban studies, historians focused on public history and archaeologists analysing the discipline’s theory.