Fetysz „obiektywności”. „Nasza klasa” Tadeusza Słobodzianka
"Objectivity fetish." Our Class by Tadeusz Słobodzianek

Summary/Abstract: Our Class was received in Poland with enthusiasm. The author was praised for his courage and his voice was considered a balanced part of the Jedwabne pogrom discussion, taking place in Poland since 2000. Why this enthusiasm now, when the publication of the Neighbours was received without it? What changes to narration about Jedwabne provided by Słobodzianek were so successful? The article described the drama’s reception which turns out to be selective. It also refers to the play’s text, bringing out two orders of presenting and explaining the events. Firstly, Our Class creates a picture of interpersonal relations where social mechanisms of discrimination are erased. This thread is picked up and developed by the Polish reviewers. The Slaughter on Jews becomes an outcome of a conflict between two equal groups with similar possibilities of action and agency and therefore not linked to domination of the majority over the minority. Hence, the symmetry of harm and as a consequence, the question of guilt and the alleged tragedy of the characters becomes unsolvable. That is supported by psychological explanations of motives and behaviours, modelled on family relations. The viewpoint of the event’s participants, that is a discrimination symptom itself, is being treated as an objectifying description. Seen up close and psychologized fates of the characters veil the background of the dominating group’s violence. This violence can be explained only in sociological terms. However Słobodzianek refers also to descriptions on a social level. In that manner he constructs the scene of Rachelka’s wedding and the handling of her salvation after the war relating it to extraordinarily described phenomena of the Righteous Among the Nations’ social functioning. He notices and describes subordination rituals organised for the Survivors and the Survivor’s mimicry. Those threads were completely ignored by the reviewers, however. They were also unable to break through the narration structures of the first type, which are more recognisable.

• Details
• Contents