‘Regionality’ as a Key Concept in Historiography of Music with preliminary considerations as regards Salzburg

Author(s): Thomas Hochradner / Language(s): English / Issue: 2/2020

This paper seeks to investigate Salzburg’s musical profile in its 20th century reception as an example of dealing with topographic facts in music history writing. In the face of awakening nationalism and the beginnings of a Mozart cult in late 19th century, and its continuation after 1900, musicologist Constantin Schneider tried to deidolize the feature of geniality by presenting two exhibitions on Salzburg’s music history in the 1920s, and to create an overall view on the bases of sources. Soon afterwards, in 1935, when Schneider published his Geschichte der Musik in Salzburg von der ältesten Zeit bis zur Gegenwart, he relied on his former projects. With this study, Schneider established a topographically supported philological approach in musicology that neither his academic teacher, Guido Adler, nor other authors had realized and that would not have come into being without the idea of ‘regionality’ as a key concept in the historiography of music.

‘Unwanted But Needed’ In South Africa: Post Pandemic Imaginations On Black Immigrant Entrepreneurs Owning Spaza Shops

Author(s): Sadhana Manik / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 0

This chapter is an attempt to imagine the policy environment and socio-economic spaces of what a post pandemic SA could be for immigrant small/micro business entrepreneurs, who are owners of ‘spaza’ shops. I present a focused gaze for this sub set of immigrants (developing the informal economy in SA) who have been experiencing a cornucopia of challenges pre-pandemic and during the pandemic based on their status as immigrant entrepreneurs, the most pronounced of which has been xenophobia which is cocooned within the explicit aim of purging South Africa of immigrants. It is for this reason that I trace the realities of the landscape pre COVID-19 and during the pandemic before offering up three ‘imaginations’ (O’Tuathail, 1996) as possibilities for the future of immigrant spaza shop owners. I draw on existing securitization policies, political utterances and practices, socio-economic events and immigrants’ experiences in post- apartheid South Africa which has created particular ‘auras’ ( Roy, 2005) and anti-immigrant discourses that provide some insights into what a post pandemic future could be.

“How were we supposed to know?” – the problem of embedding education for sustainable development in the learning process

Examples of New Zealand, France and Poland

Author(s): Małgorzata Klein / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 0

There is a broad scientific consensus that climate change has the potential to significantly transform the natural environment. If correct, this will have dire socio-economic consequences. This topic, together with the closely related issues of the rate, scale, direction, and means of achieving economic development, is studied under the rubric of sustainable development (SD). We are now confronted with having to thoroughly transform our lifestyle (Druckman, 2016; Dubois et al., 2019). In view of this fact, it seems shortsighted that primary and secondary education in Poland lacks a compulsory, separate subject dedicated to the causes, consequences, and adaptive measures required in these new circumstances. The country has yet to produce a textbook on the subject. This paper examines and compares SD education in secondary schools in Poland, France and New Zealand. These three countries are analyzed in terms of their efforts to build social awareness of the ongoing and impending environmental and socio-economic transformations through the education system. France and New Zealand have made substantial progress, Poland, however, has fallen far behind in implementing ESD.

“Makó — Not Only Hagyma”?: Competing Histories and Narratives of Onion Production and Spa Tourism in a Hungarian Town

Author(s): Vivien Apjok / Language(s): English / Issue: 2/2020

The aim of this paper is to present the role that onions and spa tourism play in local identity in the Hungarian town of Makó, as well as the possible explanations that cause the two phenomena to manifest differently in the local (urban and community) self-image. What the two phenomena have in common is the economic aspect, which in the past and in the present constitutes the main sector of the town, but we can see that this orientation is also perceived differently at many points. The question is relevant from an anthropological point of view because we can witness stacked layers of meaning that in some cases support or conflict with each other, and these affect both the self-image of the locals and the image of the town. The interpretive framework of the article is the theory of competing histories, incorporating concepts of tourism, festivals, identity, collective memory, and narrative research.The field of research is Makó, a small town in southeastern Hungary which is primarily known for its onion production but which a few years ago was also placed on the tourist map, on a national and international scale, in connection with the Hagymatikum Spa. This study seeks to answer the following questions: (1) what is the role of onions (agriculture) and spas (tourism) in the local identity of Makó; (2) how are the narratives of the two phenomena structured socially and historically; and (3) how are they intertwined in the endeavours of contemporary identity-construction? These questions are further interpreted through the theoretical framework of competing local histories and narratives that affect the construction of the local identity.

“Polish Up Yourself and Be No Drag”; The Joy and Jeopardy of Reading Anglophone Caribbean Literature in Translation

Author(s): Bartosz Wójcik / Language(s): English / Issue: Sp. Iss./2018

Caribbean literature is still under-represented in Eastern Europe, an error of exclusion that the present paper ventures to discuss. For decades Polish publishers have been understandably replicating metropolitan canons, zig-zagging between European and American bestsellers. It is only when a Caribbean or Caribbean-British writer gains an international distinction (Walcott, Naipaul) or becomes a worldwide publishing sensation (Zadie Smith, Andrea Levy) that their books are translated. Exceptions to this rule, such as the solitary Polish editions of Caryl Phillips’s A Distant Shore (Muza, 2006), Monique Roffey’s The White Woman on the Green Bicycle (Nasza Księgarnia, 2011) and Kei Miller’s The Last Warner Woman (Świat Książki, 2012), or single Francophone Caribbean novels, are few and far between. Arguably, it seems that this politics of translation and publishing stems from the systemic, colonially foisted peripherality of West Indian literature, side-lined by the cultural production of the UK as well as the USA, which dominates the curricula of English departments in more culturally homogeneous countries such as Poland. However, what constitutes a major problem for the dissemination (and popularity) of Caribbean Creole literature in Polish is exactly what makes West Indian writing so engaging, multi-layered, polyphonous and intertextual – it is the cultural component (for instance, the translation of “Creole folkways”) that is often misread, misconstrued and, as a consequence, mis-rendered. For that reason, using a number of literary sources, the present paper will attempt to showcase a selection of translatological strategies for coping with, to quote Benjamin Zephaniah, “decipher[ing]/de dread chant” into Polish.

“WE HAVE MET THE ENEMY AND HE IS US” - AN ANALYSIS OF NATO STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS: THE INTERNATIONAL SECURITY ASSISTANCE FORCE (ISAF) IN AFGHANISTAN, 2003-2014.

Author(s): Brett Boudreau / Language(s): English

The 2003-2014 UN-mandated, NATO-led ISAF mission, which featured ground combat for the first time in the Alliance’s history, took a tremendous human and financial toll. By ISAF mission end, well over 1 million NATO troops and civilians had served in theatre along with hundreds of thousands of contractors. Reliable studies conservatively estimate the financial cost to be at least $1 trillion US dollars. Almost 3,500 troops under NATO command from 29 nations paid the ultimate price, and tens of thousands more suffered serious injury. Afghanistan has been a security-related point of discussion and a major part of Western military efforts for almost a fifth of NATO’s existence. By virtually any metric it is the longest, most complex, expensive, challenging and fractious operation in NATO’s history. As a result of the massive NATO and international effort – by any socioeconomic or human development index measure – Afghanistan in 2015 is a considerably better place as a result. That is hardly to say outcomes were optimal, or that NATO helped Afghan government forces decisively defeat the insurgency: they were not, and they did not. A commonly held view is that NATO also ‘lost’ the Afghanistan strategic communication campaign. This report is an effort to deduce what is NATO and ISAF’s score on that point, and if it did not ‘win’ outright then how did Strategic Communications (StratCom) perform? Within the political-military leadership and even within the communications community there are factions of passionate supporters for StratCom and just as many opponents. All seem to agree conceptually of the need for better coordination as long as they are the ‘coordinators’ and not the ‘coordinated’. Throughout ISAF’s duration these factions were often at odds and even as they clashed, the operating and information environment transformed. This should have led to a wholesale re-evaluation of optimal structure, process and capabilities: it did not. Still, as to be expected from the accumulated experience of continuous operations over 11-plus years of the NATO-led ISAF mission, some new capabilities were added that improved how NATO communicated with national domestic audiences including the Media Operations Centre and NATO TV. But the nub of the issues and the old debates – influence versus inform, the public affairs reporting relationship to the commander, measuring effect, how to better synchronise effort – are the same discussions as 5, 10 and even 15 years ago. The current impetus for reform has little to do with lessons learned during ISAF. It does however, have much to do with the Russia/Ukraine crisis. Given the contemporary security environment, the extent to which unsatisfactory campaign outcomes should be attributed to the communication effort is not an inconsequential subject. Today’s information environment bears little resemblance to what it was at the start of the ISAF mission in 2001, in large measure a result of widespread access to reliable Internet, the ubiquity of smart phones, and the global scope and penetration of social media. In the past decade we have transitioned from grasping the implications of the ‘strategic corporal’ to dealing with the operational consequences of the ‘strategic tweet’. Adversaries also became very capable at using new communication tools to their advantage. While it may be unlikely that the Alliance will fight another mission quite like ISAF, many observations can be drawn from ISAF about whether NATO communication-related policy, doctrine, structures and capabilities are fit for purpose in future campaigns. This report offers 12 recommendations where effort and resources might be applied to achieve more favourable outcomes. A North Atlantic Council-approved policy in August 2009 defines NATO StratCom as “the coordinated and appropriate use of NATO communications activities and capabilities ... in support of Alliance policies, operations and activities, and in order to advance NATO’s aims.” Still, the actions and practice during ISAF demonstrate that NATO aspires to achieve more for its strategic communications investment, and that it is increasingly about understanding the desired effect or behavioural change required to shape what to do, say, show and signal to inform, persuade or influence audiences in support of specific objectives. NATO HQs had two strategic communications campaigns to fight during the ISAF operation, the first being for the support of domestic audiences of the 51 troop contributing nations and international audiences. Given the policy hand it was dealt, the manner in which the operation was executed for the better part of a decade, the high operational tempo at NATO and zero nominal growth (thus, downsizing) forced on it by nations, the Alliance communication effort did considerably better than it is given credit for, in particular at NATO HQ in Brussels and Allied Command Operations, and for stretches of time at ISAF. This is a finding that may strike many as counter-intuitive. The second campaign was the operational battle for the contested population and against malign actors including the Taliban. If success is measured against information policy aims: “...create desired effects on the will, understanding and capability of adversaries and potential adversaries” (Information Operations); “to influence perceptions, attitudes and behaviour, affecting the achievement of political and military objectives” (Psychological Operations); and “to inform, persuade, or influence audiences in support of NATO aims and objectives” (StratCom), then the outcomes are decidedly more mixed, if not a failure. A detailed assessment of capability and performance in this report supports the argument that ISAF was a case of a fundamentally flawed political/ command structure that was by its structural nature incapable of devising and directing a unified political-military campaign. The international community brought a sense of hubris to that shattered country which had virtually no licit economy or capacity for effective governance. It set unreasonable objectives, looked for short-term metrics of success, and wholly underresourced the mission for almost 10 years. The strategy often changed, or was confused, or was conflicted. It took few Afghan views into account. No answer could be found to effectively deal with the vexing question of Pakistan where insurgent forces found sanctuary. NATO then proceeded to break or subsume most of the principles of war, foremost being ‘selection and maintenance of the aim’, ‘unity of effort’ and ‘unity of command’. But how fair is that considering Afghanistan was a major international endeavour, that the NATO mission has lasted this long and will continue for the foreseeable future albeit in different form, that support in the country for international forces remains high, and that troop contributing nations have not endured major political recriminations from their populations? Taking a long view, the ISAF communications effort cannot have been a failure. The magnitude of collective effort by NATO nations over that period of time is a considerable expression of Alliance will and stamina. From the political-military centre of gravity perspective of “maintaining the solidarity, cohesion and credibility of the Alliance”, this alone points to a strategic success broadly speaking. This report finds that improved StratCom did not, and does not, temper the effects of bad policy and poor operational execution. In the end, strategic communications outcomes weren’t nearly what they could have been but were considerably better than critics suggest. Where policy and operations were well connected and showed results, StratCom amplified that effect. Where policy and operations were weak, negative outcomes could be mitigated but not overcome. Improving strategic communication effects needs to start with better policy, greater understanding of audiences including motivations, conducting operations following established and successful military principles, and skilled practitioners. In that respect, the weakest link in the Alliance communication effort at strategic, operational and tactical levels was the profound lack of trained, expeditionary communication- and information-related military capability in almost all NATO member nations (excepting the U.S., and perhaps Germany). For NATO to be more effective, nations need to professionalise their approach to communications by abandoning the model of employing ‘willing general service officers eager to learn on the job’ to one that is firmly based on ‘qualified, trained and experienced practitioners in all disciplines at each rank level’. ISAF served as a forcing function for incremental albeit important improvements to NATO communication-related policy, capability and capacity aggregated over more than a decade of continuous operations. However, the transformation of the information environment happened much faster than NATO HQs and member nations were able to evolve their communications-related mindset, structures, capabilities and outputs. The real catalyst for the current effort to make substantive reforms has been Russia’s attack on Ukraine. In this regard the Wales Summit Hybrid Warfare initiatives identified a series of actions that if implemented would be a major upgrade to the Alliance’s ability to compete in the new information environment.

„Bo to jest idealna praca dla mnie!” – motywy aktywizacji zawodowej kobiet poprzez agroturystykę

Author(s): Magdalena Kubal-Czerwińska / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 160/2020

The subject of this study is the process of women’s professional activation, which takes place as a result of undertaking agritourism activities on farms in rural areas of the Polish Carpathians. The main purpose of the article was to determine the motives of women to undertake professional activity in rural tourism. The study included a sample of 70 agritourism farms run or co-run by women in Carpathian rural tourist communes in the Lesser Poland (Małopolska) Voivodeship. Three groups of motives, which guided women while choosing their path of professional activation in agritourism, were distinguished. The basis for undertaking agritourism activities are expected economic benefits and factors arising from the spatial environment of farms such as local hospitality traditions, the level of tourism development, the presence of attractive values for leisure, the traditional village life, and the “internal” factors associated with household and agricultural resources. Equally mportant are the “individualistic” motifs of psychological and social nature – the need to contact other people or be “needed” in the family. The female professional activation in agritourism has not only an economic but also a social and cultural dimension.

„Dar książki dla Wrocławia i Śląska” – powojenne akcje społeczne na rzecz polskich bibliotek w Okręgu II Dolny Śląsk z lat 1945-1948 w świetle wybranych źródeł

Author(s): Aneta Firlej-Buzon / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 1/2021

Poles displaced to the so-called Recovered Territories, organizing here the social life, struggled with the lack of Polish books. An acute shortage was felt by the entire community, especially by children, pupils and students from Wrocław universities rebuild from the ruins. In order to satisfy the hunger for the Polish word and Polish books, there were organized numerous of social campaigns, both nationwide, regional and local. The authors of this campaigns were the central authorities and representatives of the Lower Silesian administration, as well as associations established in the District II, and finally private persons acting in the field of education, culture or entertainment. Books obtained thanks to social campaigns were the beginning of libraries book collections.

„Lietuvos vietovardžių žodynas“. 1 tomas: A–B

Author(s): Vytautas Antanas Vitkauskas / Language(s): Lithuanian / Issue: 60/2009

Review of: „Lietuvos vietovardžių žodynas“. Volume 1: A-B1. Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos institutas, 2009. ISBN 978-9955-704-70-6 (1 tomas), 978-9955-704-71-3 (bendras). Review by: Vytautas Antanas Vitkauskas

„Miasto, w którym los pozwolił mi znaleźć przystań…”. Spacer z pochodniami, 6 czerwca 2018

Author(s): Author Not Specified / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 1-2/2019

„Nowa” tożsamość miejsca 1 w poprzemysłowej Łodzi

Author(s): Jan Wrana / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 1/2010

Łódź owes its development in the XIX century and the fall in the XX century to great industry. The period of transformations in the political system, after the year 1989, was the time of daring attempts to revitalize large buildings providing the chance for reviving the life of the postindustrial city. Architects, the creators of changes in these very buildings, have intuitively preserved the modern context and the observance of the heritage assigned to the place, creating, at the same time, “new” identity of the places.

„Polak w Afryce” o młodych i najmłodszych uchodźcach polskich z ZSRR w Afryce w latach 1943-1945

Author(s): Marek Ney-Krwawicz / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 4/2020

The purpose of the article is to present what and in what form the Polish newspaper Polak w Afryce (Pole in Africa) appearing in Africa in 1943-45 published about the young and youngest Polish refugees from the USSR who reached the African continent. These refugees were located in the countries of British East Africa (i.e. Kenya, Tanganyika, and Uganda), in Norther Rhodesia and Southern Rhodesia as well as in the Union of South Africa. Almost half of the inhabitants of the Polish settlements were young and the youngest children, often orphans or half-orphans, and due to this fact the Polish paper devoted a lot of space to them.

„Pravi dinarci“. Crnogorci, „dalmatinski Zagorci“ i Ličani u antropogeografiji Jovana Cvijića

Author(s): Višeslav Aralica / Language(s): Croatian / Issue: 7/2020

Jovan Cvijić was a Serbian scientist specialized in geology, today famous for his book „the Balkan Peninsula“ written and published in French in 1918. That book has been for decades one of the pivotal books for many historians, ethnographers and ideologists not only among Serbs, but also among other southern Slav’s intellectuals. Key role in „the Balkan Peninsula“ was given to the so called „Dinaric psychic type“, a term forged and used by Cvijić to denote the population of the Dinaric Alps. There have been many critics, particularly those from Croatia, who had emphasized the idealization of those so called „Dinarics“ in Cvijić’s work. The reason for such idealization was seen by those critics in the ideology that served as a foundation for Cvijić’s scientific system. And that ideology was regularly identified as a form of Serbian nationalism, disguised as Yugoslav nationalism. The proof for that was Cvijić’s description and idealization of „Shumadia type/group“, that is the population of the Kingdom of Serbia, in his books in which he presented his anthropology. Those were described by Cvijić as „the best“ among the „Dinaric psychic types“, a type which was seen as „the best“ of all other psychic types of the Southern Slavs. That criticism falls short of truly presenting the complex nature of Cvijić work. Indeed, there is a clear ideological fundament in his scientific system. But to say that his work simply presents the population of the Kingdom of Serbia as „the best of the best“ is oversimplification. The idealization of „Dinarics“ is produced by the reader of Cvijić’s anthropology due to his intentional choice of epic style in describing the „Dinaric psychic type“. But — and here’s the problem for his critics, but also a problem for Cvijić himself — this idealization via epic style is not the same in all of the groups belonging to the „Dinaric psychic type“. That epic style is prevalent in the description of the groups of Old Montenegro, Lika and Dalmatian Hinterland (Zagora), and for the reader of his „the Balkan Peninsula“ they are clearly „the best of the best“ — that is, the groups that present the „Dinaric psychic type“ in its clearest form.

„Sztuka parkowania” – wykorzystanie parkingów Kampusu 600-lecia Odnowienia Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego w kontekście polityki zrównoważonej mobilności

Author(s): Grzegorz Bubak,Andrzej Jabłoński,Jakub Biesaga / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 163/2020

Sustainable mobility is one of the most current challenges of contemporary spatial planning, which focuses also on parking policy. Keeping balance between the demand and supply of parking space as well as using those in public space is under debate in many cities. The goal of the research was to evaluate the efficiency of parking policy on the 3rd Jagiellonian University Campus in Krakow. For five days, at three fixed times, the occupancy level of parking spaces was measured, and the obtained results were analyzed, which helped Authors to propose a number of spatial and organizational solutions. For a better understanding of the source of the problems, photographical documentation was made and unstructured interviewing was conducted. The Authors came to a conclusion that the parking space resources are used ineffectively despite the fact that the number of parking spots exceeds the demand of users. The obtain ed results were discussed in relation to the experiences of other universities in the country and in the world. The main idea of the article is to look at the university as an institution with special social responsibility in the implementation of solutions ensuring sustainable mobility.

„Tak oto ożywamy, tak, tak, tak”. Szkic o Agacie Harz

Author(s): Justyna Szklarczyk / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 02/2021

A biographical outline devoted to the urban traditional singer Agata Harz. The text is an attempt to answer the questions: How is it possible that a singer with proper anthropological sensitivity undertakes the performance of traditional songs, in which misogyny and xenophobia are omnipresent? How does she define the songs? What strategies does she adopt towards them? To what extent does she transform them? How does she understand the gesture of performing traditional songs today? And can Agata Harz’s work and practice have a transgressive potential? The text also constitutes a missing element of the history of Polish traditional music circles, and more broadly, of the history of past and present traditional singers.

„Ten biedny Itek! Taki zblazowany! Pozuje!” Gombrowicz jako pozer

Author(s): Ewa Kobyłecka-Piwońska / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 6/2020

Kobyłecka-Piwońska discusses Argentinian interpretations of Gombrowicz’s work that refer to notions of posing. She begins by outlining the history of simulation as an illness and as a strategy of assimilation applied by immigrants in Argentina. Next she analyses passages in the Diary, using the notion of the pose as an attitude to life and as a narrative strategy. The article concludes with an analysis of Gombrowicz’s Wędrówki po Argentynie[Travels in Argentina], where both Polish and Argentine nationality, presented throughthe lens of exotism, appear as a pose.

„Trzy kobiety i biblioteka”. Warszawska Biblioteka Wzorowa dla dzieci i jej kierowniczki (1927-2004)

Author(s): Grażyna Lewandowicz-Nosal / Language(s): English,Polish / Issue: 2/2020

The Warsaw Model Library for Children, opened in Warsaw in November 1927, is one of the best-known institutions of this type in Poland. Its organization and methods of work have served, according to the name, as an organizational model of other children’s libraries. However, the library is not only a place and collections but also people – librarians. The article presents the characters of three managers of this library and their contribution to the development of such a single institution and its impact on the nationwide network of public libraries for children. The character and activity of the organizer and the first manager of the library Maria Gutry, then Zofia Wędrychowska-Papuzińska, and Sława Łabanowska, a long-time first post-war library manager, will be discussed. The fate of the library itself is the background to present their activity. The available biographical materials and archival documents collected in the library will be referred to.

„Volte své jedy!“ K problematice vztahu trampské subkultury k alkoholu a krčemnému prostředí

Author(s): Karel Altman / Language(s): Czech / Publication Year: 0

Although the need to compensate life in the rush and buzz of the city made its numerous inhabitants seek quiet recreation outdoors, some of them sought recreation as well as excitement, whose source were adventures inspired by their ideas of the Wild West. In the past century, its heroes, real or fictional, have become the symbols of the bearers of a distinctive and unique subculture called tramping, popular exclusively in Czechia (and partly Slovakia). In spite of the unique lifestyle, tramps could not do outdoors without refreshment, food and drink, which were provided by taverns and pubs in villages and secluded places near their campsites. Those businesses that proved successful and effective from the perspective of our tramps and men of prairies became known as tramp taverns. It was mainly there, especially during various excesses, that their god, Pajda, had to stand by them.

„WALKA Z TERRORYZMEM”. DOŚWIADCZENIE PRAKTYK PAŃSTWOWYCH W REPUBLICE DAGESTANU W LATACH 2005-2014

Author(s): Iwona Kaliszewska / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 1/2015

Daghestan is the most unstable republic in the North Caucasus, Russian Federation. There is an ongoing conflict between power structures who aim to ‘fight terrorism’ and Islamic militants who strive to create an Islamic State in the North Caucasus. What is the local meaning of the term ‘fighting terrorism’? Who are the local ‘Wahhabis’? How do Daghestani inhabitants experience state practices disguised under the official ‘fighting terrorism’? What is their perception of the state dealings? I show how the meanings of the terms ‘fighting terrorism’ and ‘Wahhabis’ have changed throughout the last decade in Daghestan. From my research I conclude that after 2009 the local ‘fighting terrorism’ has been perceived as the source of violence, while a ‘Wahhabi’ has become a scapegoat, persecuted for a certain set of features. I also analyse the relation between experiences of the local state practices and the more general perceptions of the state dealings. While the local ‘fighting terrorism’ has been criticised and deconstructed, the same cannot be said about its media representation. The ‘rational’ dimension of the state has been locally deconstructed, while the ‘magical’ mode remained persuasive and did not seem to be threatened by the deconstruction.

„Warszawa jest przecież tęczowa”. Obraz przestrzeni miasta w autodziecięcych tekstach kultury nagrodzonych w konkursie varsavianistycznym Muzeum Warszawy

Author(s): Grzegorz Leszczyński / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 1/2021

The analysis of works submitted by elementary and secondary school students to the writing competition organised by the Museum of Warsaw shows that child authors reproduce schematic depictions of the city space, present in guidebooks and on the internet, while avoiding everything that is oriented towards its young and youngest inhabitants and tourists. This results, on the one hand, from the fact that Warsaw inhabitants themselves have no knowledge of places attractive to children and, on the other, from the desire of child authors to adjust their works to the hypothetical expectations of the adult jury. This second reason also results in an overload of facts as well as historical and topographical details. Child authors are not inspired by contemporary literature directed at them, by writers who want to grow up not to be their readers’ teachers, but to be children.