Can The Pushed-Back Speak? Tracing Narrative Agency of Enemised and Victimised Migrants in Poland

Author(s): Mateusz Krępa,Nasim Ahamed Mondal / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2023

The pushed-back migrants are the main subjects of the humanitarian crisis on the Belarusian-Polish border; however their presence as public discourse producers are rather scarce. The aim of this research is to trace the narrative agency of these people and explore its link to their emancipation. Drawing on the postcolonial theory, we address the question of how the subaltern(ised) subjects produce their discourse. With the analysis of media content, literature, and artistic materials, we argue that the discourse production of pushed-back migrants in Poland is heavily limited, restricted, and often interrupted, however they manifest agency by manoeuvring victimisation and contesting the enemisation of themselves. Using these results, we conclude that the researcher’s role during this crisis should be a mix of translation and representation of what the pushed-back said and were forbidden to say.

Is a Woman a Better Refugee Than a Man? Gender Representations of Refugees in the Polish Public Debate

Author(s): Natalia Bloch / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2023

Within the framework of global mobility regimes, some bodies are encouraged to move while others are pushed back. Nation-states create control mechanisms to block those who are “undesirable”. Apart from political utility, the colour of the bodies is indicated by the critics as the main criterion of division. However, one more important dimension that intersects with race here is the gender of these bodies. A woman fits the figure of an ideal victim better due to the nationalist patterns of femininity: she is vulnerable, submissive, and deprived of agency. Contrary to a man: his duty in the context of war is to remain in his homeland and fight for it. A man who does not do that, seeking asylum in Europe, is morally doubtful: he is a migrant posing a threat to “our” prosperity and security. This is how people crossing the Polish-Belarusian border are presented to public opinion and contrasted with female Ukrainian refugees. The article offers a critical analysis of gender representations of refugees in the Polish public debate through the prism of postcolonial theory, demonstrating that gendered and racialised colonial discourses underpin rationalisations about who has and who does not have a right to be a refugee.

Belarus’s Coercive Engineered Migration Case of 2021–2022: Categorisation of State Media Narratives

Author(s): Andrei Yeliseyeu / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2023

This study deploys a narrative analysis of stories on the topic of the so-called migration crisis on the EU-Belarus border published on the website of the key Belarusian publishing house Belarus Segodnya between the 1st of June 2021 and the 31st of March 2022. The key eleven narratives were deconstructed through a close engagement with and interpretation of over 1,500 topical publications. The ongoing humanitarian crisis at the EU-Belarus border which peaked in late 2021 followed from the Belarusian regime’s attempt to attain foreign policy goals, foremost the suspension of EU sanctions. The study applies the concept of coercive engineered migration proposed by Kelly Greenhill and finds that the content of most identified narratives fits Greenhill’s predictions that coercing actors focus on manipulating the ability and willingness of targeted states to accept groups of migrants and that challengers tend to impose hypocrisy costs on targets to increase coercive power. The analysis suggests that some of the major state media narratives fit into two groups of coercing strategies proposed by Greenhill while others can be accommodated in the category related to hypocrisy costs. These “blame shifting” narratives cast full responsibility for the origin and persistence of the migrant crisis on the targeted actors. An additional “triggering catastrophe” category is proposed which includes narratives which project cataclysms for the targeted actors and high cost of not hosting migrants for them.

(Non)responsibility for Refugees – Communicating about the Belarusian-Polish Border (2021–2023)

Author(s): Lidia Zessin-Jurek / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2023

Given that two dramatically different refugee regimens have developed along Poland’s eastern border, this essay explores the social conditions and discourses that facilitate such a radically different treatment of people. The Polish state’s violation of human rights on the Belarusian section of the border and the celebration of these rights on its Ukrainian section have become part of media spectacles. This text analyses both the technical and content-related issues of communication about migrants and refugees from the Global South. It includes typologies of attributional biases in the media towards people on the move, discusses their functions and the ways towards a normalisation of violence. The final section historicises the current negative responses to refugees and sets them in the wider context of the uneasy obligations imposed on the “West” by its professed values. In doing so, this essay touches upon questions not only of a sense of social responsibility, but also of actual responsibility for the people who have died in Polish forests and rivers.

Wojna i konflikt w cyberprzestrzeni. Piąty teatr wojny

Author(s): Maciej Heromiński / Language(s): Polish Issue: 30/2024

The aim of this article is to present the genesis and typology of cyberspace and the threats that result from activities carried out in this area by state and non-state entities. The basic concepts, especially cyberspace, which is treated as a potential new theater of war, have been systematized. It was also presented the characteristics of the studied phenomenon from the point of view of using it to carry out destructive activities in the digital space and in the real world. Cyberspace is becoming an area for carrying out effective activities that serve to neutralize the enemy in a short time and with little effort. To prove his theses, the author uses numerous examples from the actual international relations, such as: the cyberwarfare in Estonia, the Israeli-American operations against Iranian ICT systems and the cyber-clashes between the United States of America and China.

Challenging ‘Leftist Big Tech’ through Right-wing Alternative Social Media: Parler and Albicla in Polish Conservative Media Discourse

Author(s): Szymon Wigienka / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2023

Numerous “free speech” platforms have been launched in recent years as a form of protest against content moderation practices on mainstream social media. This paper asks the question of how the issue of these emerging right-wing alternative social media is discursively constructed, taking as an example the Polish conservative media debate over the American service Parler and its Polish equivalent Albicla. Taking a critically discursive approach, the article provides an analysis of the discursive strategies applied, and critically embeds the findings in the broader socio-political context, as well as in the alternative media theory. The results show that, drawing on the wartime rhetoric and numerous references to Poland’s non-democratic past, the discourse creates a populist narrative of identity conflict between two opposing groups: “them” – hostile “leftists” seeking to impose a radical, progressive social order and “us” – oppressed protectors of freedom and common-sense values. The study additionally indicates that the issue is also utilised for the purposes of rivalry between domestic right-wing factions. Furthermore, the data contains frequent reference to issues of political economy and thus, intriguingly, overlaps to some extent with left-wing media critique, in that both agree on the necessity of contesting a monopolised media market and developing alternative means of communication.

Kultura opozycyjna. Między jurodiwymi a instytucjonalizacją

Author(s): Roman Bäcker / Language(s): Polish Issue: 15/2023

The aim of this text is to create a conceptual apparatus (a categorial grid) that would make it possible to explain all possible manifestations of oppositional culture in autocratic regimes. I distinguish two basic understandings of oppositional culture: social and domain-specific. The first is the totality of disapproval attitudes towards an autocratic political regime. The latter includes all manifestations of artistic creativity that are critical of the existing political regime. I distinguish three basic typologies of opposition cultures in the latter sense due to the following criteria: organizational shape, place of artistic expression and levels of negation of a given regime. The first typology concerning the organizational shape allows for the differentiation of opposition culture entities due to their numbers and the strength of social bonds created while performing this social role. The second typology makes it possible to define the space of freedom for the subjects of the opposition culture, and the third one – the level of refutation of a given political system.

„Rząd rządzi – partia kieruje – naród głoduje”, czyli marsze głodowe z 1981 roku

Author(s): Grzegorz Majchrzak / Language(s): Polish Issue: 15/2023

Despite the introduction in 1981 of a meat and processed meat ration card, the supply situation in Poland was deteriorating, with stores dreading empty shelves. It became impossible to buy even basic products. This, in turn, affected public sentiment and increased the frustration of Poles, especially women. It also led – in July of that year – to a new form of protest, the so-called hunger marches. They were a way of demonstrating discontent without stopping work, organizing strikes, which would not only not improve the situation, but could even make it worse, and would also allow the PRL authorities to hold Solidarity responsible for the dire supply situation. The loudest and largest hunger marches were organized in Lodz. In the following weeks, they were also held in many other cities. An end was put to these unusual street protests (involving mainly women, often with children) by the union›s authorities – the National Coordinating Commission, which in August 1981 appealed to refrain from organizing further marches and other protests (including strikes) and declared that it would do everything it could “to lead the country out of the crisis”.

ГЕОГРАФСКО РАЗПРОСТРАНЕНИЕ НА ВЪЗРОЖДЕНСКИТЕ АРХИТЕКТУРНО-ЕТНОГРАФСКИ КОМПЛЕКСИ В ПЛАНИНСКИТЕ И ПОЛУПЛАНИНСКИТЕ РАЙОНИ НА БЪЛГАРИЯ

Author(s): Maria Grozeva,Nadezhda IlIeva / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 11/2015

National Revival architectural and ethnographic complexes and sites are an essential part of Bulgarian national culture. The aim of this study was to analyze the spatial concentration of the main reserves and complexes of this type in the mountainous and hilly areas of the country. To achieve this aim are used cartographic and comparative geographic method (Arc GIS 92) and historical approach. As a result, a map of these sites is geographically identified cultural and historical localizations and major axes of the monuments of this age. An architectural and historical assessment of their importance for cultural tourism is done.

МЕНХИРИ В БЪЛГАРИЯ И НА БАЛКАНИТЕ – ПРОБЛЕМИ И НАЛИЧНОСТ

Author(s): Lyubomir Tsonev / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 14/2017

The present study deals with a specific type of megalithic monuments – with menhirs in Bulgaria and on the Balkan Peninsula. At the beginning, some important methodological issues are discussed: definitions of megalithic sites in general and menhirs in particular – individual as well as grouped in various sets. Then information about menhirs on Bulgarian territory from the end of XIX till the beginning of XXI century is collected and presented in detail. Individual menhirs, menhir rows and cromlechs from North-East and South-East Bulgaria are described. They are compared with similar sites on Crimea Peninsula and in South Ireland. In this sense, Bulgarian megalithic area represents a significant transition region from West European and Mediterranean megalithic world in east direction towards the big Black sea megalithic arc: Balkan Peninsula – Crimea – Caucasus – Armenian Mountains Zangezur. The main methodological problem discussed here is the formal resemblance between prehistoric menhirs and medieval Islamic tombstones. Turkish researchers assert that nearly 2,000 orthostats registered in the area between Edirne and Lalapasha are menhirs and significantly differ from Islamic tombstones. Within the limits of Europe, this problem occurs only on the Balkan Peninsula and – if neglected – it can distort the overall picture of megalitism in the whole region. After a critical review of a number of similar sites in northeastern Bulgaria and Rhodope Mountains, this report comes to the opposite conclusion: The Edirne orthostats are most probably abandoned medieval Muslim gravestones and not prehistoric megaliths – menhirs.

ДЕВТАШЛАРИТЕ КРАЙ ПЛИСКА – ПРЕДЛОЖЕНИЕ ЗА РЕИНТЕРПРЕТАЦИЯ

Author(s): Lyubomir Tsonev / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 14/2017

The devtashlari are numerous objects of megalithic character. The official opinion interprets them as proto-Bulgarian monuments which are created in VII–VIII cent. AD. The author examines the devtashlari in two contexts. Compared with the early Christian architectural monuments of Byzantine 122 origin in Bulgarian lands (IV–VI cent. AD) as well as with the temples in the old Bulgarian capitals Pliska and Preslav (built in IX–X cent. AD) the devtashlari appear as extremely primitive objects. The official interpretation is shown to be impossible from the point of view of a normal architectural evolution. On the contrary, the devtashlari find their adequate place among the numerous monuments of rock-cut and megalithic character in Bulgaria originating from III–II millenium BC. So the present analysis gives a more convincing dating and interpretation of the devtashlari. The devtashlari are in fact classic menhirs. Some of them are grouped in rectangular grids exactly like the famous menhirs in Menec, Brittany, France. Such specific grouping happens very rarely in the megalithic world. The mechanical treatment of the devtashlari and the state of their surface are also identical with the Menec menhirs.

АРХЕОАСТРОНОМИЯ И АРХЕОУРБАНИСТИКА – ОБЩ ПОГЛЕД И НЯКОИ ПРОБЛЕМИ

Author(s): Lyubomir Tsonev / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 14/2017

This study aims to clarify numerous interdisciplinary problems that arise at the interface between arhаeo-astronomy and ancient Roman Urbanism. The general scheme of a Roman city as well as its concrete implementation in the new cities built during the territorial expansion of Ancient Rome is described. The author discusses in detail various situations where it is possible to make mistakes in interpreting the street system orientation of the Roman cities. Referred to are those weaknesses in the description and publication of archaeological sites that do not allow adequate and reliable archaeoastronomical analysis. All the published data about the street orientation in Roman cities in Bulgaria are collected and presented here for the first time. Several classical Roman cities in Bulgaria are commented that have inherited earlier Thracian or Roman settlements (Ulpia Escus, Serdica, Philipopol, Seuthopolis).

АНТИЧНИЯТ АНСАМБЪЛ СТЪЛПИЩЕ, РУСЕНСКО – ЕЛЕМЕНТ ОТ ТРАКО-ФРИГИЙСКАТА КОНТАКТНА ЗОНА

Author(s): Lyubomir Tsonev / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 14/2017

The locality Stalpishte / Dikili-tash (Russe) presents a combination of natural and historical objects which have a noticeable cultural and touristic potential. The present study collects all the data concerning the historical monuments from the Late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages including photographs and original descriptions. An interpretative analysis is proposed of two monuments in the locality Stalpishte / Dikili-tash: (1) a rock reflief of a horseman and (2) a cave sanctuary crowned with a rock-graved pediment. The figure of the horseman has a Thracian origin, but its rock-cut representations have been spread over the whole Thracian-Phrygian region in Roman times. The Thracian horseman is depicted on the reliefs in various compositions (the hunter-god Heros, the war-god Ares, the local king possessing a god-dignity etc.) but always in the frames of the thracian mythology infiltrated into Phrygia. The cave sanctuary with a rock-cut pediment is a more complicated object. Rock temples and graves are created in Thracia as well as in Phrygia. Pediments are also widely used in both regions. Pediments graved over rock (or cave) temples or over rock facades are a typically Phrygian phenomenon. In this sense the rock sanctuary in Stalpishte / Dikili-tash is unique on the Balkan peninsula, i.e. for the Thracian area, and it has been built possibly in Roman times under the influence of the Phrygian architecture. However, the pediment over the cave sanctuary in Stalpishte / Dikili-tash contains a typical Thracian element – four graved trapezoidal niches which are known in the East Rhodope Mountain (i.e. in Thrace) only. We can conclude that the monuments in Stalpishte / Dikili-tash (Russe) demonstrate in an very impressing and convincing way the cultural interactions between Thracia and Phrygia in Roman times.

ОБРАЗУВАНЕ НА БЪДЕЩЕ ВРЕМЕ С ЧАСТИЦА „И“ В ГОВОРИ ОТ СРЕДНОГОРИЕТО, СТРАНДЖА-САКАР И БЕСАРАБИЯ

Author(s): Vasil Kondov,Ivan G. Iliev / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 16/2019

This article traces the use of the future particle i/j ‘shall, will’ in Bulgarian dialects spoken in the region of the Sredna Gora to Middle Northern Bulgaria, in South-Eastern Bulgaria, and in Bessarabia. The authors argue that this phenomenon is one of the characteristic features of the socalled Chijshij Bulgarian dialects in Bessarabia and that, in them, it is inherited from the dialects in the region of Sredna Gora which is the land of origin of the above-mentioned Bulgarian dialects in Bessarabia.

БЕЛЕЖКИ ЗА ФОРМИТЕ НА ДВЕ БЪДЕЩИ ВРЕМЕНА В БЪЛГАРСКИЯ ПРЕСЕЛНИЧЕСКИ ГОВОР В УЗУНКьОПРЮЙСКО

Author(s): Ivan G. Iliev,Petko Petkov / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 16/2019

This article discusses future tense particles in a Bulgarian dialect spoken in European Turkey (in the villages around the towns of Uzunköprü and Babaeski). The dialect is spoken by Muslim Bulgarians who left Bulgaria at the end of the 19th century or later. Most of them originate from Middle Northern Bulgaria but some of them have come to this place from Northern Greece and have mixed with the others. There is a variety of future tense particles in the dialect under consideration: ša, sa, za, ža ‘shall, will’. The authors show examples of the use of the above mentioned particles and draw conclusions about their origin in the dialect analyzed.

ПО ПЪТЯ НА СРЕБЪРНИЯ ЧЕРПАК ОТ СТРУГА ПРЕЗ СОФИЯ ДО АНХИАЛО

Author(s): Ana Kocheva / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 19/2021

АРТИСТЪТ ОТБЛИЗО, АРТИСТЪТ НАДАЛЕЧ

Author(s): Vladimir Atanasov / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 19/2021

БЪЛГАРСКИТЕ ОБЩНОСТНИ ОРГАНИЗАЦИИ В ЧУЖБИНА В УСЛОВИЯТА НА ПАНДЕМИЯ

Author(s): Vladimir Penchev,Anelia Avdzhieva,Tanya Matanova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 19/2021

Results from an online research and observations of Bulgarian migrant communities’ organizations within and outside Europe due to Covid-19 pandemic. Main pillars are the 123 connections with the homeland, the hosting country, and with the local community, mechanisms for support, as well as forms of activities, festivity, and communal consolidation.

Проф. д.ф.н. Албена Георгиева-Ангелова (1954–2024)

Author(s): Mariyanka Borisova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 1/2024

In memoriam

Проф. д-р Магдалена Елчинова (1962–2024)

Author(s): Valentina Ganeva-Raycheva / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 1/2024

In memoriam