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About Me

People in the borderlands constitute an issue that has fascinated me for years, namely those forcibly removed from their own homelands and migrants looking for better living conditions, crossing many borders, both geographic and mental. I seek to tell their stories, to embed them in a broader context, to understand them and draw conclusions.

My Post-doc project [habilitation] was a study on forced migration and cultural appropriation of the Oder region 1945-1948. It was completed at the European University Viadrina in Frankfurt (Oder) and resulted in a publication of the book “Poland’s Wild West”, which received the Identities Prize 2016 for the best historical book in Poland.

The result of the project „Changing borders / moving people. Constructions of identity by migrants from Eastern to Western Europe and to the USA in the 20th Century” is my book: Life in the Borderlands. Z. Anthony Kruszewski. A Biography.

My current research project is about Polish Women in the USA.
Émigré Biographies from Wartime Europe and Postwar America. It is supported by Kosciuszko Foundation and deals in the first step with the biography by Danuta Mostwin.

Recent Publications

Books

• Borderlans Biography. Anthony Kruszewski in Wartime Europe and Postwar America. Publisher: Brill | Schöningh, Paderborn 2021 (Polish edition: Warszawa 2019).
• Polish Wild West. Forced Migration and Cultural Appropriation in the Polish-German Borderlands, 1945-1948. Routledge 2020. (Polish edition: Krakow 2015, German edition: Paderborn 2013).
• Beata Halicka (ed): Mój dom nad Odrą. Pamiętniki osadników Ziem Zachodnich po 1945 roku. TAWPN Universitas, Kraków 2016 (German edition: Paderborn 2014).
• Beata Halicka, Bogusław Mykietów (eds): Kozaky – Pyrehne. Polen, Deutsche und Ukrainer auf dem Erinnerungspfad erzwungener Migrationen / Kozaki – Pyrzany. Polifonia pamięci o przymusowych migracjach we wspomnieniach Polaków, Niemców i Ukraińców. Wydawnictwo Instytutowe, Skórzyn 2011.
• Karl Schlögel, Beata Halicka (eds.): Oder-Odra. Blicke auf einen europäischen Strom. Peter Lang Verlag, Frankfurt (Main) 2007 (Polish edition 2008).
• Krosno Odrzanskie / Crossen an der Oder 1005 – 2005. Wspólne dziedzictwo kultury / Das gemeinsame Kulturerbe. Wydawnictwo Instytutowe, Skórzyn 2005, 2009.
• Zur Rezeption der Gedichte von Wisława Szymborska in Deutschland. Logos Verlag, Berlin 2002 (in Polish 2005).

Selection of chapters in books and journal articles

• Multikulturaliät als Notwendigkeit? Litauen, Lettland und Estland auf dem Weg zu Neukonstruktionen von nationaler Identität, in: H.-J. Bömelburg and I. Surynt (eds.): Wer hat Angst vor Multikulturalität? Erfahrungen und Vorstellungen in der deutschen und polnischen Kultur. Marek Zybura zum 65. Geburtstag. Harrassowitz Verlag Wiesbaden 2022, p. 181-194;
• Człowiek pogranicza i nestor badań nad granicami – Zbigniew A. Kruszewski w Polsce i na emigracji, „Studia Migracyjne -Przegląd Polonijny” nr 3 (185)/2022, p. 139-161. DOI 10.4467/25444972SMPP.22.025.16726
• Pour notre et votre liberté /For Your Freedom and Ours. Polish refugees of war as soldiers and resistance fighters in Western Europe. In: Nuova Antologia Militare, Rome, Anno 2 – Fascicolo Speciale, September 2021, p. 305-332 DOI: 10.36158/978889295270622
• The Uprooted Ones – Lemkos in Galicia and Abroad, in: COPERNICO History and Cultural Heritage in Eastern Europe https://www.copernico.eu/de/themenbeitraege/die-entwurzelten-lemken-galizien-und-der-fremde

• Euroregion Pomerania, in: Critical Dictionary on Borders, Cross-Broder Cooperation and European Integration. Edited by Birte Wassenberg and Bernard Reitel. Peter Lang, Bruxells 2020, p. 429-434, DOI: https://doi.org/10.3726/b15774
• Kulturowe oswajanie przestrzeni, in: E. Opiłowska a.o. (eds.): Studia nad granicami i pograniczami. Leksykon. Wydawnictwo Naukowe Scholar Warszawa 2020, s. 184-189 https://leksykon.granice.uni.wroc.pl/Artykuly/Kulturowe-oswajanie-przestrzeni
• O rozterkach biografki, czyli jak opowiedzieć o życiu na pograniczach, in: Autobiografia”. Literatura. Kultura. Media nr 1(12) 2019, p. 179-194.
• The Kresy in Polish Memory. Between Lost Arcadia and the Bloodlands of East-Central Europe, in: Anne Bazin, Catherine Perron (): How to Address the Loss? Forced Migrations, Lost Territories and Related Politics of History. A Comparative Approach. P.I.E Peter Lang, Bruxells 2018, p. 109 – 134.
• Polish-German Border: a Laboratory of Transnational Cooperation, in: Wassenberg, Birte (ed.): Castle Talks on Cross-Border Cooperation. Fear of Integration? The Pertinence of the Border. Franz Steiner Verlag Stuttgart 2018, p. 305-320.
• Beata Halicka, Matthias Diefenbach: Neumark/Ostbrandenburg/Ziemia Lubuska, in: Online-Lexikon zur Kultur und Geschichte der Deutschen im östlichen Europa, 2018. URL: ome-lexikon.uni-oldenburg.de/p38427
• The Everyday Life of Children in Polish-German Borderland during the Early Postwar Period, in: M. Venken (ed.): Borderland Studies Meets Child Studies. An European Encounter. Peter Lang Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2017, p. 117-138. https://www.peterlang.com/view/product/25747?format=EPDF
• Od biskupstwa do województwa. Spacer ulicami Lubusza [Lebus] w poszukiwaniu korzeni Ziemi Lubuskiej, in: Marta J. Bąkiewicz (ed.): Lubuski Palimpsest. W kręgu kultury i literatury polsko-niemieckiego pogranicza. Zielona Góra 2017, p. 27-42.
• From Slaves to Settlers in the Polish ‘Wild West’: the End of the Second World War from the Perspective of Forced Labourers, in: Wege, Orte und Räume der NS-Verfolgung. Jahrbuch des International Tracing Service 2016/05, p. 148-159.
• Die deutsch-polnische Nachbarschaft im Prozess der Transformation. Aspekte der gesellschaftlichen Beziehung in: U. Bretschneider a.o. (eds.): Verordnete Nachbarschaften. Transformationsprozesse im deutsch-polnisch-tschechischen Grenzraum seit dem Zweiten Weltkrieg. w.e.b. Universitätsverlag Dresden 2016, p. 47-58.
• The Oder-Neisse Line as a place of remembrance for Germans and Poles. In: Journal of Contemporary History (JCH) 2014, Vol. 49(1) pp. 75–91.

Media Coverage

Social Media

Country Focus

Poland, Germany, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, USA, Canada

Expertise by Geography

Eastern Europe, Germany, North America

Expertise by Chronology

Modern

Expertise by Topic

Human Rights, Local & Regional, Migration & Immigration, Museums, Public History, Women, World War II