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SCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE TO AMERICANS OF POLISH DESCENT It is with great excitement that the University of Washington Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures is announcing the launch of the annual UW Polish Studies Scholarships for the UW students interested in studies in Poland between June 2008 and May 2009. The scholarships are offered by the UW Polish Studies Endowment Committee and were made possible by the generosity of supporters and friends of the UW Polish Studies.
Priority will be given to students traveling to Poland to study the Polish language, but support may be also provided to students who would like to pursue other aspects of Polish studies.
Awards of up to $1500 will be offered toward airfare, lodging and/or tuition for students enrolled in an accredited program in Poland.
To apply submit the following required materials: 1. a 2-page essay, in which you explain your intended academic plans and how these funds will assist you (double-spaced, 12 font (Courier, Arial or Times New Roman), with 1-inch margins on all sides; 2. a budget outlining your expenses; 3. one faculty letter of support; 4. an unofficial copy of your transcript.
Applications are due March 2, 2008. A decision will be made by April 6, 2008.
Please send application materials to: Shosh Westen Slavic Department, Box 353580 University of Washington Seattle, WA 98195-3580
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Artur Grabowski, Ph.D., is the 2007/08 Polish Studies Fulbright Scholar at the University of Washington. Professor Grabowski is an Associate Professor at the Department of 20th Century Polish Literature at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow. In 2004/5 and 2005/6 academic years he was a Visiting Professor at the Department of Slavic and Baltic Literatures and Languages at University of Illinois at Chicago. During the winter and spring quarters at the University of Washington, Professor Grabowski, a specialist in Modern Polish and Comparative Literature and Theater, will give the following courses:
Winter Quarter 2008
POLSH 320 (SLN 16897): Modern Polish Poetry – Philosophy in Verses; T Th 12:30-2:20; location TBA; 5 credits
The aim of this course is to present general knowledge of post-war Polish poetry in its political, cultural, and religious context. The course consists of lectures, readings, and oral reports prepared by the students. Taught by a visiting Polish scholar and poet, the course will help students understand how poetry from Poland was able to transform the unique Polish historical experience into the universal human experience. Do not expect aesthetics transformed into political studies; instead of pretentious “social issues,” the course will stress the “art of reading” with its traditional conviction that a good poem is worth reading despite trendy journalistic interest in the country where a popular pope was born and where the working-class unanimously rejected inhabiting the camp so carefully designed for them. Therefore, it may not be an accident that Polish poetry of the last several decades was widely read in English speaking countries. Many acclaimed masters – Seamus Heaney, Charles Simic, W.S. Merwin, and Mark Strand, among others – declared that poets like Milosz, Herbert, or Rozewicz influenced their creative writing.
Since the poems will be read in English, the course would also serve students of comparative literature. We will try to find poems from literatures other than Polish (including American) to read them in tandem.
Depending on the number of participants, the course will require a mid-term paper or students will be asked to prepare a summary of a collection of essays (chosen from suggested books) in the form of an oral presentation, and also to draw up a thesis for class discussion. The final paper will be in the form of an essay (approximately 6-8 pages) and be an original interpretation of a poem (one or more) of the student’s choice. Course grade will be determined by the paper submitted by the student and his/her significant participation. There will be no final exam.
Website: www.grabowski.art.pl
Spring Quarter 2008
SISRE 590b : The Ironic Hero: In Search of Self-Definition in Modern Polish Literature and Film; T Th 11:30-1:20; (location TBA)
This course examines the modern Polish mentality, focusing on the intersection of forms and popular symbols in the culture and daily life of Poles as expressed in language, social rituals, economic practices, and other readable proofs of self-created identity. To explore what “Polishness” is now, we will look back on what it was, peering into the tradition that shaped and justified, or at least influenced, its present.
From reading modern literature and watching films produced in the last several decades, we will learn from social and historical points of view and anthropological perspectives. Throughout our inquisitive study and engaging discussions, we will constantly turn our attention to the imaginary figure of the “Polish Intellectual” as a self-appointed hero of current Polish culture. Devoting our first class to the introduction of the romantic origin of the “hero,” we will later concern ourselves with the hero’s 20th century revisionists and followers. Finally, the main theme of the course will lead us to the most horrible but also surprisingly funniest part, the long-lasting effort of Polish spiritual leaders to create, often caricatured but at least appropriate, a portrait of their subjects. Dealing with the period of Communist power and changes brought about by its demise, students will have the unique opportunity to observe the process of cultural self-definition of a Central European nation in its comedies and dramas of rare mastery.
Themes for particular classes will be drawn from the marvelous poems of Zbigniew Herbert and Czeslaw Milosz, the sarcastic tragicomedies of Slawomir Mrozek, and the famous novels of Witold Gombrowicz, together with the contemporary movies of Wajda, Zanussi, and Kieslowski.
No final exam; final and mid-term essays will be required instead.
Website:
www.grabowski.art.pl you are visiting www.PolishStudiesUW.org, the website of Polish Studies at the University of Washington Endowment Committee
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Distinguished
Polish Speakers' Series
POLSH 405/SLN 16898: SECOND-YEAR POLISH; MWF; 12:30 - 2:20; 5 credits Instructor: K. Dziwirek
SLAV 490 /SLN 17455A: WOMEN IN CINEMA; T Th 2:30 - 4:20; 5 credits (VLPA) Instructor: G. Crnkovic
EURO 302: Eastern European Politics & Society I&S, TTh 1:30-3:20; LOW 118; 5 credits Instructor: A.
Cirtautas
HSTEU 552
History of Eastern Europe: 1939 to the Present; T
3:30-5:20; BLM 308; 5 credits
POLS 460:
Political Economy of the
European Union; TTh 1:30-3:20; PAR 212; 5
credits
ECON 475: Economics of the European Union; MW 12:30-2:20;
5 credits HOME | About Us |How to Contact Us |How to Contribute | Distinguished Polish Speakers' Series
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It is truly amazing to behold creation, to see something arise out of nothing thanks to the good will and generosity of a community. It is hard to believe that five years ago the UW Polish Studies Endowment Committee (UW PSEC) did not exist and it is amazing to contemplate how much we have accomplished since 2002. April 2002 saw our first outreach event at the University of Washington: Tom Podl’s presentation on “Colors of Identity: Discovering Polish Heritage through Art”. The same year we received two sizable grants from Simpson Center for the Humanities and from Arts and Sciences Exchange Program to organize, during the next two academic years, an outreach speaker series entitled “50 Years of Polish at the UW: Celebrating Polish-American Heritage”. The series was also supported by smaller grants from the Polish Home Association, Polish Home Ladies’ Auxiliary, University of Washington Slavic, History and Jewish Studies Departments, the REECAS Program, and the Seattle Public Library. In 2004 a very generous gift from Izabella and Andrzej Turski enabled us to continue the series, now known as Distinguished Polish Speakers’ Series, for the next three following years and beyond: Leszek Balcerowicz is scheduled to inaugurate the 2007/08 Series with a lecture next October. One look at the impressive list of events organized by the UW PSEC gives an appreciation of our organization’s vitality and achievements over these past five years (see below).
The Polish Studies Endowment Fund
with $120,000, twenty three Distinguished Polish Speakers’ Series
events, the Fulbright Lectureship, the Scholarship Fund: none of
these existed 5 years ago. And neither did UW PSEC itself, a grass
roots organization of volunteers, whose generosity and dedication to
the twin goals of fundraising for an Endowed Chair of Polish studies
and educating the Seattle community about Poland are truly
awe-inspiring. Foto:Commitee
members with Professor and Mrs. Balcerowicz
you are visiting www.PolishStudiesUW.org, the website of Polish Studies at the University of Washington Endowment Committee HOME | About Us |How to Contact Us |How to Contribute | Distinguished Polish Speakers' Series
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Leszek Balcerowicz in Seattle By Dr. Arista Cirtautas, Visiting Lecturer at the UW Jackson School of International Studies That Professor Leszek Balcerowicz is still very much a man with a mission was clearly in evidence during his lecture on “Post-Communist Transformation in Central Europe,” and his meeting with students at the University of Washington, Nov. 1-2, 2007. While his mission was once to transform the “destructive system of communism” into a well-functioning “Western system of capitalism,” a revolutionary transformation that he carried out most ably as Finance Minister, Deputy Prime Minister and as President of the Polish National Bank, his current goal is to ensure the continuity and sustainability of sound market-building economic policies against the vagaries of intemperate and short-sighted political decision-making. As he noted in the question and answer session following his lecture, the most difficult challenge now and in the future is to navigate the “period of normal politics” when economic policies are all too easily politicized and distorted by non-market-building objectives. Difficult as the initial reform period might have been, the stabilization, liberalization and privatization policies introduced then under his leadership took place under a “period of extraordinary politics,” an admittedly short but vital grace period when a permissive consensus on the part of both elites and publics enabled radical reform. After political life routinizes and returns to ‘normal,’ the biggest question is, as Professor Balcerowicz elaborated at the student meeting, “how can good policies be maintained through regime change and beyond as in the case of Chile?” In addressing this new challenge or mission, two key strategies can be delineated following Professor Balcerowicz’s remarks, one more defensive in character, the other more offensive or proactive. On the defensive side, it is important to promote, protect and preserve an appraisal of the recent past that does justice to what was overcome and what has been achieved since 1989 in order to offset the negative, politically mobilizing effects of unnecessarily critical or uninformed assessments of his reforms. Accordingly, Professor Balcerowicz reminded his lecture audience of the destructive nature of the communist system, how it might have provided some sort of security but at a very low level of economic development with no rule of law and an unprecedented “scope of control over individual freedom.” Both “Western illusions” regarding welfare under socialist regimes and east European “myths” regarding the responsibility of the state to provide for “free lunches” need to be dispelled by a return to the objective facts of communist development, specifically that, during the communist era, the developmental gap between eastern and southern Europe grew enormously leaving post-communist countries with that much more “backwardness” to overcome. Consequently, an “extremely broad transformation” was needed to move from communism to capitalism; a transformation that “did not neglect institutional change as some observers claim” (especially since “privatization is institutional change) and that did have to take a “radical approach on a broad front with maximum possible speed but at different rates depending on issue areas, e.g. stabilization or liberalization.” This, and not “shock therapy”, a term Professor Balcerowicz dislikes due to its association with electrical shocks, is a more realistic portrayal of his reform package. Furthermore, due consideration has to be given to the positive outcomes produced by these reforms such as increased life expectancy, declining infant mortality rates, a marked reduction in industrial waste and, correspondingly, a reduction in the negative environmental impact associated with communist economic development, and, most importantly perhaps, the enhanced scope of individual freedom as in both “market and non-market transactions, people establish their own relationships.” Inevitably, more needs to be done to ensure continuing rates of economic growth, government spending needs to be controlled, privatization needs to be completed, unnecessary bureaucratic regulations need to be removed and the judiciary, especially the prosecutors, need to be more efficient and impartial. Most importantly, overcoming the continuing effects of economic backwardness such as high levels of emigration (producing a potential “brain drain”) and the disparity between high west European price levels and much lower east European wage levels, are completely dependent on a sustained rate of growth which, in turn, is dependent on the continuity of good economic policies. But how can such policies be preserved in the face of growing political populism and the general unpopularity of the market economy? As Professor Balcerowicz himself noted in answer to a question after his lecture, this lack of popularity can be ascribed to a potent combination of socioeconomic interests (as those with a privileged status under communism like miners exchange places with those who held a much lower status under the previous regime like educated people), myths (such as the myth of the “free lunch” and “brotherhood”) and morality (as in the assumption that the “profit motive is bad”). Here, a more offensive, proactive strategy is needed to promote good communication (e.g., “good slogans” to undermine populist appeals) between market oriented elites and the general public. In his meeting with students, Professor Balcerowicz informed us that, precisely in order to foster good political communication in Poland, he has founded a new NGO, (with the acronym “FOR” – “we are for and not against,” he emphasized), which has the following goals: identify the most popular populist beliefs, use psychology and marketing to challenge and overcome these beliefs (for example, through the use of satire and sharp, pointed humor). Most recently, FOR initiated a “get out the vote” campaign, primarily addressed at the younger generation using text-messaging and the internet, which doubtlessly contributed to the 15% increase in electoral turnout in the parliamentary elections and the electoral victory of the Civic Platform, a party much more favorable toward sound economic policies than their opponents. Basically, it appears as if this new Balcerowicz mission is designed to foster, by conscious design, the very factors that initially combined spontaneously to support market reforms in Central Europe and the Baltics. Since these factors, reform linkages, quality of leadership and the politicization of social dissatisfaction (as Professor Balcerowicz pointed out in his lecture, it is “bad reasoning” to conclude that because there is social dissatisfaction, the reforms –his reforms—must be wrong), played such an important role, according to Professor Balcerowicz, in “determining the difference in the rate and success of reforms in the former Soviet bloc,” they might well be of equal importance in determining when and where good economic policies persist beyond regime transition. Hence, the new mission is to promote “positive reform linkages” whereby market reform or continued good economic policies are linked to positive, highly desirable non-economic objectives, to promote, via the electoral process, a qualified, pro-market leadership and to undermine the populist effort to connect social dissatisfaction to pro-market policies. Given the drive, determination and focus Professor Balcerowicz brings to his work, he is likely to be as successful in these endeavors as in his past undertakings.  printer
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