Warsaw – Heritage, Tradition, and Urban Myths with a (very) Modern Twist a lecture by Justyna Zych, Ph.D.

Tuesday, June 9, 2020 at 7:00 PM on ZOOM

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• Do you know which star of the world literature lives in an unbelievably tiny, 48-inch-wide, apartment in Warsaw?
• Have you heard that Warsaw has its own Mordor?
• Are you able to imagine a vegan version of a traditional schabowy (pork chop)?
• Are you aware that there are modern versions of Tyrmand’s “Zły” and Gojawiczyńska’s “Dziewczęta z Nowolipek” in Polish literature?
• Do you understand what Varsovians mean when they call someone a słoik (a jar)?
• Would you believe that you can meet David Bowie during your stroll in Warsaw and that a huge palm tree grows in the very heart of the Polish capital city where the temperature in winter easily falls to 10 Fahrenheit?
  If you have answered “No” to at least one of the questions above, you must attend this lecture about contemporary Warsaw!

Dr. Justyna Zych is a Visiting Fulbright Scholar at the UW Slavic Department. She has been teaching a course “Warsaw: A Window to Contemporary Polish History and Culture” during spring quarter 2020. Back home (Warsaw, obviously!), Dr. Zych is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Polish Studies at the University of Warsaw. She spent two years as a Visiting Professor at the University of Toronto and she lectured in many countries in Europe and Asia. Her research focuses on contemporary Polish literature, especially on literary portraits of Warsaw and on Cultural Otherness, as well as on teaching Polish culture to foreigners.