News - League of POW

The ‘League of POW Remembrance’ Network has co-organised its first major event. Together with  the Center for Research on the Economics of Memorial Sites at USWPS, we took the first big step towards integration of the community dealing with the sites of former POW camps and preservation of the memory of  POWs (including family memory!).

Let us start with some organisational information: the Congress was held in assembly halls of the SWPS University in Warsaw, in a hybrid format - most people (about 100) attended it online, however the in-person attendance was also satisfactory. The audience included representatives of museums (mainly from Warsaw), members of POW families, university teachers and undergraduates. The theme evidently proved to be compelling, as there were also lively conversations carried on afterwards.

The main part of the Congress featured speeches grouped into four thematic panels, followed by a summary provided by the moderator. The question-and-answer and sharing opinions' session came later - during a longer panel discussion. As many as 13 panellists sat on the panel. Although the number of the panellist was quite high, yet each of them had the opportunity to give their opinions and answer questions from the audience, including those who attended the meeting online. The discussion included voices from guests from the United States and France on the public perception of POWs. This fresh perspective is certainly interesting and useful for the development of the League's activities.

The main purpose of the Congress, in addition to the aforementioned networking, was to address the legacy of POWs and attempt to outline strategies for the future. Both of these goals were achieved during the congress, and the challenges facing POW memory were formulated Dr. Violetta Rezler-Wasielewska, Director of the CMJW, as follows: preventing forgetting; developing an educational strategy when there is no longer an emotional bond with the past (the last witnesses to history are passing away); preserving relics (raising funds for this purpose); coping with the variety of strategies resulting from the multidimensionality of captivity during World War II; revitalising memorial sites with respect for their authenticity; keeping a neutral, objective view of the mechanisms of historical policies; educating in an easy-to-understand, cognitively attractive and reliable way; integrating local and global memory, thus reconciling the meanings attributed to POW camp sites by local communities with their presence in a transnational historical narrative.

We would like to thank all Fellows of the League for their active participation in the event.

The activity, carried out as part of the project, was financed from funds of the National Reconstruction and Resilience Plan - investment A2.5.1. ‘Programme to support the activities of entities from the cultural and creative industries sector to stimulate their development’, and the Self-government of the Opole Province.