Collective Memory, Social Time and Culture: The Polish Tradition in Memory Studies

Abstract

In Poland, research into collective memory has a long tradition and clear cultural perspective. The author’s aim is to show that this research tradition, which is deeply associated with the legacy of the Durkheimian school, was very strong in Poland in both the prewar and postwar periods, especially in the work of Stefan Czarnowski, the only Polish member of the school. In this perspective, social memory is closely connected with culture and time. In the first part of the paper, the author explains why the relations between social memory, culture, and social time are important for evaluating the Polish research tradition. The second part is dedicated to the works of Stefan Czarnowski, who started the cultural stream in Polish memory studies many years ago. The third part presents the idea of social time, and the relations between the sociology of time and memory studies in Polish sociology. The specificity of Polish studies on collective memory is little known today, especially to foreign researchers, but the tradition is worth remembering.