Abstract
I enter a debate about state-socialism elite’s reproduction and higher education to propose an implementation of Bourdieu’s hysteresis effect. I argue that the intelligentsia and the interwar university shaped biographical paths of academics stronger than the political factors, which are usually brought to the forefront by contemporary researchers. I analyse academic biographies shaped by the socialist university and reconstruct a model academic biography in the post-WWII period, in particular, in Poland. I compare it with biographies of professors from working-class and peasant backgrounds, and arrive at the conclusion that the differences are minor. Those who formed a seemingly perfect new intelligentsia were socialized by the traditional academic habitus. A few who entered the new academic world from working class or peasant backgrounds had to embrace the interwar university ethos in order to justify their own merits in belonging. I propose a model of opposite hysteresis vectors to explain tensions between academia and political field.
Highlights
I enter a debate about state-socialism elite’s reproduction and higher education to propose an implementation of Bourdieu’s hysteresis effect
A testing ground is found in academic biographies in post-WWII Poland
Using hysteresis as a tool for analysing the construction of the socialist university leads us to examine the change in the academic habitus under the influence of changes in the political field
Summary
The universities had a rather conservative profile with respect to both their methodological and political aspects. Following the conclusion of the war in 1945, only 30% of its former citizens remained, but its material structure was well preserved, and together with the influx of internally displaced Poles, it become a temporary, informal capital of the country, welcoming 200,000 newcomers in just the 3 years. It was a Bmagnet for leftist intellectuals^(Connelly 2000, p. Despite various attempts and quite sophisticated tools and policies democratizing access to education, the PRL’s entire modernization project, including year zero, preparatory courses, part-time and evening studies as well as university consultation centers in small towns, was not catching on.
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