‘Stop calling me Murzyn’ – how Black Lives Matter in Poland

Abstract

ABSTRACT The scholarship on race and racism has tended to focus mostly on countries in Western Europe. It has thereby overlooked racial dynamics taking place in other regions – including Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). This article examines the reverberations of the recent global antiracist mobilisation triggered by the killing of George Floyd in the United States in this underexplored context. Specifically, it considers the significance of the ‘Black Lives Matter’ (BLM) movement for Black people in Poland. Championed by the BLM movement, there have been demands for further reflection on racial inequalities in European societies, where many citizens in Europe’s West are beginning to engage with the impact of colonialism. The effect of George Floyd’s death has also reached unexpected places such as Poland, where Black communities have renewed their calls to reshape their representation in public discourse. We trace these mobilisations via our analysis of an online video discussion that unfolded under the hashtag #DontCallMeMurzyn. This article makes a case for the significance of concepts such as race and racism to our understanding of social relations in Poland; it shows, furthermore, how the BLM mobilisation has revived conversations about everyday racism and the representation of Black people in the public sphere.