Together but Apart: University Experience of Jewish Students in the Second Polish Republic

Abstract

This paper examines the experiences of Jewish university students in Warsaw, Lvov, Wilno and Cracow, focusing on their interactions with each other as well as with other students. These experiences are divided into three categories: daily encounters and mutual relations (or the lack thereof), the vision of the academic community to which the students aspired, and Jewish students' reactions to antisemitism. I argue that for many Jewish students, these daily university experiences both on campuses and beyond strengthened their sense of being outsiders. Having been excluded from most of the general student organizations they had to form their own, which limited their interactions with other students even further, and, above all, strengthened feeling that they were being singled out and victimized.