Polish Immigrants Research Articles

Immigrants in the Transnational Far Right: Integration through Racisms and Negotiating White Supremacy in a Migratory Context

Despite the historical and contemporary instances of immigrants and their descendants engaging with the far-right, whether through long-distance nationalism or country of residence politics, migration scholarship has surprisingly paid very little attention to this process. In this paper we argue that insufficient engagement with instances of the far-right attracting and mobilizing immigrants and ethnic minorities is a theoretical omission in both migration scholarship and scholarship of the far-right and is related to the reproduction of reified notions of “majority”’ and “minority,” normative assumptions about immigrants’ political activism as inevitably progressive, and methodological nationalism implicit in studying the far-right from a political science perspective. Through an analysis of a case study of Polish immigrants and their descendants in Britain, we demonstrate that these omissions can be bridged by paying more attention to relational processes of constructions of whiteness, the role of systemic racism, and the increasing transnationalization of the far-right. The cases we describe, captured through the notion of integration-through-racisms, are therefore a symptom of both increasing complexities of migration-driven diversity with threatened white privilege as the focus and dynamic changes in global far-right ideologies and strategies.

Las formaciones identitarias y sus diversas perspectivas entre los inmigrantes polacos en Misiones (Argentina) durante el periodo 1930–1940: el caso de Casimira Kotur

The paper discusses the identity of Polish immigrants in the province of Misiones, Argentina. The first part of the article presents the historical context, while the second one comprehensively analyses the identity of one of the residents of Posadas, Casimira Kotur, based on interviews conducted with her. The working methods is based on the following theoretical concepts: narrative identity according to Paul Ricoeur, review of social roles of social actors and Mikhail Bakhtin’s concept of polyphony.

Childhood vaccination among Polish immigrants in Norway: a qualitative study

BackgroundConfidence in childhood vaccination is high in Norway and the Norwegian Childhood Immunization Programme (NCIP) achieves high overall coverage rates. However, lower coverage has been observed for some immigrant groups, including Polish immigrants who represent the largest immigrant group in Norway. Anti-vaccine sentiments and increased refusal of mandatory childhood vaccination has been on the rise in Poland, but it is unknown whether such attitudes also apply to Polish immigrants in Norway, as they experience a different vaccination policy and perhaps also different attitudes to vaccines. This qualitative study aims to explore attitudes towards childhood vaccination in Norway among Polish immigrants.MethodsWe interviewed 15 Polish parents living in Norway in 2022. We recruited the participants by purposive sampling and analyzed the interviews by reflexive thematic analysis.ResultsThree themes were identified: views of childhood vaccination, vaccine hesitancy, and differences in childhood vaccination between Poland and Norway. Overall, the participants favored childhood vaccination and viewed most of the vaccines included in the NCIP as safe and reliable. Human papilloma virus, meningococcal and pneumococcal vaccines were declined by some of the parents. Comparisons of childhood vaccination in Poland and Norway was evident in many of the interviews, especially among parents whose children had received vaccines in both countries. The participants were well acquainted with the NCIP, favored voluntary childhood vaccination, and the majority expressed a high level of trust in Norwegian health authorities.ConclusionsPolish immigrants to Norway generally expressed positive views about childhood vaccination. Non-vaccination was related to lack of knowledge and/or unfamiliarity with certain vaccines and not with anti-vaccine sentiments or conspiracy theories. The study highlights how parents’ knowledge, in combination with norms and trends from both birth country and country of residence, influence parents’ decision making about vaccination.

The discourse and practices of Polish migration policy during the COVID-19 pandemic – economisation as a form of emergency governance

The existing literature points to securitisation as a dominant form of emergency governance emerging in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, also in relation to migration. However, another important way of framing migration during the pandemic is in terms of economisation. This article aims to analyse the rationale underpinning Polish immigration policy during COVID-19 with a focus on different forms of economisation: macro-economisation, which prioritises economic growth over other socially important issues; and substantive economisation, which centres the needs of a population during a given historical moment. Based on desk and qualitative research, including analysis of official documents and media coverage as well as in-depth expert interviews, we argue that the logics of both kinds of economisation can be discerned in Poland’s immigration policy. Our overall conclusion is that during the COVID-19 pandemic, and despite strong anti-immigrant rhetoric in official political discourse, Poland’s immigration policy prioritised the interests of the national economy and labour market over strategies of security and social control.

Unbinding ideology: The impact of communist indoctrination revocation in polish schools on later life self-employment

Given communist ideologies discourage individual enterprise, this research investigates whether eliminating compulsory Marxist-Leninist indoctrination from schools influences later life self-employment. Focusing on a mid-1950s reform in Poland that revoked the Communist indoctrination curriculum while holding other aspects constant, the study leverages variation in exposure based on annual school enrollment cut-off birthdates. Contrary to expectation, the empirical analysis finds no discernible effect of indoctrination removal on later-life self-employment. Additionally, the study examines whether Polish immigrants exposed to reform and arriving in the US after 1960 exhibit increased self-employment propensity, but finds no significant differences. Overall, the study's findings highlight negligible impacts of the revocation of Communist indoctrination in Polish schools on self-employment.

Association of the bitter taste genes TAS2R38 and CA6 and breast cancer risk; a case-control study of Polish women in Poland and Polish immigrants in USA.

It is known that the perception of bitterness is mediated by type 2 bitter taste receptors (TAS2Rs). However, recent reports have suggested that the carbonic anhydrase 6 (CA6) gene may also influence bitterness sensing. Genetic variants in these genes could influence dietary intake of brassica vegetables, whose increased consumption has been observed in the literature, though inconsistently, to decrease breast cancer (BC) risk. We hypothesized that the estimated odds ratios (ORs) for the association between BC and taster diplotype (PAV/PAV) and/or genotype A/A, will be in the direction of increased BC risk, potentially due to reduced consumption of brassica vegetables. Using a case-control study of BC in Polish women in Poland (210 cases and 262 controls) and Polish immigrant women to USA (78 cases and 170 controls) we evaluated the association of the taster diplotypes in TAS2R38 gene and genotypes in the CA6 gene and BC risk in these two populations individually and jointly. No significant increase in risk was observed for the TAS2R38 PAV/PAV diplotype (tasters) in each population individually or in the joint population. For the CA6 gene, in the joint population, we observed an increased BC risk for the combined G/A and G/G genotypes (non-tasters) vs A/A (tasters), OR = 1.41 (95% CI 1.04-1.90, p = 0.026) which after adjustment for False Discovery Rate (FDR), was not significant at p≤0.05 level. However, for the joint population and for the combined genotype of the two genes AVI/AVI+G* (non-tasters) vs. PAV/*+A/A (tasters), we observed a significant increase in BC risk, OR = 1.77 (95%CI 1.47-2.74, p = 0.01), for the non-tasters, which remained significant after FDR adjustment. In conclusion for the joint population and the joint effect for the two bitter sensing genes, we observed an increase in BC risk for the bitterness non-tasters, association which is in the opposite direction to our original hypothesis.

‘I Don’t Want to Be Other. I Want to Be Normal’: Mental Boundaries and the Polish Experience in the UK in Agnieszka Dale’s Fox Season and Other Short Stories

Borders and frontiers are often problematized in Agnieszka Dale’s Fox Season and Other Short Stories (2017), where mental borders seem to be more divisive than spatial boundaries. Many of these narratives feature Polish immigrants in Britain who struggle with their displaced condition in various ways. As some of the stories in the collection reveal, the scenario of post-Brexit Britain compromises conviviality amongst different groups, including the Polish community. Special attention is placed upon how several narratives in the volume underscore the prevalence in British society of Polish stereotypes as the crystallisation of the still widespread animosity against non-Europeans. Homi Bhabha’s notions regarding the formation and dynamics of stereotypes will be helpful in understanding the mechanisms beneath such constructions. Likewise, some of the major tenets of social theory, as well as Edward Said’s notion of ‘Orientalism’, will contribute to shedding light upon this resentment towards the Polish minority, occasionally adopted too by already established immigrants against their former compatriots. This article will ultimately intend to draw attention to the cautionary nature of Dale’s collection as a call for harmony and the appreciation of difference among nations, thus preventing the gloomy perspectives the dystopian futures of some of these stories forecast upon Europe.

Polish Immigrant Organisations in The Republic of Ireland: Theri Present State and Scenarios for Theri Future Development

The presence of an extensive number of Polish immigrants in Ireland has a short history, which began after Poland’s accession to the EU. Therefore, the organizations that have been set up since 2004 were to a high degree built up with no or little impact of the existing tradition of immigrant structures and institutions. This makes Ireland a specific laboratory for testing a new model of immigrants’ organization of the 21st century. The article aims to describe the development of Polish immigrant organizations in Ireland and to present their characteristics, including their goals, activities, the role of new media and technology, as well as the patterns of participation and communication. The detailed presentation of these characteristics and case studies serves the goal of answering the question: if and to what extent “young” Polish immigrant organizations in Ireland can be seen as the forerunners of a new model of immigrants’ organization of the 21st century.

Post-Digital Connectivities: Framing Offline Encounters in a Digital Prospection Space

Abstract This paper explores the use of mobile technologies in facilitating offline encounters, through a post-digital lens which posits the digital not as new or disruptive but as a ubiquitous and accepted part of everyday social connectivities. In the paper, we explore ways in which migrants draw on jointly assembled semiotic repertoires, affordances, and constraints of the digital space, as well as cultural knowledge and spatial relating, to establish common ground and an interpretative framework for engaging in ensuing offline encounters. Drawing on an interactional analysis of data from a large linguistic ethnographic project, we focus on how a group of Polish immigrants who live in different parts of London bring their offline contexts and socially or culturally motivated expectations into their interactions to facilitate alignment in interactional frames in the context of limited familiarity with each other. Overall, our analysis points to the role of group messaging in creating a digital prospection space in which a joint frame of reference can be interactively constructed in anticipation of an offline encounter.

Middle class by effort? Immigration, nation, and class from a transnational and intersectional perspective

ABSTRACT This article examines how highly skilled immigrants from Poland become middle-class in Germany through a transnational and intersectional lens. Hence, it asks what is the middle-class, and who and where belongs to it. First, it considers the fluidity of social class in post-socialist Poland to deconstruct middle-classness. Second, it draws on Reckwitz's distinction between the new and old middle classes in Germany and their factions to argue that immigrants cannot become middle class members by default. Based on the analysis of empirical material consisting of narrations of Polish immigrants, the article asks if Polish immigrants become middle class ‘by effort’. The analysis shows that Polish immigrants’ habitus locates them in-between different middle-class factions. The narrations suggest that these immigrants experience discrimination and exclusion, but – curiously – also demonstrate these immigrants’ lack of awareness of structural barriers in access to the middle-class factions in Germany. It argues that such ‘blindness’ to structural underpinnings of exclusion is a result of the entanglements of nationalism and neoliberalism, for example, the immigrants’ belief in meritocratic principles. Finally, the article suggests avenues for future theory-building by addressing the intersection of social class, gender, life course, and ethnicity to better understand middle-classness of immigrants.

Is it Antislavic racism, or how to speak about liminality, stigma, and racism in Europe

AbstractThis article discusses the present‐day positionality of Polish immigrants in Germany and the discursive possibilities for articulating their experiences of discrimination as racism. As interviews with these immigrants do not capture explicit accounts of racism, and there is practically no research on racism directed at Eastern Europeans in Germany, this article scrutinizes the epistemological context in which the voicing of discrimination is embedded. They include the imagined liminality of Poland in Europe, the binary and coloured understandings of racism in Poland and Germany, and the socialisation of Poles to lean towards silence on racism. Based on empirical data, the article discusses three intersecting forms of experiences of racism: disappearance through effort, devaluation of experience, and cultural precarity. Finally, the article argues that metaphors of liminality, stigma, stickiness and cultural precarity offer a nuanced understanding of Eastern European positionalities in Western Europe.

Ekonomia sakramentalna i wybrane sakramentalia w Polskiej Misji Katolickiej w Hamburgu

Proclaiming the Gospel to the whole world, and as part of this, caring for people, caring for the faithful, is one of the basic tasks of the Church; it is carried out through pastoral care in individual parishes. It is the parish which forms the center of religious, liturgical, and sacramental life for the Christian.This article provides a source knowledge on various aspects of sacramental service and is also a reflection on this problem.The article presents the sacraments, which form the center of religious life and are the source of initiation and deepening in the Faith, uniting one to Christ and to the whole community, and especially for Polish immigrants, a bond which spiritually connects them to their homeland. For that reason, the whole sacramental life of the Polish community in Hamburg is presented here, taking into account concrete numerical data and also the meaning of these sacred signs in the lives of the faithful. The sacraments, although they sanctify the most important moments of human life and are irreplaceable, do not fulfill (?) all the spiritual needs of the People of God. Therefore, the conclusion presents other aspects of man’s sanctification on the basis of selected sacramentals.

Polish Immigrants in Civil War Louisiana

Polish Immigrants in Civil War Louisiana

Attitudes towards the childhood immunisation programme among Polish immigrants in Norway

Abstract Background Norwegian-born children by Polish-born parents have lower coverage of some childhood vaccines than the general population in the nationwide Childhood Immunisation Programme. However, we know little about why this group have lower coverage. This study explored attitudes towards the Childhood Immunisation Programme among Polish immigrants in Norway. This knowledge can enhance vaccine information and further improve the prevention of infectious diseases in Norway. Methods We conducted semi-structured interviews with 15 Polish immigrants in Norway in the fall of 2022. The project explored vaccination in general, while the focus herein is on child vaccination. To better understand how the experiences and knowledge shape the participants’ attitudes towards vaccines and vaccination, the data was inductively analysed using a reflexive thematic analysis. The analysis is ongoing, and results are thus preliminary. Results Most of the participants had lived more than 10 years in Norway, while three had lived here for less than five years. All the participants had children. Based on the thematic analysis, we focused on three sub themes: 1) view of the child immunisation programme; 2) vaccine hesitancy; and 3) differences in childhood vaccination between Poland and Norway. Most of the participants’ children followed the immunisation programme. Some reported hesitancy towards the pneumococcal vaccine and the human papilloma virus vaccine. The majority of the participants expressed feeling less vaccine pressure in Norway than Poland and emphasized a high level of trust in the Norwegian health authorities. Conclusions The knowledge related to vaccine attitudes and differences between the Polish and the Norwegian programmes identified in the study, can help adapt better vaccine information and further improve the prevention of infectious diseases in Norway in general and for under-vaccinated groups in particular. Key messages • This knowledge can be used to adapt better vaccine information. • This knowledge can help to improve the prevention of infectious diseases in Norway and for under-vaccinated groups in particular.

Książę Adam Jerzy Czartoryski i jego obóz polityczny wobec grekokatolików

Prince Adam Jerzy Czartoryski and his political camp towards Greek Catholics The article aims to describe the actions of Prince Adam Jerzy Czartoryski and his friends of the same political group directed towards Greek Catholics. Prince Adam Jerzy, firstly religiously indifferent, came into contact with Uniates’ problems at the beginning of the 19th century, as a curator of Vilnius Scientific Society. In that period he was a protector of Uniate Bazylian Convent. As a representative of authorities of the Kingdom of Poland he aimed to engage Uniates in development of people’s education. New opening for Czartoryski’s activities started with the Great Emigration after the failure of the November Uprising. As a leader of Hotel Lambert Prince Czartoryski observed with a great worry the liquidation of the Church Union in Russian partition. Several times he intervened by Pope Gregory XVI in favour of the persecuted people of Uniate Church. Apostolic Capital was then receiving journals, letters, and other proofs for Russian repressions. In 40s and 50s of the 19th century Czartoryski’s agents were involved in issues of Uniates living in Russian and Austrian partitions. Some examples of these actions were: giving the Roman Catholic Church Madonna del Pascola to Bazylian Convent, opening of Uniate Collegium and placing Galician clerics in Apostolic Capital. Moreover, initiatives for Greek Catholics among Polish immigrants were supported and also the foundation of the Greek Catholic Church in Bulgaria was backed up.

Caring From a Distance: Experiences of Polish Immigrants in the United States Providing Care to Parents With Dementia Overseas.

Aging populations and an increasing number of immigrants in recent years have led to numerous changes in intergenerational relationships. Although many studies have investigated the impact of providing care to a parent with dementia, little is known about the impact of caregiving activities provided from a distance, such as in the case of immigration, and over a long period of time to a person with dementia. Our understanding of how transnational caregiving for a person with dementia affects relationships is also limited. Using the Intergenerational Solidarity Theory as a theoretical framework, this paper examines the experiences of adult children and immigrant caregivers of a parent with dementia living in Poland. A qualitative, semistructured interview was conducted with 37 caregivers living in the United States while providing transnational care to a parent with Alzheimer's disease or other forms of dementia. The data analysis was based on the thematic analysis strategy. Four themes were identified: (1) filial obligations and solidarity, (2) caregivers' contradictory emotions regarding transnational care, (3) financial and emotional exhaustion, and (4) challenges of nursing home dilemmas. Transnational caregivers represent a unique group who face distinctive challenges related to competing demands and limited resources. This study contributes to a better understanding of their experiences whereas the findings highlight the importance of addressing the mental and physical well-being of immigrant caregivers of individuals with dementia and have important implications for health care professionals and immigration policies. Implications for future research were also identified.

Gray Racialization of White Immigrants: The Polish Worker in Norway

The literature on racialization has typically focused on the situation of people of color in the Western world. In this article, we explore the analytical value of extending the concept of racialization to analyze symbolic boundaries that rely on and fortify the ascription of the specific skills and identities of white immigrants. The discussion builds on a review of the emerging literature on Polish immigrants in Norway since 2004. It reveals other everyday experiences of Poles and how they see themselves – and how others see them – differently compared to Norwegians and other immigrants and minorities. We examine how these processes of identity ascription are rooted in the Poles’ position as ‘labor migrants’ in predominantly low-waged and low-skilled segments of the Norwegian labor market. We also demonstrate how their location in the productive structure has far-reaching implications that work to construct symbolic boundaries, setting the Polish migrant apart from mainstream Norwegian society. The conclusion suggests a modified racialization concept, ‘gray racialization’, to conceptualize the discriminatory situation of the Poles as an immigrant and minority population, which we find to better allow for an understanding of power relations and social inequalities than its conceptual alternatives.

Immigration and Entrepreneurship: The Role of Enclaves

Immigration has proven to be a major force driving entrepreneurial dynamics. In this paper I investigate how the geographical distribution of immigrants within a given country, and in particular the presence of “enclaves,” affects the relationship between immigration and entrepreneurship. I examine the impact of Polish immigration to Great Britain following the unprecedented migration wave caused by the European Union enlargement in 2004. I address omitted variable concerns by using information on the location of historical Polish military settlements and the occupational composition and growth of Polish immigration in Ireland to construct instruments for enclaves and location choices of immigrants. The econometric results indicate, on the one hand, that immigration does increase immigrant entrepreneurship, but not in existing immigrant enclaves. On the other hand, immigrant entrepreneurs outside enclaves tend to achieve worse growth outcomes than those in enclaves. Further analyses provide an explanation to these findings due to blocked labor markets and to the higher prevalence of “necessity entrepreneurship” outside of enclaves. These results offer new insights to understand the influence of geography on entrepreneurship in the presence of immigration. This paper was accepted by Toby Stuart, entrepreneurship and innovation. Supplemental Material: The data files and online appendix are available at https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2023.4776 .

The Polish Heritage Library and Archives in Panna Maria, Texas

The Polish Heritage Library and Archives in Panna Maria, Texas

Poland and the Holocaust in the Polish-American Press, 1926–1945

Poland and the Holocaust in the Polish-American Press, 1926–1945