ENLIGHTENED, PROGRESSIVE, PATRIOTIC... NATIONAL HEROES IN THE PRESS IN 1955-1957 (Oswieceni, postepowi, patriotyczni ...Bohaterowie narodowi na lamach prasy w latach 1955-1957)

• Autorzy: Rafalska Dominika
• Języki publikacji: PL

Abstrakty

EN

The communists assigned an extremely important role to history since the latter was to fulfil a concrete propaganda role. Throughout the whole period of the People's Republic of Poland history was falsified and treated selectively. A relevant part in this process was performed by the press. It was precisely on the pages of the daily newspapers and periodicals that the average citizen could encounter articles recalling celebrated events and figures from the history of Poland. Historical publicistics from the 1950s cannot be regarded as either interesting or valuable. Nor can it be considered (with few exceptions) to be an important voice in a discussion about national identity. Strangely, this situation was not altered essentially by the events of 1956 - a time of dramatic developments and great albeit short-lived hopes and transformations - even though while following closely the social or political publicistics of the period we can clearly see (although, naturally, not in all cases) considerable animation: many newspapers started to issue bold articles written with enormous involvement, especially by the young authors. History, however, was still relegated to the margin and described in a biased and cliche manner, with no attempts at a more innovative approach. The national heroes described in 1956 are the same figures as those found in Marxist textbooks. Next to activists of the peasant or workers' movement they include 'universal' persons whose biographies, after a suitable interpretation and selective presentation, were ideal for the purposes of legitimisation. In this fashion, the heroes are the participants of national uprisings, Enlightenment thinkers and Romantic poets. It is interesting to observe the manner in which the press, after applying suitable tricks, managed to reduce such variegated figures to a single common denominator.

Słowa kluczowe

EN

HISTORICAL PUBLICISTICS; NATIONAL HEROES IN PRESS; PROPAGANDA OF COMMUNISTS' SYSTEM

• Wydawca: Polska Akademia Nauk. Instytut Historii im. Tadeusza Manteuffla PAN w Warszawie
• Czasopismo: Dzieje Najnowsze
• Rocznik: 2009
• Numer: 2
• Strony: 95-115
• Rodzaj publikacji: ARTICLE

Twórcy

autor

Rafalska Dominika

• Dominika Rafalska, Uniwersytet Warszawski, Instytut Dziennikarstwa, ul. Nowy Swiat 69, 00-046 Warszawa, Poland

Identyfikatory

CEJSH db identifier

10PLAAAA072221