Afro-Poles. Plurisocialization, Identity Building, Culture in the Making

For more than a decade now, a generation of Poles born into families of African immigrants from the communist and early transformation era has been entering adulthood. They grew up in Poland and were educated in Polish schools, Polish is their first language and they are saturated with Polish culture. Despite this, their countrymen on the street regularly address them in English, compliment them on their use of Polish, and at times vulgarly send them back 'to where they came from’. In a seemingly mono-ethnic and mono-cultural country until recently, the appearance of Afro-Poles remains a stigma of otherness and foreignness, carried with them constantly.

However, contemporary Poles of African descent – as reported in the press and as my first interviews show – not only consider themselves Polish but want to change Polish culture and society, based on their and their families’ difficult experiences.

They have started NGO’s, organized large-scale media actions, intercultural workshops and street protests, as well as addressed petitions. They have written memoirs, novels and essays about their condition. In recent years, at least five theatre plays, several books, a major contemporary art exhibition and a research group at an important art institution were devoted to the Black experience.

Within the scope of the study, I am trying to address issues of race and racism in the Polish context through a multi-layered description of the experience of being a Pole of African descent, including aspects such as social and cultural mobility, activism and cultural production.

The study is based on auto-biographical narrative interviews, complemented by a photographic interview.

The paper will be a mid-fieldwork work-in-progress presentation on the most recent findings.