Góralszczyzna i pamięć
Highlander Culture and Memory

Summary/Abstract: The point of departure for this article is the Polish highlander culture of the Podhale region, an exceptional case of local culture and a valuable laboratory of cultural constancy and change. For those reasons, this particular culture also became a sui generis domain of a theoretical dispute about the comprehension of such phenomena as tradition/modernity, continuum/change, authenticity/non-authenticity, and the autotelism/instrumentalism of culture. The dispute also enters the range of the obligations of the researcher threatened with a confrontation with methodological dilemmas along the cognitive objectivism/subjectivism, distance/involvement, etc. axis. The above problems compel him to pursue reflections about the meanings of basic terms and concepts serving the description/explanation of cultural phenomena. This hold true in particular for the context of folk qualities, whose explanatory usefulness does not decrease albeit its meaning content succumbs to changes calling for methodical recognition and use in the scientific discourse.

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