Obrazy osobliwe
Peculiar Images

Summary/Abstract: The characteristic feature of the ethnographic works by Joanna Tokarska-Bakir is acertain paradox. On the one hand, they concentrate on images, which in itself is arather exceptional approach in Polish anth- ropology of culture. On the other hand, the author’s research declaration appears to be, to agreat extent, pretence, since the „image” appears to be amere backdrop or apre-text in relation to the text proper, and ultimately it disappears altogether. The presented essay discusses aresearch approach to the category of the image in Tokarska-Bakir’s celebra- ted book: Obraz osobliwy. Hermeneutyczna lektura źró- deł etnograficznych, her most recent Legendy okrwi (especially the chapter on the so-called Sandomierz paintings) and the film A Pole in aWardrobe by Artur Żmijewski who cooperates with the anthropologist. The point of departure, however, is afundamental re- lation to the examined phenomenon, and thus to the studied people as well as certain initial assumptions concerning the terrain of the research, the method and the position of the researcher. The text suggests that the selection of atraditional „terrain” and the co- urse of conducting anthropological studies conceal al- so certain traditional presuppositions about the essen- ce of the examined phenomenon (in this case, Polish anti-Semitism) and, simultaneously, the very essence of ethnography. While dealing with the image the author focused on silently accepted and unfounded opinions and premi- ses concerning images in works by Tokarska-Bakir. He argues (by using, i. a. the categories proposed by the anthropologist in her Obraz osobliwy) that acerta- in reception of images (naïve, wild and non-distingu- ishing) cannot be ascribed to any social group distin- guished due its education, place of residence or age, but is just as strongly present in the relation of Joan- na Tokarska-Bakir and her students to the paintings from Sandomierz depicting ritual murders.

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