Post-colonial Poland—On an Unavoidable Misuse
Post-colonial Poland—On an Unavoidable Misuse

Summary/Abstract: The post-colonial face of Poland is rather problematic. Nationalistic right-wingers started using interpretations applying the post-colonial theory, and the theory itself seems to put little resistance to this type of appropriation. Rather than acknowledging such state of affairs as the fate of every idea falling into the hands of the natives, in this paper I would like to treat the problems of Polish post-coloniality as a very interesting test, both for the theory itself and for the analyses of the Polish reality. I shall compare the cases of nationalistic misuse with a more “mainstream” approach to the issue of applicability of the post-colonial theory to the situation in Eastern Europe, and particularly to the situation in Poland. As I shall try to demonstrate, this comparison will reveal many disturbingly common threads—which in my opinion are unjustified assertions and conclusions—resulting not only from errors in reasoning but the shortcomings of the theory itself.

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