Writing the History of Sexual Violence – Beyond Borders The article reviews the present research and discourses on rapes committed by Red Army soldiers in Hungary. The article after defining two analytical frameworks present in the Hungarian historiography, the intentionalist and the structuralist, tries to overcome this dichotomy with analysing visual sources.

Occupation and Gender: New Research Perspectives on German Occupation in Poland World War II radically changed Polish society. Brutal occupation politics and farreaching deportations destroyed social structures and relations. This affected society as a whole and individuals in their social roles. Hence, the occupation of Poland in World War II also had an impact on gender roles and relations. The aim of this article is to re-examine the German occupation of Poland with a focus on the experiences of women and men during occupation. Firstly, I will resume the state of research regarding the experiences of female German occupiers, then looking at (sexual) power relations between the occupied and the occupiers, and then ask for the intrusion of German occupation in the established societal order in regard to gender. The paper aims at resuming the state of research and to open up a panorama of still under-researched questions.

‘We got to know each other through our eyes…’ Research on Strategies for the Survival of Jewish Women Functioning above ‘Ground’ on the Aryan Side in Occupied Krakow and its Surroundings The purpose of this article is to show the survival strategies and the everyday life of Jewish women living on the so-called Aryan side in occupied Krakow and its surroundings. Ego-documents are the core source: relations and diaries collected in the Archive of the Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw, the Archives of Yad Vashem in Jerusalem and the Archives of the Metropolitan Curia in Kraków. A thorough analysis of the phenomenon is very complex, therefore this article only discusses the fate of the Jewish women who co-existed amongst Polish society rather than those who did not have ‘Aryan documents’ or could be betrayed by their appearance, and were thus forced to remain in hiding the whole time. The article not only pays attention to the survival strategies and ways in which they disguised their origins and identities, but it also explores the everyday life, family relationships, work and religious life of these women. The author’ s aim was not to analyse aid provided to Jewish women by non-Jews, or symmetrically, to synthesise problems regarding the selling out of Jews in occupied Krakow. Both issues do appear in the article, but rather as background to the individual cases, since they were, in fact, inseparable elements of any survival strategy on the Aryan side in the GG ‘capital’. The article also notes the absence of certain topics in the interviews, related to the daily life of Jewish women in hiding, which makes a more comprehensive analysis difficult.

The Service of Women in the Military Structures of the Polish Underground State. The Example of the Central Command of the Polish Victory Service and the General Headquarters of the Union for Armed Struggle – Home Army This text is an attempt to depict the broad theme of Polish women’ s involvement within the structures of the Polish Victory Service, the Union for Armed Struggle and the Home Army (SZP/ZWZ/AK) in years 1939–1945. In the first part, it discusses the involvement of women in the struggle for independence, and subsequently in its defence in the years 1914–1921. In the second part, it examines the tasks conducted under the auspices of the Women’ s Military Service and related organisations in the preparation of women for the upcoming war in defence of independence, finishing with a brief description of women’ s participation in the Polish campaign of 1939. The third part is devoted to the formal place of female soldiers both within the structures of the SZP-ZWZ-AK, and broadly – Polish Armed Forces in general. The fourth shows female soldiers’ involvement within the military structure of the Polish Underground State on specific individual examples.

Female Sabotage Troops in the Underground Army in 1940–1944, Based on the Relations and Memories of their Members The tradition of Polish women participating in pro-independence activities dates back to the nineteenth century. Since the beginning of the twentieth century, they had joined political parties and participated in the military preparations undertaken by these parties. In 1918 they even created the first female military formation – the Voluntary Legion of Women, which took part in the war on the border of the Second Republic. The next phase was their participation in the preparation of defence during the interwar period, followed by service in the Polish Victory Service/Union for Armed Struggle/Home Army (SZP-ZWZ-AK) in 1939–1945. A female unit, code-named ‘Cooperative’, was established in the structures of the SZP’ s Department I (Organisational) Chief Command, and led by Col. Maria Wittek. The most important organisational development of the Women’ s Military Service took place in 1942. After renaming the Union for Armed Struggle (ZWZ) to the Home Army (AK), the Commander of Home Army issued order No. 59 on 25 February 1942, which formally established the WSK (Women’ s Military Service) and published detailed guidance on its operation. As an official task, it was foreseen that – in addition to sanitary service, communications, administrative, and economic and educational propaganda – women would also take part in acts of sabotage, intelligence and combat. For this reason women in the underground army were not only invited to join male sabotage subunits, but they also created their own ones. The latter teams included the Women Mining Patrol (KPM) and the Women’ s Department of Subversion and Sabotage, code-named ‘Discus’. The KPM was established in March 1940. Until 1942 they were part of the Union of Retaliation, and in November of that year they joined the Kedyw. The commander was Zofia Franio. ‘Discus’ was also established (in April 1942) within the structures of the Union of Retaliation, and then Kedyw, under the command of Lt. Wanda ‘Lena’ Gertz. Sabotage tasks by both troops began as early as 1942. The largest level of action by the KPM took place in 1942–1943, and ‘Discus’ in 1943–1944. In late 1943, members of both troops were withdrawn from diversionary actions and redirected toward preparations for the uprising, which included aiding in the production of incendiary bottles and gathering them in specially prepared quarters. At the outbreak of the uprising, the two female sabotage and diversion troops were reorganised. KPM ceased to operate within the structures of the Kedyw Warsaw District and was recreated into 16-member Female Branch of Sappers led by Dr. Franio, with the remaining mine layers sent to various male branches. The ‘Discus’ unit passed to the structures of Lt.-Col. Jan ‘Radosław’ Mazurkiewicz. It is difficult to precisely determine the number of women performing diversionarysabotage tasks, as many of them were not registered. During the occupation, ‘Discus’ consisted of approx. 100 members and KPM approx. 50. During the uprising, in total there were around 100 women performing these tasks, which accounted for only 1.4% of the women fighting in the Army at that time. Most members of the underground army acted as messengers or nurses, or performed other auxiliary tasks.

From False Universalism to Fetishisation of Difference. The History of the Warsaw Uprising and the Revisionist ‘Herstorical Turn’ This text is an attempt to connect the reflection on historiography and collective memory with the perspective of gender studies regarding historical writings on the Warsaw Uprising. The article tracks the various stages or ‘ideal types’ of professional and popular historiography and memory of the Warsaw Uprising seen from the perspective of the visibility and position of women: false universalism of a large part of professional historiography of the uprising and the resulting invisibility of women and their experience in historical works; compensatory works that fill the ‘white spots’ of classical historiography, treating the history of women as a mere addition to the history of World War II; as well as the recent ‘herstorical turn’, characterised by a growing interest in women and the distinctiveness of their experiences. The article concludes with a reflection on the theoretical and methodological pitfalls of the ‘herstorical turn’ and attempts to put the phenomenon in broader socio-political context of current cultural wars in Poland.

Emotions, Commitment and Effectiveness of the Government’ s Remembrance Policy. Results of an Experimental Study The paper presents results of the experimental study on the role of commitment and emotions in an influence of remembrance narratives. It offers brief theoretical introduction to the government’ s remembrance policy and its main features and then it compares these hypotheses with experimental observations. The study shows how manipulations of commitment and emotions influence memorization of information, change of attitudes towards the remembrance and behavior in real-life. Moreover, the paper discusses results of participant’ s self-assessment after an exposition to a narrative and their evaluation of its contents. As the result, theoretical considerations and research results enabled authors to present final conclusions and to state five new theoretical hypotheses on the impact of commitment and emotions on the effectiveness of remembrance story-telling.

Krzysztof Kosiński, Wiwisekcja powszedniości. Studium wczesnej twórczości Marka Nowakowskiego (1957–1971), Instytut Pamięci Narodowej, Warszawa 2014, 559 p.