2023
The Forum podcast
Professor Anita Prazmowska took part in an episode of The Forum. In it, she debated the Polish Soviet war along with other distinguished academics. Listen to the recording.
2020
Vice article
Professor Prazmowska was quoted in a Vice article on 18 November. The article discusses a campaign promoted by a Polish embassy official to glorify a notorious anti-Semite, Władysław Studnicki, who is buried in Kensal Green. Studnicki argued for the removal of Jews from Poland and sought to collaborate with Nazi Germany. Read more
Turkish TV TRT World Roundtable programme
Professor Prazmowska participated in a discussion about the recent court ruling in Poland banning all abortions and how the scale of the protests that followed has set the scene for a confrontation between hardliners and those on the streets. Watch the programme
2018
New article in Europe-Asia Studies
Professor Prazmowska published a new article in the journal Europe-Asia Studies, entitled “’Frenchmen’ in Polish Mines: The Politics of Productivity in Coal Mining in Poland 1946-1948”. In this period, 13,721 Polish miners were repatriated by the state from France to Poland. The repatriation was vital to the development of coal mining. This repatriation was distinct because it did not involve returning to Poland people who had been displaced during the war. These Poles had emigrated to France during the interwar period. After a successful start, when over 5,000 men and their families came to Poland in 1946, the project came to a halt. Poland was not a welcoming environment for these men and France wanted to retain them. LSE users, can read the article for free.
Featured on BBC and CNN
In early February, Professor Prazmowska was featured in two articles regarding the Polish legislation to outlaw references to Polish death camps in Holocaust bill. The phrase, first used by Barack Obama in a 2012 speech, has led to a controversial bill which makes it illegal to accuse Poland of complicity in Nazi crimes. According to the BBC article, there is widespread agreement that Polish citizens participated in the Holocaust through the betrayal and murder of Polish Jews, but does that equal a larger Polish complicity? She responded: “this is history as a tool, as a means for a nationalistic government to accuse everyone else of betraying the nation while painting itself as the only true carriers of the Polish flag”. In the CNN article, she adds that legislation shouldn’t be used to force a particular historic interpretation, as this forms a broader attempt to revise negative aspects of history.
2017
Quoted in The Guardian
Professor Anita Prazmowska was quoted in an opinion article in The Guardian, entitled “William and Kate have been duped into endorsing Poland’s ugly nationalism” (21 July). The opinion article, authored by writer and academic Kate Maltby, looks into Poland’s slip into nationalist authoritarianism and the royals' designed tour to flatter the one nation most likely to soften a Brexit punitive deal.
Documentary participation, Dear Coreczko
Professor Prazmowska contributed to a documentary shown on Polish television, on 19 February, which was based on the letters from the Warsaw Ghetto she deposited in the Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw in 2015. Watch the documentary on YouTube (in Polish).
2016
New book on Wladyslaw Gomulka
Professor Anita Prazmowska newest book came out in December 2015. Wladyslaw Gomulka. A Biography is part of series Communist Lives, published by I.B. Tauris. The volume is a new and challenging reinterpretation of the role played by the Polish Communist leader in Polish and European politics. Professor Prazmowska traces Gomulka's progression from a poorly educated worker in the Krosno district of Poland, to his election as First Party Secretary in 1956 and finally to his forced resignation in 1970. She considers Gomulka's pivotal role in building a communist-led resistance in occupied Poland during World War II as well as the critical part he played in post-war Polish politics and the 'de-Stalinization' process. Incorporating recently released and previously unpublished sources, this book provides a vivid picture of how Communism functioned in Poland and an original analysis of Poland's international role in the Cold War era. Read more about the book and purchase it in the publisher’s website, I.B.Tauris.
2015
Leverhulme Trust Research Fellowship
Professor Anita Prazmowska was awarded a two-year Major Research Fellowship from the Leverhulme Trust, 2016-18. The topic of her research will be ‘The Cold War Jigsaw: Poland's role in the Angolan Civil War, 1976-1986’.
Rare collection of postcards donation
Professor Anita Prazmowska was in Warsaw on 3 November 2015 to donate rare postcards written between a Jewish friend, Tamara Frymer, based in London, and the latter's family, trapped in the Warsaw Ghetto during the Second World War. "Professor Prazmowska only found out about the postcards after her friend's death, when her son, Martin, showed them to her. After his death in March this year, Prazmowska, fearing these historical artifacts might be lost, asked the executor of Martin's will to let her take them to Poland. The postcards will now go on display at the Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw and be included in the Central Jewish Library, an online collection of digitized Jewish documents from the Institute's archives". Read more about this incredible donation which tells a deep emotional story of a Jewish family's struggle for survival as reported by the Haaretz Newspaper. Watch Professor Prazmowska on Polish-speaking TVN Warszawa talking about her donation.
BBC World Service
On 26 October 2015, Professor Anita Prazmowska was on BBC World Service, Newshour. She commented on the recent Polish elections, saying "this was an election where people voted for emotions rather than policies". Listen to her analysis from 14m00s.
2014
BBC Radio 4
On 11 August 2014, Professor Anita Prazmowska spoke in BBC Radio 4's programme 'Document': 'The Hague Warning'. The programme examined "the state of the British intelligence community [in July 1939], the split between appeasers and those who distrusted every German move and why this Document and the later Venlo incident in which two British intelligence officers walked into a trap laid by the Germans, was a Secret Intelligence Crisis". Listen to the podcast.