Skip to main content

Web Content Display Web Content Display

Researchers and projects

Web Content Display Web Content Display

July 2021

20210716
Previous week
Next week

(Un)accidental Tourists: Polish Literature and Visual Culture in South Africa in the 20th and 21st Centuries

Date: 16.07.2021 - 15.07.2025

OPUS NCN

The goal of the project is to investigate the reception of 20th- and 21st-century Polish literature and visual culture in South Africa and to recognize the endurance and longevity of transnational and transgenerational Central European memory in South Africa’s literary and cultural universe. It also wishes to demonstrate the fundamental role played by Polish literature and visual arts in the development of South African literary and artistic production in the 20th and 21st centuries. The project intends to analyse the works of thirteen major South African writers and visual artists, as well as their bonds with over a dozen Polish writers and visual/performance artists and a number of other Central European artists. The project argues that placing prime focus on Poland and Central Europe is far from been “accidental” and that Polish history, experience, and literary/art works are of fundamental importance not only to the individual oeuvres and artistic visions of a number of South African writers and artists but also to the birth and evolution of South African literature and culture in the discussed period. Simultaneously, the project will scrutinise and reconstitute the trajectory of the reception of Polish literature and visual culture in South Africa, including its origins, scope, and existing acquisition models. Additionally, it will address the meaning and functions of the creative “dialogue” carried out by both Polish and South African writers and artists over the last decades. The project outcomes will provoke the need to re-consider and re-interpret the South African literary and cultural canon, as well as critically re-examine the role of Polish and Central European cultural heritage in its production. The project has been carried out by a research team composed of 5 notable scholars from a variety of academic disciplines (literature studies, culture studies, history, art history).