In Between? 2022

About In Between? 2022

6–16 July 2022, Alsace, Friuli Venezia Giulia, Cieszyn Silesia

In Between? is an educational project for students interested in exploring the history of the European borderland regions. This year the participants will meet in Warsaw and subsequently set off on study visits to Alsace, Friuli Venezia Giulia or Cieszyn Silesia, where they will interview members of the local community and produce a series of podcasts.

The programme starts on 6 July with three days of training in Warsaw with lectures in oral history, along with workshops on podcast creation and production. The part dedicated to the theory and practice of oral history research will include meetings with Liana Blicharska, a Ukrainian historian collaborating with the Territory of Terror Museum in Lviv; Maria Buko, a social scientist and oral history specialist; Ewa Maj, Chief Specialist in the Research Department of the ‘Remembrance and Future’ Centre in Wrocław, and Jarek Kociszewski, a journalist, podcaster and the editor-in-chief of the New Eastern Europe magazine. John Beauchamp, a journalist and podcast producer (Free Range), will hold a workshop on podcast creationn and production. On 9 July participants will be split into three groups and travel to one of the German-French, Slovenian-Italian or Czech-Polish borderland regions.

The destination of the first group will be partner cities of Cieszyn and Český Těšín at the foot of the Beskid Mountains on the Polish-Czech border. Before the First World War, Poles, Czechs, Jews and Austrian Germans lived in Cieszyn, the capital of the region. The provisions of the Treaty of Versailles of 1919 began the process of regulating the borders of the Polish and Czechoslovak states diplomatically, militarily and politically. As a result, the city was divided by a border running along the River Olza. Here, the participants of the project will look for answers to the questions on how have the the mutual relations between the Czechs and Poles changed in the region since the borders opened up on joining the European Union? What roles do regional and national identities play? Do Prague and Warsaw set the tone or are local cultural and economic ties more important? The group will receive help from members of the Český Těšín’s Polish minority and from local activists from both sides of the border.

The members of the group going to Alsace are guests of the Albert Schweitzer International Youth Centre in Niederbronn-les-Bains, one of the sites run by the German War Graves Commission. Niederbronn-les-Bains is the starting point for tours throughout the region and to Strasbourg, which lies 40 km away. Nowadays, the capital of Alsace and the seat of the European Parliament is considered to be a symbol of a peaceful coexistence and of economic and cultural integration in a united Europe. However, the Alsatian people living here have been victims to the territorial and political claims of France and Germany in the past. Have the local people managed to retain their own identity and language? Have the wounds inflicted by the wars and ideologies of the 19th and 20th century had time to heal?

The third group travels to the Friuli Venezia Giulia to explore the twin cities of Gorizia and Nova Gorica on the Italian-Slovenian border respectively. During the First World War, Gorizia, a city located on the banks of the River Isonzo became the scene of intense fighting, as evidenced nowadays by a large number of cemeteries and memorial sites. Similar to the neighbouring city of Trieste, Gorizia has been shaped by three cultures: German-Austrian, Slovenian and Italian-Venetian. The participants of ‘In Between?’ will follow their mutual relations. The local partner of the project will be Kulturhaus Görz – a cultural centre dedicated to preserving the multilingual heritage of the city.

Each team will gather materials documenting personal experiences of the inhabitants of the multi-ethnic borderlands and create a short artistic podcast, conveying the atmosphere and history of the region with the help of sound. The 2022 edition marks the start of a three-year-long programme by the ENRS dedicated to migrations in Europe. The interviews will become an integral part of an educational package planned for 2025. The podcasts will be shared in the ENRS’s multimedia library and on the streaming platforms Spotify and Simplecast.

Workshops & Mentors

Liana Blicharska

Workshop "oral history"

Historian, oral history researcher and cultural anthropologist; graduate at the Jagiellonian University and Ukrainian Catholic University. Researcher and interviewer in Memorial Museum of Totalitarian Regimes "Territory of Terror", Lviv, Ukraine. Coordinates oral history project "Unheard" and in 2021-2022, together with the museum's team, completed oral history project "Lost Childhood" - an online platform where was visualized 30 oral interviews with people who have witnessed violence, repression and crimes against humanity in their childhood. Coordinator of Ukrainian team of "In Between" project in 2021.

Maria Buko

Workshop "oral history"

Sociologist, historian, oral history researcher. PhD student at the Institute of Applied Social Sciences, University of Warsaw. In the years 2012-2021, a researcher at the History Meeting House in Warsaw, where from 2019 she headed the Oral History Archive. Author of „Pogłosy. Dzieci więźniów niemieckich obozów koncentracyjnych” („Echoes/Post-voices. Children of survivors of German concentration camps”) and co-author of „Przetrwałam. Doświadczenia kobiet więzionych w czasach nazizmu i stalinizmu” („I survived. Testimonies of women imprisoned during Nazi and Stalinist times”). Specializes in the oral history of war experience, and transgenerational memory of war trauma.

Ewa Maj

Workshop "rules for archiving files and publication possibilities

American Studies graduate at the University of Wrocław and holds a PhD in the Humanities; a researcher of the history of the Polish People’s Republic’s diplomacy and the oral history method. Chief Specialist in the Research Department of the ‘Remembrance and Future’ Centre in Wrocław and deputy editor-in-chief of "Wrocławski Rocznik Historii Mówionej" (Wrocław Oral History Yearbook), member of the Polish Oral History Association.

John Beauchamp

mentor in podcast production

John is a Polish-British journalist and one of the most prominent English voices in Poland. He worked for Polish Radio for over a decade, and currently produces podcasts for the Polish Press Agency (PAP). He teaches journalism, and has also worked on a number of innovative audio projects in both Polish and English, including geolocated ‘soundwalks’ for Culture.pl. He is one of the founders of Free Range Productions, an independent audio storytelling company. You can also hear his voice on the Warsaw subway. John shared his expertise during the study visit to Alsace.
Photo by Jaap Arriens

Jarosław Kociszewski

Mentor in podcast production

Jarek is a journalist and international relations expert. For many years he was a Middle East correspondent for the Polish press and one of the hosts of the program “Więcej Świata” on Polish Radio. Presently he is a chief editor of www.new.org.pl portal run by College of Eastern Europe and collaborates with Stratpoints NGO focusing on development and security. He is a frequent guest on several radio programs, where he comments on the current political situation in Asian and African countries. Jarosław Kociszewski is also one of the three founders of Free Range Productions. He accompanied the participants in Cieszyn/Cesky Tesin as a mentor during their podcast production.
Photo by Jaap Arriens

Bartosz Panek

Mentor in podcast production

Bartosz has over 20 years of experience as a journalist, documentary maker and presenter on Polish Radio. During his career he has produced hundreds of radio shows on a variety of subjects, ranging from culture and travel to social interest. His works has received international recognition, the most important being the 2014 Prix Italia, awarded for extraordinary originality and innovation to his radio documentary “I Want More”. His most recent distinction was the silver medal at the URTI Radio Grand Prix for “Keeping my Cool”- a record of one month in lockdown, spent together with his family during the pandemic. In 2020 Bartosz left Polish Radio to launch Free Range Productions. He joined the Italian-Slowenian study visit to assist the “In Between?” team during the podcast making.
Photo by Jaap Arriens