The Necessity of Remembrance
Ewa Hauser, director of Rochester's Skalny Center for Polish and Central European Studies, describes the "politics of memory" as the rewriting of history by various factions with political agendas. She and Fredrick Harris (above), associate professor of political science and director of Rochester's Center for the Study of African-American Politics, cohosted a conference in Warsaw, Poland, last March that addressed unresolved issues facing both America and Poland affected by the politics of memory.
The two-day conference, "Comparative Perspectives on Race, Nationalism, and the Politics of Memory—Poland and the United States," at Warsaw University, drew faculty from Rochester, other American universities, and international historical centers to discuss how nations remember slavery, genocide, and war can help prevent atrocities in the future.
The Fulbright Scholar Program supported the conference as well as two years of academic collaborations between Rochester and Warsaw University, which are coordinated by Hauser and Zbigniew Lewicki, professor and director of Warsaw's American Studies Center.
