Agnieszka Magdziak-Miszewska, Consul General of the Republic of Poland in New York, will visit Rochester at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 28, to discuss “Collective Memory as a Factor in Polish-Ukrainian Relations.” Her talk, sponsored by the Skalny Center for Polish and Central European Studies at the University of Rochester, will take place in Lander Auditorium of Hutchison Hall on the University’s River Campus. It is free and open to the public.
Miszewska, who graduated from the University of Warsaw in Polish literature and from Jagiellonian University in theater studies, began her career as a staff writer for the monthly Wiez, a journal started by former Prime Minister Tadeusz Mazowiecki and connected to KIK or the Club of Catholic Intelligentsia. A year later in 1985, she was one of the creators of the independent Center for International Studies in Warsaw, a research unit later banned by the communist authorities.
After 1989 when the country was renamed the Republic of Poland and a free-market economy was established, Miszewska joined the Polish diplomatic core and was appointed the chargé d’affaires of the Embassy in Moscow from 1991 to 1995. From 1995 to 2001, she served as assistant editor-in-chief of Wiez, and for three years during that period was an advisor to former Prime Minister Jerzy Buzek for Polish-Jewish relations. Since April 2001, she has been the Consul General of the Republic of Poland with offices in New York.
Miszewska has published numerous articles on topics of foreign policy, international security, and specifically on Ukraine, formerly a republic of the Soviet Union, and on Polish-Jewish relations.
The Consulate General of Poland in New York serves residents of Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Vermont.
A reception will follow her talk. For more information, contact the Skalny Center at (585) 275-9898.