Korek, Janusz [red.]

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From sovietology to postcoloniality

The idea of applying a postcolonial perspective to the countries of Central and Eastern Europe may seem controversial. Opponents of the idea emphasize that we are not dealing with classical colonies, which are distant and lie across the seas, in relation to the imperial centre. We can, however, accept the essence of research into imperialism and colonialism as an attempt to understand how the imperial centre of authority aims to subordinate to itself or dominate the territories desired by itself. Just as with gender theories, which read known canons a new and carry out, for example, new historical analyses while bearing in mind heteronormative structures, so too postcolonial theorists carry out new readings of known canons from the perspective of the position of authority - the oppressed : the imperialist. We can look in a similar way at the modern history of Central and Eastern Europe, at the recently fallen Soviet Empire, and research the imperialist discourses of the “West” on the subject of the European “East” as well as re-evaluate the work of Slavonic and Soviet Studies that was deformed by the atmosphere of the Cold War. In this book, readers will nd analyses of literary, social and political phenomena seen through the prism of various aspects of postcolonial theory, albeit with a common denominator. This common denominator is the question of identity: from the question of national identity in the context of contemporary political processes in Ukraine to the problems of individual identity – Otherness, Foreignness, Uniqueness – addressed by Polish literature and analysed from a philosophical perspective.