The Cracovian–Lower Silesian Costume: Toward Dialogical Collaboration, Hybridization and Openness to User Experience

Abstract

The subject of the article is the selection of a folk costume by the amateur singing group “Sąsiadeczki” from Dobrzeń in Lower Silesia. Against the backdrop of the region’s postwar history and contemporary cultural practices, the author analyzes the costume-related decision-making process as a hybrid action, combining elements of heritage, aesthetic preferences, and the users’ embodied experience. The empirical material was gathered during ethnographic workshops conducted with the group, using dialogical, experimental, and participatory methods. The folk costume is presented as a “third space” (H. Bhabha)—not merely a reproduction, but a field for negotiating identity, community, and functionality, as well as a component of group-making processes. The introduction of the category of user experience makes it possible to identify contemporary choices of folk costume as informed not only by aspirations toward ethnographic “correctness,” but also by bodily needs, comfort, a sense of belonging, and the realities of everyday practice. The article argues that folk costume should be understood as a dynamic medium of community formation as well as an active site of social agency, and emphasizes the importance of employing participatory methods in its analysis.