“Small homeland” in the memories and life strategies of displaced persons from the Polish-Ukrainian borderland: some experiences of the 40 – 50’s of xx century

Abstract

Based on eyewitness accounts of forced resettlement from the Polish-Ukrainian borderland between 1947 and 1951, the article traces reflections on the abandoned “small homelands” and their place in the further life strategies of the evicted persons. Special attention is paid to the definition of the abandoned land in the narratives of displaced persons from Western Boykivshchyna, Lemkivshchyna, and Nadsiannia. Such concepts as “Bieszczady”, “homeland”, “home”, and “hut” are examined, as well as other words in the semantic field of the “small homeland”. The aim is to trace how the memory of the land of origin and the search for a familiar socio-cultural and natural geographical space influenced the making of important life decisions, especially for those who experienced the trauma of expulsion as teenagers or young adults. In some memory narratives of those who directly experienced resettlement during Operation Vistula in 1947 and the so-called territorial exchange between Poland and the USSR in 1951, a sense of nostalgia, and  for the abandoned home, land and household are prominent. The article also analyses the visits to places of birth in the Polish-Ukrainian border, as a strategy to come to terms with the own traumatic past.