PAHA AWARDS January 7, 2023
Presented at the 79th Annual Meeting Awards Dinner January 7th, 2023 at the Affiliated Polish Home in Philadelphia.
Mieczyslaw Haiman Award is offered annually to a scholar for sustained contribution to the study of Polish Americans.
Grazyna Kozaczka holds a Ph.D. in American Literature and an M.A. in English Literature and Teaching English as a Second/Foreign Language from the Jagiellonian University, Institute of English Philology. Professor of English and All-College Honors Program Director, Cazenovia College, Cazenovia, N.Y. She has authored three books: Writing the Polish American fiction and Polish women writers. The Polish American Woman in Postwar Ethnic Fiction, Athens: Ohio University Press, 2019; William Dean Howells and John Cheever: The Failing of the American Dream - An Analogy, UNIVERSITAS, Krakow, Poland, 1993; Old World Stitchery for Today. Chilton Book Company, Radnor, Pennsylvania, 1987.
Her book Writing the Polish American Fiction ... won both the 2020 Oskar Halecki Book Prize given by PAHA as well as the 2020 Waclaw Lednicki Award in the Humanities from PIASA. She also received the James S. Pula Distinguished Service Award from PAHA in 2017 and has served as past president and board member. She is the PIASA Book Review Editor for Literature and the Arts.
Oskar Halecki Prize recognizes an important book or monograph on the Polish experience in the United States. Eligibility is limited to works of historical and/or cultural interest, including those in the social sciences or humanities, published in the two years prior to the year of the award.
William Hal Gorby. Wheeling’s Polonia: Reconstructing Polish Community in a West Virginia Steel Town. Morgantown, West Virginia University Press, 2020.
This book is very insightful with attention given to a smaller Polonia community which is usually not the topic of research. To quote from Matthew Stefanski’s review of Gorby’s book in the December 2020 Pol-Am Journal, Gorby seeks to reframe smaller urban communities as equally important to understanding the Polish emigre experience. “Given that most Americans did not live in cities over several hundred thousand people,” he argues, “turning our attention to smaller urban locals dramatically alters our understanding of the lived experiences of working-class immigrants.” With this guiding aim, Hal Gorby takes readers on a fascinating journey through nearly 50 years of rich Polonia history in Wheeling, West Virginia. Through in-depth research conducted over the course of a decade, Hal Gorby presents a comprehensive picture of a Polish community in Wheeling as it established itself, overcame many obstacles, and prospered. While Wheeling has some unique characteristics, being that it was a mostly urban, industrial, Catholic community in a state that was otherwise not; its Polish history, as Hal Gorby has shown, is absorbing, relatable, and no less worthy of documenting than that of larger metropolises. It is a well- researched, scholarly volume with extensive bibliography and notes yet very readable for anyone interested in the “ordinary” people who make up a Polish community.
Skalny Civic Achievement Award honors individuals or groups who advance PAHA's goals of promoting research and awareness of the Polish American experience. Possible initiatives may include preservation of artifacts or broader community initiatives related to Polonia.
1.Peter and Beverly (Flynn) Glofcheskie of Barry's Bay, Ontario, Canada for their dedication to preserving and promoting Polish and Kashubian culture in the regional and international diaspora. Peter has been President of the Wilno Heritage Society (WHS) for the last 10 years. His wife, Beverly, has also been instrumental in her role as membership director and heritage store manager. The WHS membership has increased and the "Kashub Day" festival has grown in size and variety under their guidance.
Canada Day festivities with children's activities have also been a mainstay event under their tenure as well They have also encouraged research into subjects involving the Wilno Heritage Society as well. The WHS, the park and museum would not be as well-known and active to this day without the leadership and efforts of Peter and Beverly Glofcheskie.
2.Polish People’s University in Philadelphia Janusz Romanski, President
https://www.polishpeoplesuniversity.org/
The Polish People's University (PUL) in Philadelphia was established in 1918. PUL is associated with the Polish American Congress and its cultural and educational achievements for Polonia date back for over one hundred years. The goal of the University is the introduction to and cultivation of Polish culture and tradition, as well as education about today's Poland among Americans of Polish descent. Since its beginnings, the University has placed a great emphasis on maintaining and preserving the beauty of the Polish language thus lectures and readings are in Polish. The lectures encompass a diversified spectrum of topics from arts, literature and science , and are followed by a social gathering and lively discussions.
3.Polish American Cultural Center and Museum (PACCM) Michael Blichasz, President
The Cultural Center and Exhibit Hall are outgrowths of Polish American Social Services (PASS), an agency dating back to 1908 to address the social service needs of the substantial Polish American population in the Philadelphia area. In 1981, PASS leaders recognized the need to move beyond the social service needs of Polish Americans and organized the Polish American Cultural Center to enhance a museum exhibit hall to preserve and display Polish history and culture for the general public. In their current home in the heart of America's most historic square mile, the museum holds portraits of famous Poles along with their biographies, coats of arms of Polish families, displays and descriptions of Polish customs.
The Center publishes a monthly newsletter, supports a local Polish American radio program, provides activities during Polish Heritage month, Pulaski Day parade and other cultural events throughout the year.
https://www.polishcultureacpc.org/orgs/PHSP.html
The Polish Heritage Society of Philadelphia is an Affiliate of the national American Council for Polish Culture, dedicated to fostering an interest in Polish Heritage and culture, and spreading an awareness of the accomplishments of Poles and Polish-Americans throughout the world, most especially in the Unites States. The society dates to the Polish American Historical Association Convention in 1964 where members discussed the formation of a new Polish cultural society in the Delaware Valley and the Society was born.
PHSP activities include the awarding of scholarships, book and author promotions, the annual Chopin Concert, the annual Adam Styka Art Exhibit, and the annual grand Polonaise Ball. The members participate in the annual Pulaski Day parade. which led to the formation of the PHSP. Over the years the Society was instrumental in the commissioning and placing of the Kopernik Monument adjacent to the Cathedral of Sts. Peter and Paul. Through efforts of late members Edward Piszek and Edward Pinkowski, the Independence National Park, in cooperation with the National Park Service, refurbished and opened the Kosciuszko House. Many of the group members have volunteered as visitor guides at the house. The Society, with the assistance of the Poles in America Society, erected and dedicated a marker on the Drexel University campus to Dr. Walter Golaski, biomedical engineer and former chair of the Kosciuszko Fdn Board of Trustees. They have supported other historical markers throughout the area.
Amicus Poloniae Award recognizes significant contributions enhancing knowledge of Polish and Polish-American heritage by individuals not belonging to the Polish American community.
David Strathairn, actor, Clark Young, script writer, and Derek Golden, writers and producers of “Remember this. The lesson of Jan Karski.” Originally developed at Georgetown Univ, where Karski taught for four decades, the one-man dramatic production has been shown to great acclaim in Chicago, New York, Washington DC, among many locations. Strathairn himself has imbued himself into Jan Karski’s heroic story as a Polish resistance fighter and his struggle to convince the Allies of the Holocaust’s enormity and gives lectures and talk backs about the man he portrays. He has been telling this story of the World War II hero for seven years. In carrying out this 90-minute, one man production the 73-year-old actor goes through a physically demanding regime: “The more time I spend with him, his legacy continues to amplify,” says Strathairn. The contemporary relevance in the story of an Eastern European man who testifies to atrocities committed by a foreign invader based on what he has seen is plain to understand. The play will travel to Spain and potentially an off-Broadway run.
Creative Arts Prize recognizes the contributions in the field of creative arts by individuals or groups who have promoted an awareness of the Polish experience in the Americas.
Karolina Waclawiak is the author of three critically acclaimed novels: How to Get into the Twin Palms, The Invaders, and Life Events. Her debut novel, How to Get into the Twin Palms, develops the themes of displacement and alienation in this immigration story.
Karolina Waclawiak holds a BFA degree in Screenwriting from USC and an MFA in Fiction from Columbia University. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, VQR, The Believer, Hazlitt, and other publications. She was formerly the deputy editor at The Believer, and in June 2022, became the outlet’s Editor-In-Chief and previously served as the Executive Editor of Culture and Director of Development for News Documentaries.
SWASTEK PRIZE
The Editorial Board of Polish American Studies selected the best article for the year in recognition of an outstanding scholarly contribution to the journal. The Swastek Prize is given to Dr. Karen Majewski. The article selected as the best article (volume 78 issue 1 (2021)) is “Abortion and Infanticide in Polish American Detroit and Hamtramck, 1900-1960: A Preliminary Look.” Majewski’s article was commended for its unique use of data, new primary sources, and most importantly for addressing an important, timely and hitherto unaddressed and taboo topics in Polonia and Polonia studies. It was described as pathbreaking and courageous. Majewski’s findings, as suggested in the conclusion of the article, are significant for Polish American history, but also contribute to understanding of historical issues of gender in general.
GRADUATE STUDENT/YOUNG SCHOLAR TRAVEL GRANT
The two grants dealing with the Polish diaspora experience in any historical epoch, scholarly field, or aspect submitted by junior scholars.
Dorota Choinska (Wroclaw)
Ms. Choinska holds an MA in Public History from the University of Wroclaw and is currently in her second year of a Ph.D. program in History at the University of Wroclaw and the Open University of Catalonia in Barcelona. Her supervisors are Joanna Wojdon and Marc Gil Garrusta, under whom she is preparing her doctoral thesis on Polish refugees who sought refuge in Spain from Nazi-occupied Europe during World War II. Her research interests are migration and refugee studies, politics of memory, and qualitative and quantitative methods of data analysis. She utilizes police interrogations as sources in migration studies as a study of migratory fluxes and their participants, particularly those deemed as illegal or undesirable. She received a Preludium20 research grant from the National Science Center in Poland as well as a Fulbright Junior Research Award to conduct research at New York University beginning in September 2022.
Natalie Cornett (Canada)
Dr. Cornett is currently a postdoctoral fellow researcher at McGill University (Montreal) in the Dept. of History and Classical Studies. She holds a Ph.D. in history from Brandeis University: her dissertation was entitled: “The Politics of Love: The ‘Enthusiasts’ and Feminism in Nineteenth Century Poland”. She also has a MA in Cultural Studies from the Jagellionian University and her undergraduate degree in Arts in History is from the University of Toronto. She is an editorial assistant for the Canadian Slavonic Papers. She is the guest editor of the forthcoming issue (Fall 2023) Polish Review “Gender and the Nation.” Her current research explores internationalist socialism through the person of Rosa Luxemburg and her views on the Polish question.