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Depiction of Warsaw Uprising in Games: Politics of Memory

Explore the connection between Polish cultural memory and games about the Warsaw Uprising, analyzing dominant and contested narratives. Discover the impact of gamic conventions on memory and the negotiation between local, national, and global perspectives.

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Depiction of Warsaw Uprising in Games: Politics of Memory

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  1. Children of Warsaw,We'll Go into the Fight: Discourses of Polish Cultural Memory in Games About the Warsaw Uprising Piotr Sterczewski, M.A. PhD candidateJagiellonian University in Kraków

  2. Basic topics • Depictions of the Warsaw Uprising in 3 games: Uprising44: The Silent Shadows, Mali Powstańcy (Little Insurgents), Enemy Front • Connection to discourses of Polish cultural memory/politics of memory • Dominant discourses vs. gamic/narrative conventions • Negotiation between the local/the national and the global

  3. Warsaw Uprising – basic facts • August 1st – October 2nd, 1944 • Aim: retake Warsaw from the German forces before the Red Army • Incited by the underground Home Army (Armia Krajowa) • Result: Polish defeat, Polish casualties over 200.000, demolition of Warsaw, over 500.000 internal refugees

  4. Warsaw Uprising – key symbols

  5. Warsaw Uprising: politics of memory • Neglected during the Communist rule (1945-1989) • Rising '44 boom (since 2004): Warsaw Rising Museum, concerts, books, comics, movies • One of the central events in Polish collective memory • Highly controversial (was it worth starting?)

  6. Warsaw Uprising: dominant and contested memory • Contested: • civilian • pragmatic • herstorical • left-wing • Jewish • the individual • uprising as a wrong decision • Dominant: • military • heroic • sacrificial • male-centered • right-wing • the national • uprising justified/inevitable

  7. Victimhood and noble suffering (Nijakowski, Janion) • Poles as oppressed, attacked, defeated • BUT • honorable, idealistic, courageus, „moral victors”, victims/sacrifices/offerings, failure is identity-building (raising from the ashes) • the concept of „martyrology” (martyrologia)

  8. Uprising 44: Silent Shadows military-centered, heroic

  9. Uprising 44: Silent Shadows phantomic existence of civilians

  10. Uprising as an adventure. Little Insurgents

  11. Scout Military Mail: a non-violent topic?

  12. Enemy Front: gamisms vs. martyrology

  13. Enemy Front: gamisms vs. martyrology

  14. Enemy Front: religious discourses

  15. Enemy Front: gamic conventions vs. gravity of situation

  16. Enemy Front: a foreign hero

  17. Enemy Front: game conventions in non-Warsaw segments

  18. Enemy Front: glimpses of „everydayness”

  19. Enemy Front: civilians in heroic context

  20. Enemy Front: civilians in heroic context

  21. Enemy Front: civilians in heroic context

  22. Games on Warsaw Uprising and Polish cultural memory: conclusions • Games generally in line with the dominant modes of cultural memory • Gamic conventions reinforce heroic narratives • Filters and ommissions: violence, internal conflicts, non-hegemonic identities, pragmatical sense of the uprising

  23. Thank you for your attention! Piotr Sterczewskitwitter: @frenolestes

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