Appropriating Auschwitz: The Żwirowisko Crosses

Abstract

This article examines the issues of commemoration and modern-day political and religious agendas as played out at the Auschwitz site. It focuses upon the episode of the erection of the Żwirowisko crosses around the larger Papal cross immediately outside the perimeter of Auschwitz I. Setting the reactions to the crosses within the contexts of the history of suffering at the contingent parts of the Auschwitz complex, of the economic needs of the surrounding community, and of contemporary Polish and Jewish politics, it illustrates the inappropriateness of simplistic judgements about the ‘uses’ of Auschwitz.

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Charles Turner

Charles Turner lectures in sociology at the University of Warwick. A version of his doctoral thesis was published in 1992 as Modernity and Politics in the Work of Max Weber. His research interests are in social theory, the history of sociology, political sociology, and theories of modernity and postmodernity. He is currently working on the relationship between memory, history, and the reproduction of political communities.