CREATING KASHUBIA: HISTORY, MEMORY, AND IDENTITY IN CANADA'S FIRST POLISH COMMUNITY **FIRST EDITION**

BLANK, JOSHUA C.

ISBN 10: 0773547207 / ISBN 13: 9780773547209

Published by McGill-Queen's University Press, Montreal, 2016

About this Item

pp: 347. A history of the Kashubs who emigrated from a part of Eastern Europe, sometimes included within the boundaries of Poland. For many decades, the kashubs remained within the area in, and around, Renfrew, Ontario, and along the Ottawa River. This is a very good copy with light signs of use at the corners of the front cover, and some marks on the bottom edge. The text block is clean and free of markings and underlining.

Seller Inventory # 007382

Bibliographic Details

• Title: CREATING KASHUBIA: HISTORY, MEMORY, AND IDENTITY IN CANADA'S FIRST POLISH COMMUNITY **FIRST EDITION**
• Publisher: McGill-Queen's University Press, Montreal
• Publication Date: 2016
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0773547207
• ISBN 13: 9780773547209
• Binding: Soft cover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Condition: Very Good
• Dust Jacket Condition: No Jacket, As Issued
• Seller catalogs:
  • GENEALOGY
  • CANADA

About this title

Synopsis

In recent years, over one million Canadians have claimed Polish heritage - a significant population increase since the first group of Poles came from Prussian-occupied Poland and settled in Wilno, Ontario, west of Ottawa in 1858. For over a century, descendants from this community thought of themselves as Polish, but this began to change in the 1980s due to the work of a descendant priest who emphasized the community’s origins in Poland’s Kashubia region. What resulted was the reinvention of ethnicity concurrent with a similar movement in northern Poland. Creating Kashubia chronicles more than one hundred and fifty years of history, identity, and memory and challenges the historiography of migration and settlement in the region. For decades, authors from outside Wilno, as well as community insiders, have written histories without using the other’s stores of knowledge. Joshua Blank combines primary archival material and oral history with national narratives and a rich secondary literature to reimagine the period. He examines the socio-political and religious forces in Prussia, delves into the world of emigrant recruitment, and analyzes the trans-Atlantic voyage. In doing so, Blank challenges old narratives and traces the refashioning of the community’s ethnic identity from Polish to Kashubian. An illuminating study, Creating Kashubia shows how changing identities and the politics of ethnic memory are locally situated yet transnationally influenced.

About the Author

Joshua C. Blank teaches Social Studies and English in the Ottawa Catholic School Board.