Paper short abstract:

The paper discusses three anthropological interventions aimed at evoking empathy which were carried out by anthropologists from the Centre for Migration Studies in Poznań to challenge the anti-refugee rhetoric in Poland during the first crisis of receiving refugees in Europe.

Paper long abstract:

During the first crisis of receiving refugees in Europe, Poland refused to participate in the solidarity scheme of relocating asylum-seekers between different EU countries. As anthropologists working in the Centre for Migration Studies at the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, we observed the escalating anti-refugee and Islamophobic public debate in the country. To challenge this rhetoric and evoke empathy towards refugees we carried out three anthropological interventions, namely: (1) “We’re All Migrants. (Re)covering Migration Memory,” a project comprising an exhibition of letters sent home by Polish emigrants to the US and Brazil at the end of the 19th century, an educational programme for secondary school students, and ethnographic research in those migrants’ villages of origin which aim was to move away from reducing the figure of migrant/refugee to the category of the Other and to speak of ourselves as migrants instead; (2) “Adopt a Lifejacket,” a social campaign in which lifejackets worn by refugees when crossing the sea were placed in public urban spaces in Poznań to evoke discussion about the absence of actual refugees among us; and (3) “A Gallery without a Home,” a campaign addressed to primary school students, who during a series of workshops on exile prepared postcards for children from the refugee camps in Serbia, Greece, and Italy (the postcards then made up a virtual and mobile gallery). In the paper, I critically examine these interventions, their potential for an academy of hope, as well as limitations.