Paper short abstract:

The paper discusses the relations between the pre-war German heritage and Poles who appropriated it as a result of post-war decisions. It proposes the term “espoused heritage” to grasp the phenomenon of hostile objects that became appreciated and paradoxically served to create a sense of belonging.

Paper long abstract:

The paper is based on the ongoing research on the pre-war materiality and its meanings for the contemporary inhabitants of Western Polish territories. The discussed region, before World War II belonged to Germany, was incorporated to Poland as a result of the Potsdam Agreement. The border change evoked massive migration of both: people leaving and coming to the region together with their belongings. New inhabitants of the region settled into abandoned houses, filled with objects of everyday use that were owned by their war enemies. The objects provoked many contradictory emotions, they were foreign but also useful in the post-war time of deficiency. We analyze feelings and affects induced by pre-war German heritage in Poles: from the sense of temporality and disturbance to the feeling of mine-ness (Traba, Jemeinigkeit Heidegger). The focus is put on the objects that, while unknown or even hostile at the beginning, were finally appreciated, incorporated into the family history to fill the gap of personal lost (homeland, family, objects). We propose the term “espoused heritage” to underline the ties and feelings evoked in the object-person relation and the role of objects in creating a sense of belonging. The paper is based on theories developing the concept of heritage through the situation of inheritance and analyze the entanglement of disinheritance and appropriation of the legacy of others (Ashworth G., Graham, B., Tunbridge, 2007). We will also explore the relations between affects, emotions and heritage (Smith L., Wetherell M., Campbell G. 2018).