Heteronomization of the Field of History in Contemporary Poland. An Analysis of the Forum of Contemporary History Scholars

Abstract

The paper is an analysis of contemporary Polish historical discipline from the standpoint of sociology of knowledge. My goal is to recognize the value ascribed by the contemporary history scholars to the idea of the autonomy of the discipline of history as well as to answer the question of how they understand this notion. The analysis concerns the Forum of Contemporary History Scholars that took place in Warsaw December 2016. The debate was organized to discuss the violations of the boundaries of the discipline by scholars and external actors and offers a rare insight into the way Polish historians understand their own profession. I examine the speeches of its participants with recourse to Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of the field of science, particularly his concept of autonomy. My focus is on the forms of heteronomy observed by the participants of the debate. These forms are generated by four main external powers breaching the field: political power, media, education, society. The analysis reveals that all of the participants, regardless of their position in the debate, are strongly attached to the idea of autonomy. It also allows the analyst to describe multiple reconfigurations of the meaning of autonomy that enable an individual scholar to maintain the status of the defender of the discipline independence on the one hand, and on the other to articulate his or her own projection of historical scholarship.