Lexicon of Katyn Archaeology (1990–2015)

Ethnographic Reconstruction of the Research Process and Its Social Reception

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.1558/jca.30311

Keywords:

ethnographic interviews , Katyn Massacre, Katyn archaeology, memory

Abstract

The interdisciplinary research project “Lexicon of Katyn Archaeology (1990–2015)” aims to collect formerly dispersed material relating to research that was undertaken during the 1990s and early 2000s on traces of the Katyn Massacre of 1940, in which Soviet forces killed 22,000 Polish officers who were prisoners in the USSR. An important part of the project comprises ethnographic interviews with researchers and participants in archaeological work that took place at execution and burial sites. These interviews  make it possible to reconstruct the course of the research and to identify significant aspects that sometimes escape historical studies, archaeological reports and analytical scientific texts, but that emerge from a biographical, personal and emotional context. The project also involves interviews with people whose biographies, experiences and memories are connected with the Katyn Massacre. These reveal the reception of the archaeological research by those with the most personal interest in it, as well as what is recorded in individual experience and family memory. They also indicate practised and postulated forms of commemoration.

Author Biographies

  • Olgierd Ławrynowicz, University of Lodz

    Olgierd Ławrynowicz is an assistant professor in the Institute of Archaeology at the University of Lodz. His academic interests focus on medieval weapons, the symbolism of arms and recently also archaeology of the contemporary past and archaeology of military conflicts. At present, he is carrying out scientific projects concerning the examination of traces of totalitarian crimes and the category of remembrance in the physical and cultural landscape.

  • Aleksandra Krupa-Ławrynowicz, University of Lodz

    Aleksandra Krupa-Ławrynowicz is an assistant professor in the Institute of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology at the University of Lodz. The main focus of her research is cultural heritage as recorded in landscapes and memory. She is interested in the dynamics of transformations of local spaces and identities. Outside of the university she also runs educational workshops and animation projects, and engages in commissioned research. 

  • Sebastian Latocha, University of Lodz

    Sebastian Latocha is an assistant professor in the Institute of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology at the University of Lodz. His academic interests focus on difficult heritage, and on historical, architectural and medical anthropology. His studies include the ethnography of the Katyn Massacre, and German settlement and post-Germanism in central Poland.

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Published

2025-06-25

Issue

Vol. 11 No. 2 (2024): Special Issue: Polish Contemporary Archaeology

Section

Research Articles

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© Equinox Publishing Ltd.

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How to Cite

Ławrynowicz, O., Krupa-Ławrynowicz, A., & Latocha, S. (2025). Lexicon of Katyn Archaeology (1990–2015): Ethnographic Reconstruction of the Research Process and Its Social Reception. Journal of Contemporary Archaeology, 11(2), 202-223. https://doi.org/10.1558/jca.30311