PI: dr Magda Szcześniak
Co-investigator: dr Krzysztof Świrek (Faculty of Sociology, University of Warsaw), mgr Marek Kawka
Funding body: Excellence Initiative Research University, University of Warsaw (IDUB)
Project time-span: 2023–2025
Representations, especially images, are crucial participants in the process of shaping class identities and relations between social classes. Class is relational and fluid—it would be difficult to identify even a single stable element that consistently denotes membership in a specific class—yet it is also subject to constant visualization, whether in the form of negatively tainted stereotypes or grassroots symbols. The project aims to examine the modes of representating the popular classes (urban working and peasant classes) in contemporary Polish visual culture (2015–2023, with references to purposefully selected examples from post-1989 visual culture). Classifying dominant images of working classes, followed by their critical analysis, will allow for an understanding of the role images play in discussions about class structure and class relations in contemporary Poland.
The project therefore asks what roles images of working classes play in the public sphere and what assumptions about class structure and relations can be gleaned from them. One of the project’s goals will also be to identify the relationship between the affective and ideological dimensions of images, their media carrier, and the genre of visual representation. The project is interdisciplinary in nature, combining reflection on social class using tools from critical social theories with cultural studies analyses of visual representations and theories of image circulation and agency drawn from visual culture studies.
