“Via Dolorosa” in the Shtetl: Reenactment of the Jews’ Last Journey in Olkusz, Poland

Abstract: This article analyzes the controversies and debates over the commemoration of the Holocaust in one Polish town, as a case study that demonstrates the tensions, ambivalences and competing emotions surrounding the memory of the Holocaust in postcommunist Poland. The article focuses on the annual Memorial March in honor of the Jewish victims in the town of Olkusz, which evoked deep divisions regarding the meaning of the wartime heritage and the hierarchy of suffering and martyrdom. Adopting a bottom-up approach to collective memory and analyzing the Memorial March as a performative act of reenactment, this article highlights the ethical, historical and religious challenges inherent in commemorating the Jewish victims of the Holocaust by non-Jewish communities.