In May 2018, in support of a-n 2018 Bursary, I visited Ethnographic Museum in Krakow, Poland archives. I been mostly interested in researching these materials that are regarding love (love letters and songs) and women rituals, I also focused on looking at textile works, masks and headwear.
Power structures surrounding folk recordings and archives became subject of many conversations. There is a certain, very important social class problematic to it. The traditional folk songs were at times not ‘poetic’ or ‘sophisticated’ enough (or too obscene) for the people who collected and archived them, so at times they censored or modified them. The collectors of the ethnography were mostly coming from the upper class, therefore they were appropriating this heritage in a very specific way. They were trying to change the songs as they were trying to make them more usable for upper-middle-class context.
During the Communist period there was an operation of adaptation of what was considered ‘low’ culture to ‘high’ places like palaces of culture, where the folk songs were performed for the party nomenclature and city audience.
