State Conference of the German-Polish Society in Duderstadt

The public conference 2019 of the German-Polish Societies in Lower Saxony takes place under the motto “German-Polish Encounters” on Saturday, 1 June 2019, 11 o’clock, in the council hall of the historic town hall of Duderstadt, Marktstraße 66, 37115 Duderstadt.

After a short report from the previous non-public members’ meeting, greetings from the mayor Wolfgang Nolte and the chairman of the German-Polish Circle of Friends in Duderstadt Paul Schneegans are expected. Thereafter, the Lower Saxony Minister of Culture Grant Hendrik Tonne will speak for the state government on the partnership work of the state and the current state of German-Polish relations.

Students of Eichsfeldgymnasium will then present together with their supervisor Ben Thustek the exchange of ideas with students from Duderstadt’s Kashubian twin town Kartuzy. This exemplary town twinning, which is a regular meeting of all generations, has prompted the organizer to get a speaker of Kashubian origin for the presentation of the morning program.

Dr. Miłosława Borzyszkowska-Szewczyk from Gdańsk will inform about “100 years of Polish Independence Day – how did the Kashubians do it?”. The lecturer is a doctor of German and works as a university teacher at the University of Gdańsk. Volunteer she sits before the Günther Grass Society Danzig and works to preserve the Kashubian identity as a stv. Chair of the Kashubian Institute and as a member of the Kashubian Commission of the Polish Academy of Sciences PAU Krakow, section Gdańsk. Most recently, she held a visiting professorship at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz in the winter semester of 2018/2019.

After lunch together, the Leipzig literary scholar Dr. Hans-Christian Trepte on “From the Polish divisions to the Polish independence”. Our guest is Slavist, Anglist and Polonist. Until 2016 he taught at the Institute of Slavic Studies at the University of Leipzig and is co-editor of “west-east-passages” and other scientific volumes such as u.a. “Basic Terms and Authors of East-Central European Exilliterature 1945-1989”, “National Textures. National Poetry as a Literary Concept in Northeastern Europe (2009) “and” Between East and West: Joseph Conrad in European Conversation “. Dr. Hans-Christian Trepte is holder of the Cavalier Cross (2001) and the Gratitude Medal of the International Solidarity Center (2014).

German-Polish Societies in Lower Saxony e.V.

Harm Adam, chairman