Zuzanna Bogumil is Assistant Professor at the Maria Grzegorzewska University in Warsaw. She works on the religious dimension of memory. Her recent publications focus on representation of the Second World War in Eastern European museums and rediscovery of Russia's repressive past.

Malgorzata Glowacka-Grajper is Assistant Professor at the Institute of Sociology at the University of Warsaw. She has published several articles and books on ethnic minorities in Poland, ethnic identity and social memory in post-Soviet countries.

This book shows how vernacular communities commemorate their traumatic experiences of World War II. It draws on four case studies: Kalków-Godów, Michniów, Jedwabne and Markowa, to argue that it is still possible in the Polish countryside to discover milieux de mémoire. The state also uses local histories to bolster its moral capital.

Vernacular memory - Vernacular community - Local community - National site of memory - Local history - Moral capital - Religious framework of memory - Milieux de mémoire - Cultural trauma of local community - Vernacular commemoration - Relationships between ethnic Poles and Polish Jews - Jedwabne - Markowa - Ulma Family - Michniów - Martyrdom - Kalków-Godów - Polish peasants - Historical politics

This book shows how vernacular communities commemorate their traumatic experiences of the Second World War. Despite having access to many diverse memory frameworks typical of late modernity, these communities primarily function within religious memory frameworks. The book also traces how they reacted when their local histories were incorporated into the remembrance practices of the state. The authors draw on case studies of four vernacular communities, notably Kalków-Godów, Michniów, Jedwabne and Markowa, to argue that it is still possible in the Polish countryside to discover milieux de mémoire. At the same time, they show that the state not only uses local histories to bolster its moral capital in the international arena, but also in matters of domestic policy.