The International Journal of the History of Sport

Historical Perspectives on Sport in Polish Literature and Culture

CALL FOR PAPERS: special issue of The International Journal of the History of Sport - Historical Perspectives on Sport in Polish Literature and Culture

Editor Michał Mazurkiewicz (Jan Kochanowski University)

Sport, both as a cultural phenomenon and as a symbolic field, has played an important but relatively little-studied role in Polish literature and culture. From the emergence of the early forms of sports rivalry to contemporary reflections on the body, competition, and national identity, sport has provided a dynamic lens through which writers and artists can engage with broader historical, political, and aesthetic questions.

This special issue will explore how sport has been represented, narrated, and interpreted in Polish literary and cultural texts across different historical periods. We are particularly interested in critical approaches that consider sport not only as a subject but also as a cultural phenomenon characterized by national identity, ideology, memory, and artistic expression.

Prof. Michał Mazurkiewicz invites proposals for papers with a broad focus on the historical presence of sport in Polish literature and culture, including, but not limited to, sport history, cultural history, literature history, or media history.

Potential topics discussing the unique contributions of sport to broadly understood culture, include:

• Sports literature: prose, drama, and narrative fiction
• Sports poetry and lyrical depictions of athleticism, combat, and physical performance
• Autobiographical writing by sportspeople: identity, memory, nostalgia, and the self
• Sports journalism: greatest figures, language, and cultural impact of sports reporting in Poland
• Sport in the visual and performing arts: painting, film, photography
• Gender and the sporting body: representations of masculinity, femininity, and physicality
• Patriotism and sport: symbolic roles of sport and athletic achievement in Polish national identity and resistance
• Sport and socialism/communism: ideologies of health, discipline, and collective achievement
• Olympic narratives and international competition in Polish literature and media
• Commemoration and mythologization of key athletes or sporting events in cultural memory

Submissions may address any historical period, from the distant past to the present day, including the times of the partitions, the interwar period, the People’s Republic of Poland, and the post-1989 era. Interdisciplinary approaches drawing from literary studies, cultural history, gender studies, media studies, or sport studies are encouraged. In other words, papers including intersectional analyses of the sport–culture relations are particularly welcome. 

This call is part of a wider initiative to foster scholarly dialogue on the intersections between literature, culture, and physical culture in Poland's historical contexts.

Please send questions to Michał Mazurkiewicz at michalmazurkiewicz@op.pl