www.sprawiedliwi.org.pl – new version
On Monday, September 20th, 2010 at the Austrian Cultural Forum on Próżna Street in Warsaw took place the presentation of the new version of the portal www.sprawiedliwi.org.pl. Among the participants of the meeting was Anna Stupnicka-Bando, president of the Polish Society of the Righteous Among the Nations, and Marian Kalwary, representing the Association of “Children of the Holocaust” in Poland. The symbolic unveiling of the "monument" commemorating the Polish Righteous - an Internet portal - was carried out earlier by Paweł Brylski from the Communication Department of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews. "We want to prove that monuments do not need to be shaped out of bronze or concrete. They also do not necessarily have to provoke arguments" - he said, with reference to the arguments concerning the plans of building in this spot a monument devoted to the Poles who saved Jews during the Second World War.
The portal was presented to the assembled by its administrator Przemysław Szałkowski and by the coordinator of the project “Polish Righteous – Recalling Forgotten History” Łucja Koch. They described is as a modern monument, a contemporary form of collective memory, contrasting with traditional, one-time ways of commemoration, having a strictly limited reach and effect. The portal “Polish Righteous” is supposed to be a lively platform – not only a rich source of information, but also a tool of education and interaction with its recipients. Thanks to its unique form, adapted to the requirements of the modern world, the portal is available to users throughout the world, both in English and Polish. During the presentation of the new version of the project www.sprawiedliwi.org.pl, some recent modifications and improvements have been presented. Among them are a modern system of links, a glossary helping users to benefit from the gathered materials, new forms of presenting multimedia and information, as well as maps showing the places where the Righteous had been hiding Jews.
The main goal of the project “Polish Righteous – Recalling Forgotten History”is to preserve and protect the memory of the Polish Righteous, for years forgotten and marginalized in the collective memory. This situation is gradually changing – more and more people talk and write about the Righteous. The creators of the portal hope that the project of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews has played and will play in the future an important part in this process. From over 6 thousands Polish Righteous about 500 live to this day. The Museum of the History of Polish Jews reached about 300 from among them and is planning to conduct about 50 new interviews until the end of this year. These interviews will be recorded and presented both in the form of audio and video files on the portal of the project “Polish Righteous – Recalling Forgotten History”.
The program “Polish Righteous – Recalling Forgotten History” is subsidized by the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage and is co-financed by the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Poland as part of the cyclical program "Promotion of knowledge about Poland" and by the program Civic Initiatives Fund.
