Monday 18 March 2024

Dissertation Prize Winners’ Award Evening 14th March 2024

We were delighted to be able to award certificates to our LAHS dissertation prize winners for 2024. Our chair, Matt Beamish, presented to Jakub Milcarz, winner of the BA History prize. The citation was read by Liz Tingle. Well done to Jakub!

Jakub's dissertation is entitled ‘Living Conditions in Polish Resettlement Camps 1947-1960’ (De Montfort University, 2023).

The study looks at living conditions in the Polish Resettlement Camps in post-war Britain, focusing on physical aspects of camp life such as the quality of housing and food, as well as the social and cultural well-being of the camp inhabitants. Using oral histories as well as newspapers, government reports and memoirs this study demonstrates that the living conditions in the camps were inadequate when the Poles arrived but were subsequently improved. Case studies from a variety of camps from across Britain, but with a majority drawn from Leicestershire and Rutland, demonstrate that the presence of nation-wide Polish institutions such as the ex-combatant's association or the Polish Catholic Mission as well as access to the Polish exile press meant that despite geographical separation, the camps developed across the same cultural trajectory. By understanding the agrarian origin of the Poles, their war time experiences and the subsequent development of the exile identity, we can see how the camps were transformed to suit a traditional Polish way of living as well as creating a unique Polish cultural enclave.

Jakub has also written a blog on the Polish Resettlement Camps which can be accessed here.