Deaf Cinema In Post-Communist Poland

• In Event: Stories of Disability Liberation in Eastern Europe: Art, Migration, (De)institutionalization, and Ecology

Abstract

From the 1970s, small, affordable cameras allowed the deaf film movement to flourish in Poland, as in other Eastern European countries. It was integrated into the structure, activities and funding of the state-run National Association of the Deaf and fell under the state's communication regimes, such as strict control of content, propaganda and censorship. In my presentation, I will discuss the change in the dynamics and production strategies of deaf films after the change of political order in 1989, which influenced the funding and role of the National Association of the Deaf, and consequently its position in the activities of the deaf community.
The focus of my presentation will be on the production of Polish deaf films in the political, cultural and economic context of the transformation of the 1990s. I will consider the concepts of amateur, independent and interdependent filmmaking and their applicability to the Polish capitalist, harshly neoliberal order of the transformation era.

Author

• Magdalena Zdrodowska, Jagiellonian U (Poland)