What does the voice of a Polish immigrant sound like? Not a politician, not a historian, not a commentator — but an ordinary person who wrote a letter to a Polish-American newspaper in 1902, or a mother who recalled crossing the Atlantic in the 1950s, or a girl from Chicago who recorded a video in 2015 about what Polishness means to her? On Tuesday, April 14th, at 6:00 PM, Prof. Anna Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann — one of the most important researchers of Polish-American history — will present a book that gathers these voices into a single narrative stretching from Jamestown in 1608 to contemporary America.
Book: “Polish Americans About Themselves”
The presented publication is “Polish Americans About Themselves. Sources for History 1608–2020” — the third volume of the monumental “History of Polish Americans” published by Państwowy Instytut Wydawniczy in Warsaw in 2025. The editors of the volume are Prof. Anna D. Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann and Prof. James S. Pula. This is the Polish-language version of their earlier English-language work “Polish American Voices: A Documentary History, 1608–2020” (Routledge, 2024), which was enthusiastically received in academic circles in the United States.
The book is something rare in Polish-American historiography — instead of telling about immigrants from the outside, it gives them a voice. One hundred forty-five source documents: letters to the editors of Polish-American newspapers, fragments of diaries and memoirs, interviews, organizational documents, press articles, as well as visual materials — photographs, drawings, caricatures, and posters. Ten thematic chapters guide the reader through the experiences of successive waves of emigration: from bread-seekers at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, through political refugees after World War II, to contemporary Poles seeking something in America that they themselves can best name.
The meeting is part of the celebrations of the 250th anniversary of the United States — the Semiquincentennial, which America celebrates throughout 2026. Poles arrived on the American continent as early as 1608, in the Jamestown settlement — and “Polish Americans About Themselves” documents their uninterrupted participation in building this country from the very beginning.
Who is Prof. Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann
Anna D. Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann is a figure that anyone interested in the history of Polish Americans should know — although, as is often the case with the most serious researchers, her name appears more often in academic footnotes than in newspaper headlines. Born in Lublin, with a master’s degree in history from Maria Curie-Skłodowska University, she has lived and worked in the United States since 1988. She earned her Ph.D. in history from the University of Minnesota. For years, she lectured at Eastern Connecticut State University, where she received the university’s highest academic title — Distinguished Professor of History. She retired in 2022 with the status of Professor Emerita.
Her academic output is impressive and consistent — each subsequent book opens a different dimension of the Polish-American experience in America. “The Exile Mission” (Ohio University Press, 2004) told of the tensions between the old Polish diaspora and post-war political emigration. “Letters from Readers in the Polish American Press” (Lexington Books, 2014) gave voice to readers of Polish-American newspapers — people who wrote letters to the editor because they had no other forum. “The Polish Hearst” (University of Illinois Press, 2015) brought closer the figure of Antoni Paryski — publisher of “Ameryka-Echo” from Toledo, Ohio, who built a Polish-American media empire at the turn of the century.
Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann is also the editor-in-chief of “Polish American Studies” — the most important academic journal dedicated to the history of Polish Americans — and a former president of the Polish American Historical Association (2007–2009), an organization bringing together researchers of Polish-American history on both sides of the Atlantic.
And if anyone thinks that the professor emerita is resting on her laurels — in July 2026, her latest book will be published by Columbia University Press: “Pierogi: An American Story of Polish Food.” The history of pierogi as a story of identity, assimilation, and how food becomes a bridge between cultures. From immigrant letters to pierogi — the logic is not obvious, but that’s precisely why it’s fascinating.
Why it’s worth coming
The author’s meeting with Professor Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann is not an academic lecture for the initiated — it’s a conversation about us. About what our grandparents wrote in letters to newspapers that have long ceased to exist. About what a Polish school in America looked like a hundred years ago and what it looks like today. About what Polishness is when it is experienced not in Warsaw or Krakow, but in Bridgeport, in Hamtramck, in Greenpoint, or in Schiller Park. The book “Polish Americans About Themselves” does not tell a textbook history — it tells a story that Polish-American families carry within themselves, often without even knowing it.
In a year when America celebrates 250 years of independence, this book reminds us that Poles have been there from the beginning — and that their voices deserve to be heard.
Practical information
- What: Author’s meeting — “History of Polish Americans through the voices of immigrants: presentation of a new book”
- When: Tuesday, April 14, 2026, 6:00 PM
- Where: Józef Piłsudski Institute of America, 138 Greenpoint Avenue, Brooklyn, NY 11222
- Author: Prof. Anna D. Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann
- Book: “Polish Americans About Themselves. Sources for History 1608–2020” (edited by A.D. Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann, J.S. Pula, PIW, Warsaw 2025)
- Admission: [TO BE CONFIRMED — free / tickets]
Editorial Staff, Voice of Polish Americans in the USA
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