Dr Marcela Szymańska from the State Higher Vocational School in Racibórz won the national competition “Roots and Wings” organized by the National Institute of Rural Culture and Heritage. She was awarded for her doctoral dissertation on the culture and heritage of rural areas “Cultural heritage of the Silesian countryside on the Silesian-Moravian border (Krzanowice commune)”.
23 MA and 13 PhD dissertations were submitted to the competition. Their topics dealt with issues related to the culture and heritage of rural areas and touched upon problems in the field of architecture, art, musicology, sociology and geography.
For 20 years, the laureate has been a teacher of the Polish language and education for family life at the Primary School in Krzanowice. Her scientific interests include the cultural and linguistic heritage of the Silesian-Moravian borderland, traditional and contemporary regional culture, food and dishes in culture, religiousness and popular piety, cultural tourism, and regional varieties of the language.
