Małgorzata Bakalarz is a PhD candidate in the Department of Sociology at the New School for Social Research in New York. Holding degrees in art history and sociology, she develops her academic interests around the realms of word and image. Her research focuses on discourse and space analysis, visual culture, narratives of dis/placements, and politics (and distortions) of memory.

Her research draws on her past involvement in Polish-Jewish dialogue in Poland (before coming to the US) and focuses on local reactions to the process of reclaiming of Jewish communal property in three small towns in rural southeast Poland. She studies these cases to further explore social and cultural complexities of Polish transition to democracy in the borderlands.