Uncovering ‘Invisibility’: Identities and Experiences of Exclusion among Highly Educated Germans of Polish Descent

Despite representing the second-largest immigrant group in Germany, Polish immigrants and their descendants are understudied and have often been described as ‘invisible’ as they have a reputation of ‘becoming German’ quickly and unproblematically. Challenging this notion and considering the prevalence of anti-Eastern European racism in the German context, this study analyses interviews with 22 highly educated Germans of Polish descent, focusing on how interviewees talked about being German and/or Polish and their experiences of stigmatisation and discrimination, in both their childhood and teenage years and as adults. In so doing, the study contributes to the literature on how the ethnic and national identities of white descendants of immigrants are related to experiences of exclusion. Specifically, some interviewees (Type 1) said that they felt only German (and not Polish) and denied experiencing stigmatisation or discrimination in their present lives. Other interviewees (Type 2) embraced a symbolic Polish ethnicity while framing exclusionary experiences as a thing of the past. Type 3 interviewees reported a process of re-ethnicisation, arguably enabled by the absence of exclusionary experiences in their present lives. Finally, there were interviewees (Type 4) who reported embracing their Polish identity, which led to experiences of stigmatisation in certain contexts.