Category: Calls for Papers (CFPs)

Deadline: October 31, 2023

Workshop 14/15 March 2024

Institute of Contemporary History, Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague

Georgetown University, Washington DC

Center of Contemporary History, ZZF Potsdam

Re-constructing Perestroika(s): In Search of a new Vocabulary for the Transformation of Central and Eastern Europe and Eurasia

For a long time the term Perestroika meant first and foremost ‘reforms from above’, whose initiative and execution were inextricably linked with the name of Mikhail Gorbachev. Yet a look back into contemporary sources and commentary quickly points to many actors, many ideas, and many debates and conversations taking place in a time characterized by emotional intensity and economic hardship, by ardent pursuit of hidden facts and fascination with mysticism and conspiracies. From a distance of more than thirty years, it has also become apparent that Perestroika cannot be limited to the political and economic spheres, but comprises the entirety of social and cultural life as well as new fields of intellectual, organizational and cultural activity.

Continue reading “CFP: Re-constructing Perestroika(s): In Search of a new Vocabulary for the Transformation of Central and Eastern Europe and Eurasia”

Deadline: September 15, 2023

Sergei Parajanov at One Hundred: Chimeras of Nation, Form, and Being

February 22-24, 2024

University of Southern California

In his interview with Ron Holloway, Parajanov proclaimed that he was a chimera, a being inscrutable to others but also uniquely able to look ahead and beyond all constraints. The chimera, a mythological figure comprising parts of different bodies, emblematizes both the possibilities of imagination and the impossibility of categorization and control. It poses a challenge to homogeneity, fixity, swift legibility and intelligibility by re-constellating the known to produce aesthetic wonders that are always in excess of the sensible. A slap in the face of propriety and pure reason, a blow to scientific and epistemological certainty, the chimera boldly transcends limiting constructions and strictures. And for those very same reasons, the chimera is often subject to suspicion, fear, and persecution.

Continue reading “CFP: Sergei Parajanov Conference in 2024 (University of Southern California)”

Deadline: September 30, 2023

55th Annual Convention of the Northeast Modern Language Association (NeMLA)

March 7-10, 2024

Boston, MA

For many Americans, Belarus was put on the (literary) map in 2015, when Svetlana Alexievich won the Nobel Prize in Literature. Many more learned about Belarus in 2020, when a tenacious wave of country-wide post-election protests (unprecedented in the history of this arguably most Soviet of the post-Soviet states) brought Belarus into public discourse in the US. The initial American enthusiasm for Belarusians’ struggle for democracy has since ebbed away. Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, which the Belarusian regime supports, the country has receded from view as an independent actor.

Continue reading “CFP: Diversifying Slavic Studies. Making Room for Belarusian Voices”

Deadline: August 15. 2023

We are organizing a panel stream on Polish culture at AATSEEL 2024 (see the description below). If you like to join one of the panels, submit a paper abstract to AATSEEL by August 15 and mention the stream title in your message. Please feel free to contact me (wodzynski@wisc.edu) or Lukasz Sicinski (lsicisnsk@indiana.edu) with any questions. 

Beyond Horizon: Alternatives and Transgressions in Twentieth- and Twenty-First-Century Polish Culture 

Continue reading “CFP: Polish Culture (AATSEEL 2024)”