Midwest Slavic Conference 2021

The Midwest Slavic Association and the Center for Slavic and East European Studies at The Ohio State University will host the 2021 Midwest Slavic Conference from April 15th-17th. This year, the conference will be an online conference. The full schedule of events is below. More details can be found at the conference website.

April 15th-17th via Zoom

Register for free here

Thursday, April 15, 6:30 — 8:00PM EDT

Dr. Yvonne Howell, University of Richmond

“The Geography of Joy: Alex Dubas, Voices of Russian Happiness, and the Art of Translation”

The keynote will be held via a Zoom webinar. Every person who wishes to attend MUST register INDIVIDUALLY in advance. You can register here.

It’s a cliché that the word “happiness” is not what springs to mind when one delves into Russian literature and culture. Yet, Alex Dubas (Latvian-Russian journalist and performer; host of Silver Rain radio in Moscow) hit a resonant chord with his recent book of first-person accounts of Moments of Happiness (Momenty schast’ia, ACT, 2016). The book has already been reissued several times, and it thrives as a performance piece in theaters as well. In this unusually happy (but actually rather serious) presentation, I will argue that Dubas’ documentary prose, while paradoxically similar to Svetlana Alexievich’s fiction/non-fiction, functions as an inquiry into what it means to be an urban, educated post-Soviet citizen in Russia today: primarily by trying on modes and definitions of “happiness” that one is not ashamed of, that one can aspire to, and that help one make sense of competing narratives about Russian national identity. Along the way, we will also revisit Jakobson’s characterization of “metaphorical” and “metonymic” axes of communication to illuminate the ways in which Moments of Happiness can work as either an emotionally evocative text, or as a unprecedented ethnographic text.

Friday, April 16,10:00 — 11:30AM EDT

The plenary panel will be held via a Zoom webinar. Every person who wishes to attend MUST register INDIVIDUALLY in advance. You can register here.

Dr. Hannah S. Chapman, Miami University

“Manufacturing Consent: The Politics of Showmanship in Putin’s Russia”

From call-in programs to reality shows following the daily life of Vladimir Putin, the Kremlin frequently utilizes entertainment as a means of shaping the political narrative. But do these strategies actually “manufacture consent” and improve public attitudes toward Putin and his regime? This talk examines the use of showmanship as a tool of regime resilience in Russia—and its potential long-run drawbacks.

Dr. Smoki Musaraj, Ohio University

“Temporalities of Concrete: Housing Imaginaries at the Margins of Europe”

Over the past decade, numerous protests have erupted in major cities in Albania, targeting new construction and urban redevelopment projects. These protests often use the idiom of anti-betonizim (anti-concrete-ization, from beton, concrete). The critique of the betonizim of the city tap onto different meanings associated with the material of concrete. Indeed, concrete has represented different temporalities in Albanian public discourse—from that of modernity and progress to that of authoritarianism and decay. In this presentation, I explore the changing temporalities of concrete in Albanian discourse from the communist period to the postcommunist period, noting continuities and shifts in the broader cultural imaginaries of the present and future of the city. 

Dr. Karen Petrone, University of Kentucky

“War Memory as Entertainment in 21st Century Russia”

While it seems somewhat incongruous that remembrance of “The Great Patriotic War of the Fatherland,” which cost the Soviet Union 27 million lives, might be associated with joyful entertainment, it turns out that this is a common phenomenon in contemporary Russia. This paper will investigate contemporary Russian video games,  3-dimensional war dioramas and multi-media museum exhibits to explore connections between war memory, entertainment and leisure activities, and joyful affective attachments to the contemporary Russian nation.

Friday, April 16

To facilitate discussions between participants, all pre-recorded videos and papers will be posted online by April 6 on this password protected webpage. You must register for the conference to receive login credentials.

Schedule

1:00PM EST – History

2:00PM EST – Linguistics

3:00PM EST – Social Sciences

4:00PM EST – Literature, Culture, and Film

How the Individual Sessions Will Work

Each disciplinary session will have a dedicated Zoom meeting room for their discussion. Participants can access the page for the Zoom meeting rooms here, it is the same page where the videos and papers are posted. At the beginning of each session, a member of CSEES staff will be present to call the session to order and have participants introduce themselves. Then participants can breakup into smaller breakout rooms for discussions. There will not be a moderator or discussant to direct the conversation!

We realize that this is a bit of an unusual format but our goal is to use the time to foster discussion, not formal presentations. To that end, below we have created suggested subgroups for each disciplinary session to group similar topics together to encourage networking and discussions among individuals working on similar research.

1:00PM EST – History

 Balkan History and Identities

• “We Are Not Sheep!”: Making a Border and the Politics of Ethnicity in Epirus, 1912-1913″, Christopher Kinley, Ohio State University, graduate student
• “We Are Not Turks, but Descendants of the Pelasgians: Categories, Culture, and the Muslim Cams during the Greek-Turkish Population Exchange (1921-1928)”, Lediona Shahollari, University of Michigan, graduate student
• “Once Were Empires: Habsburg Loyalists and Ottoman Imperialists Collide at the Siege of Szigetvár Inscribing the Destiny of Suleiman the Magnificent in the Kingdom of Hungary and the Süleymaniye Mosque and Külliye in Turkey”, Titian Butash, University of St. Thomas, graduate student
• “Postwar Ljubljana: Elite Transformation after First World War”, Irena Selišnik and Ana Cergol Paradiž, University of Ljubljana, faculty

Byzantine and Medieval Russian Texts

• “Byzantine Demons in Ohrid: Creating a Slavic Antichrist”, Shawn McAvoy, Patrick Henry Community College, faculty
• “Rereading Dracula as a Warning: Dark Humor and Political Philosophy in Fyodor Kuritsyn’s 1486 Skazanie o Drakule Voevode“, Stephan Sveshnikov, Saint Petersburg State University, graduate student
• “Writing on the Knees (kolennoe pismo) in Medieval and Early Modern Russia”, Anna Belova, Saint Petersburg State University, graduate student

Early Soviet History

• “Participation and Hierarchy in the State Grain Monopoly: Layered Responses to the Poor 1917 Harvest, Penza”, Peter Fraunholtz, Northeastern University, faculty
• “American Protestantism and Russian Orthodoxy in Early Soviet Russia”, August Hagemann, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, graduate student
• “Socialist Internationalist Education in the Soviet Union, 1965-1975”, Liana Kirillova, Southern Illinois University Carbondale, graduate student
• “Red Army Veterans and Rural Elections in the 1920s Soviet Countryside”, Thomas Stevens, University of Pennsylvania, graduate student

Imperial Russia

• “Off to the Train! Off to the Dacha! US Diplomats about Summer Vacations in the Russian Empire”, Svetlana Paulson, Southern Arkansas University, faculty
• “The Town the Sitka Kwaan Built: Trade between the Tlingit and the Tsarist Empire in Novo-Arkhangel’sk, 1820-1830”, Michael Kraemer, Ohio State University, graduate student
• “Variations on the Russian Imperial Idea: Land and People in Hunting Publications”, Mollie Cavender, Ohio State University, faculty

Military History

• “The Polish Military During the Interwar Year: Myths, Misinformation, Reality”, Jacek Czarnecki, The City University of New York, faculty
• “The Turbulent 1560s: Public Activity of the Petty East European Nobility”, Uladzimir Padalinski, Belarusian State University, faculty
• “Why the Soviets Slept”, William Zadeskey, Ohio State University, graduate student

Institutional and Ideological Challenges in late Socialist and Post-1989 Periods

• “Bulgarian Libraries After the Fall of Communism – A Tale of Resilience and Growth”, Stefka Tzanova, The City University of New York, faculty
• “The Motherland Recalls: The Fall and Rise of the Kutaisi Glory Memorial”, Schuyler Neuhauser, independent scholar
• “Why Did Socialism Fail?”, Brian Porter-Szűcs, University of Michigan, faculty

2PM EST – Linguistics

• “From Fiction to Reality: Sociolinguistic Situation of Montenegro and Montenegrin Language as Linguistic Reality”, Ljiljana Duraskovic, University of Pittsburgh, faculty
• “Between the Censorship and the Interpretation: Translations of American Texts in the Inostrannaia Literatura in the Late 1970s”, Georgii Korotkov, independent scholar

3PM EST – Social Sciences

Foreign Policy

• “Evolution of  Washington’s Strategic Goals in the Countries of Central Asia”, Zabikhulla Saipov, independent scholar
• “Navigating States’ Interests in the EU’s Sanctions Policy: A Case Study of the Ukraine Crisis”, Nathan Kornfeind, Lafayette College, undergraduate student
• “Russia’s Re-Entry into the Afghan Arena”, Dinoj Upadhyay and Athar Zafar, independent scholars
• “The Demilitarization of Kaliningrad”, Helen McHenry, Ohio State University, undergraduate student

Governance Challenges in the Digital Age

• “Investigating Economic Cyber-espionage in the Visegrád Four (V4) Countries”, Federica Cristani, Institute of International Relations in Prague, senior researcher
• “Slovakia: Nationalist Propaganda and Disinformation Now & Then”, Jakub Šimkovič, University of Edinburgh, graduate student

Identity Formation

• “Magzhan Zhumabaev and the Everlasting Bleeding Heart Of A Distant Brother”, Sureyya Yigit, New Vision University, faculty
• “‘Do I Have a Motherland?’: Expressions of Udmurt Identity from the 1980s to Today”, Quentin Swaryczewski, Indiana University, graduate student
• “Desire or Dejection? Russia’s Longing Gaze Cast toward the Hagia Sophia”, Mateusz Ferens, University of Wisconsin – Madison, graduate student
• “West-Russism, Litvinism, and Aleksandr Lukashenko’s Hybrid Nationalist Rhetoric”, Marika Olijar, University of Pittsburgh, undergraduate student

Media Audience

• “Digital Nomadism as a Manifestation of the Evolution of Genres in Travel Journalism (on the example of the texts of the magazine “Around the World”, LJ Ilya Varlamov and Sergei Sukhov’s travel blog)”, Elizaveta Cheprasova, Moscow State University, graduate student
• “Translation Strategies of Russian-Language News Media: Meduza’s Coverage of the Russian Constitutional Reform”, Ekaterina Tikhonyuk, Ohio State University, graduate student

Relationships, Communities, and Politics

• “Fictive Kinship among Nationalist Politicians: State Capture through Kumstvo”, Keith Doubt, Wittenberg University, faculty
• “Friendship Patterns as a Tool of both Integration and Community Building? The Preferences of the Russian Speakers in Switzerland in Terms of Friendship”, Léa Moreau, Université de Genève, graduate student
• “The Patterns of Traditional and Modern Family in the Novel Cesta životom by Ladislav Nádaši-Jégé”, Peter Kúdelka, Charles University, graduate student

Russian and Ukrainian Domestic Politics

• “Russia’s Tik-Tok Revolution: Navalny’s Swan Song or Putin’s Waterloo?”, Peter Milich, Washington University in St. Louis, faculty
• “The Rise of Populism in Contemporary Ukraine”, Jaro Bilocerkowycz, University of Dayton, faculty
• “Assessment of Some Threats to Political Stability in Ukraine and Russian Federation 2035 on the Basis of a Simulation Model”, Mykola Polovyi, Vasyl’ Stus Donetsk National University, faculty

4PM EST – Literature, Culture, and Film

19th and 20th Century Russian Writers

• “‘Manuscripts Don’t Burn’: A History of the Creation of Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov”, Natalie Guingrich, University of Maryland, undergraduate student
• “The Voices of Grief: Anna Akhmatova’s Requiem as Lament for Female Victims of the Great Terror”, Oksana Husieva, University of Kansas, graduate student
• “Tolstoy’s Realism: A Vehicle for His Pluralism”, Ayesha Suhail, independent scholar
• “S. Bulgakov’s Dostoevsky“, Elizabeth Blake, Saint Louis University, faculty
• “Vladimir Mayakovsky and Socialism in the USSR – A Critical Reading of The Bedbug and The Bathhouse“, Pedro Réquio, independent scholar

Art

• “Where is the Muranów Lily?: Unearthing Traces of Queer Jewishness in Contemporary Warsaw”, Aleksandra Gajowy, independent scholar
• “Disidentification in Recent LGBTQ+ Polish Protest Art”, Ela Przybyło, Illinois State University, faculty
• “Revolutionary Labor: Communism, Femininity, and Craft in Natalya Danko’s Woman Worker Embroidering a Banner“, Sydney Givens, Kent State University, graduate student
• “The Intertwining of Neoclassicism and Romanticism in Karl Briullov’s Depictions of Women”, Kaytlynn Wintermute, Wright State University, undergraduate student
• “The Scythian Stag in Contemporary Arts and Craft: Tuva and Abroad”, Katherine Leung, independent scholar

Children’s Literature and Literacy

• “How Children Taught Adults to Be Good Communists: The Pedagogy of Revolution and the Revolutionary Pedagogy in the Works of Arkady Gaidar”, Victoria Buyanovskaya, University of Wisconsin – Madison, graduate student
• “LikBez and the Legacy of the Soviet Literacy Campaign”, Carlotta Chenoweth, United States Military Academy, faculty
• “Narrative Strategies and Memory in Contemporary Russian Children’s Literature (The Raven’s Children by Yulia Yakovleva and Sugar Child by Olga Gromova)”, Sylwia Kamińska-Maciąg, University of Wrocław, faculty

Film

• “A Surviving Camera: Precarious Choreographies between Zagreb and Columbus”, Marjana Krajac, Ohio State University, graduate student
• “Eurydice Undead: Balkan ‘feminine’ and Theo Angelopolous’ Ulysses’ Gaze“, Niko Lazetic, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, graduate student

Publications as Cultural Tools

• “Ethnic Working-Class Tastes vs. Cultural Leaders’ Agenda in the 1930s”, Tim Pogačar, Bowling Green State University, faculty
• “The Rise of Voronezh: The Journal Pod’em and the Literary Making of the Black Earth Region”, Philip Gleissner, Ohio State University, faculty

Reception of Western Writers

• “‘Watch Out! Here Comes Pipes!’: Soviet and Russian Press Responses to the Works and Career of Richard Pipes, 1958-2018”, James Brown, University of Northumbria, graduate student
• “Metropolitan Greetings: Allen Ginsberg behind the Iron Curtain”, Michael Breger, Stanford University, graduate student

Science Fiction

• “The Moscow Metro in Post-Soviet Science Fiction: From Omon Ra to Metro 2033“, Philip Decker, Princeton University, graduate student
• “Collectives of Titans and Lonely Demiurges: Forging Nature in Early Platonov’s Science Fiction Tales”, Monica Puglia, Sassari University, graduate student
• “From ‘Thingism’ to New Class Thing: ‘Re-education’ of the Material World in Early Soviet Science Fiction”, Marsel Khamitov, University of Wisconsin – Madison, graduate student
• “The Forgotten City of Light”, Aneta Soberaj-Skorski, University of Vienna, undergraduate student
• “The Scenography of Science Fiction”, Dan Matthews, The Ohio State University, faculty

Texts, Memory Studies, and Interpretations

• “Black Humor under Stalin: What’s the Point?”, Alex Adams, Miami University, undergraduate student
• “Witchcraft Past and Present: The History of the Memory of Magical Practice in Eastern Europe”, Sasha Stott, Indiana University, graduate student
• “‘This dream, and the note it gave rise to’: The Historicity of Modal Historicism”, Heidi Goulding, Kellogg Community College, faculty
• “Ukrainian Literary Metamodernism: Formation of the Phenomenon in the National Socio-cultural Space”, Tetiana Grebeniuk, Zaporizhzhia State Medical University, faculty

Friday, April 16, 6:00 – 7:30PM EDT

This student roundtable will be an open discussion for a variety of topics related to research and academic career goals. Students will be able to discuss their own research interests, strategies for staying motivated and focused, how they stay connected with their colleagues both online and in-person, and more.

This event is open to all undergraduate and graduate students participating in or attending the Midwest Slavic Conference.

Please make sure to register for this event using this link.

Panel Schedule

To access the panels, you must be registered for the conference. Once registered you can access the password protected webpage.

Panel Session 1: Saturday, April 17, 10:00AM – 11:30AM EDT

Panel Session 1A

From Earth to Empire: Materiality in Imperial Russia and the Soviet Union

Chair: Dr. Nicholas Breyfogle, Ohio State University

• “The Stones of Leningrad: Granite, Tarmac, and Appropriation of Space in Revolutionary Petersburg”, Markus Lahteenmaki, ETH Zurich, graduate student
• “A Metropolis of Metal: Ekaterinburg and the Rise of Urban Russia”, Michael Corsi, Ohio State University, graduate student
• “Middlemen and Capitalists: ‘Reviving’ the Handicraft Carpet Industry in the 1890s and 1930s”, Sohee Ryuk, Columbus University, graduate student
• “Without Toil There is No Treasure: Environment and Labor in Soviet Tajikistan”, Nicholas Seay, Ohio State University, graduate student

Panel Session 1B

Traveling as Bridging National and Gender Perspectives

Chair: Dr. Jessie Labov, McDaniel College

• “‘Seven Seas and Three Oceans’ — Experience of the Self and the Other in Travelogues by Serbian Writer Jelena Dimitrijevic (1862-1945)”, Biljana Dojcinovic, University of Belgrade, faculty
• “Polish Womens Writers Traveling Abroad as Diplomats (Casimire Illakowiczowna) and as Associated Writers (Zofia Nalkowska) during the Interwar Period”, Lucyna Marzec, Adam Mickiewicz University, faculty
• “Affected by the Experience of Otherness: Wilhelm Mach’s Non-heterosexual India Travelogue”, Adriana Kovacheva, Adam Mickiewicz University, faculty
• “The Poetics of Migration and the Process of Boarders’ Shifting — Novels and Plays by Croatian Authors: Dino Pesut and Goran Fercec”, Gabriela Abrasowicz, University of Silesia in Katowice, faculty

Panel Session 2: Saturday, April 17, 12:00PM – 1:30PM EDT

Panel Session 2A

Book Panel: The FIFA 2018 World Cup in Russia

Chair: Dr. Richard Arnold, Muskingum University

• Coulter McDermott, Muskingum University, undergraduate student
• Brooke Piazza, Muskingum University, undergraduate student
• Alexandria Lee, Muskingum University, undergraduate student
• Ryan Cochenour, Muskingum University, undergraduate student

Panel Session 2B

Moral Tensions and Deprivations in Slavic Cinema

Chair: Randall Rowe, Ohio State University, graduate student

• “Ivan Paliychuk, Lamb of God: Christian Imagery in Sergei Parajanov’s Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors“, Rachel Hutchison, Ohio State University, graduate student
• “Come and See: An Accurate Yet Exaggerated Portrayal”, Philip Kopatz, Ohio State University, graduate student
• “Polish Nationhood and the Male: Film Revealing Change and Continuation”, Joseph Ernst, Ohio State University, graduate student

Panel Session 3: Saturday, April 17, 2:00PM – 3:30PM EDT

Panel Session 3

Engineering, Space, and Russian

Chair: Dr. Andrei Cretu, Ohio State University

• “Per Aspera ad Astra: Russian for Rockets”, Olga Lyanda-Geller, Purdue University, faculty
• “The Importance of Translating Tsiolkovsky and Experience Translating”, Michael Pilipchuk, Purdue University, undergraduate student
• “Linguistic Trajectories: Tracking Spaceflight-Driven Changes in Russian and English Lexica”, Geoffrey Andrews, Purdue University, graduate student
• “Translating Russian Airplanes Using a Common Language: Engineering”, Justin Mansell, Purdue University, faculty

Panel Session 4: Saturday, April 17, 4:00PM – 5:30PM EDT

Panel Session 4

Sight and Sound in Slavic Culture

Chair: Dr. Philip Gleissner, Ohio State University

• “The Multiple Roles of Music in Pawlikowski’s Ida“, Sofia Bachman, Ohio State University, graduate student
• “The Woman Questions in Opera: Dargomyzhsky’s Stone Guest, Alexander Burry, Ohio State University, faculty
• “She Animates Her: Subversive Tactics in Constructing Female Subjectivity by Czech Women Animators”, Aleksandra Shubina, Ohio State University, graduate student
• “Visual Horror in Minor and Major Keys: Current Polish Art”, Helena Goscilo, Ohio State University, faculty

Saturday, April 17, 6:00 – 7:30PM EDT

Need to take a break from conference panels and want to meet other students in your field of study? Join us for the Midwest Slavic Conference’s student mixer. While we can’t meet in person this year, we welcome students to join us for a period of relaxation and fun where they can meet some of their fellow colleagues, talk shop, enjoy some informal conversation, and maybe even join in some online trivia.

This event is open to all undergraduate and graduate students participating in or attending the Midwest Slavic Conference.

Please make sure to register for this event using this link.