Centennial, Commemoration, Catastrophe: 1917-2017 as Past and Present in Russia and Beyond
Young Researchers Conference, Havighurst Center for Russian and Post-Soviet Studies, Miami University
13-16 June 2017. Villa Vergiliana, Cuma, Italy
Program
Discussing the Russian revolution is impossible without addressing the causes, legacy, and echoes of this event. The very phrasing is contentious—was 1917 a revolution, overthrow, or accident? Examining the Russian and Soviet response is complex enough, yet the Bolshevik takeover had ramifications for the world. In literature the image of the revolution and the ensuing changes was polarized from the beginning, both in the new Soviet state and abroad. Those in history and the social sciences have long puzzled over interpreting the USSR, its influence on Eastern Europe (and the developing world), and the aftermath of its collapse. In otherwise disparate regions—from eastern Germany to Central Asia and the Russian Far East—1917 and the USSR defined the twentieth century, whether as horrific trauma, utopian promises, or a confounding combination of the two. How our field responds to the Russian revolution will define Eurasian studies for the coming decades, just as experts continue to debate the significance of other cultural markers such as 1905, 1956, and 1989.
The Young Researchers Conference welcomes papers by scholars of literature, history, political science, anthropology, cultural studies, art history, gender studies, religion, and similar areas, as well as fields not traditionally represented at Eurasian studies conferences (for example, Middle Eastern studies, psychology). Papers should examine how 1917 influenced events in politics, economics, literature, religion, art, or culture, whether in the former Second World or beyond its borders.
Some of the papers presented will be chosen for peer review and possible publication in a special volume on 1917 with the journal Revolutionary Russia.
The participants
The conference will feature the following keynote speakers:
Catriona Kelly (Oxford)
Boris Kolonitskii (European University at St. Petersburg)
