The great friendship? The Soviet Union as a polyethnic state, 1953-1991

The great friendship? The Soviet Union as a polyethnic state, 1953-1991

Veranstalter
Moritz Florin (Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg); Matthias Uhl (Deutsches Historisches Institut Moskau); Manfred Zeller (Forschungsstelle Osteuropa an der Universität Bremen)
Veranstaltungsort
DHI Moskau
Ort
Moskau
Land
Russian Federation
Vom - Bis
16.02.2017 - 17.02.2017
Website
Von
Manfred Zeller

The Soviet Union represents an audacious – and ultimately failed – experiment in creating a historically unprecedented political order: a socialist state that was also a unique union of national republics. For scholars, the historical novelty of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics presented the challenge of conceptualizing and categorizing the Soviet state. Was the Soviet Union a traditional empire, or – perhaps – an “empire of nations,” a “federation”, a “state of nations”, an “affirmative action empire”, or perhaps even a “communal apartment”?

The question, of course, is not just academic: not only scholars, but former Soviet citizens also remain divided on this topic. While the Russian leadership politically exploits nostalgia for an idealized Soviet past of interethnic “friendship”, the Soviet experience has also proven to be highly divisive in other contexts, both inside and beyond the Russian Federation, and most critically in the ongoing armed conflict in eastern Ukraine. While the Russian leadership’s call for creating a new type of union under the common banner of Eurasianism has received some support, other leaders of post-Soviet states have likened the Soviet experience to colonialism, and even to Nazi-occupation.

In other words, there are many good reasons to look back upon the shared, but also controversial, experiences of the Soviet Union as a multi-ethnic state 25 years after its disintegration. Our workshop does not primarily intend to address the well-researched (but still controversial) question of how Soviet institutions and politicians regulated, controlled or exploited national differences within a multi-ethnic state. Instead, the focus will be on the variegated collective and individual experiences of living in this multi-ethnic state. It is another goal to transcend teleological narratives of Soviet history as a story of the inevitable decline of a flawed system by uncovering the many different positive and negative meanings attached to the experiences of the Soviet multi-ethnic state.

For the majority of (former) Soviet citizens, ethnicity (resp. “nationality”) was and still remains highly relevant. Ethnicity not only played a role in the making of careers, but also in personal relationships, everyday interactions, in identifying with heroes and victims of the past and present, and in the ways people spoke about their common Soviet experience. All former Soviet citizens share the experience of growing up in a multi-ethnic state that had its own specific institutions, discourses and mechanisms for regulating ethnic and national belonging and conflict. Our conference seeks to better understand this shared experience.

Programm

Thursday, February 16th, 2017
Welcome and introduction
Matthias Uhl / Moritz Florin / Matthias Uhl / Manfred Zeller

Panel I:
Everyday life and deterritorialized Milieus
Повседневная жизнь в местах «вненаходимости»
Alltag und entterritorialisierte Milieus
Walter Sperling (München):
Spitting on the Streets of Grozny. Multi-National Everyday Life in the late Soviet Union
Плевки на асфальте Грозного. Культурность, дружба народов и другие банальности повседневной жизни многонационального СССР
Rotz den Straßen von Grosny. Zivilisation, Völkerfreundschaft und andere Banalitäten des Alltags in der multiethnischen UdSSR
Galina Zelenina (Moskau):
Between Malakhovka and Ovrazhki: Invention of the nation in deterritorialized milieus
Между Малаховкой и Овражками: нахождение нации в местах «вненаходимости»
Zwischen Malachovka und Ovražki. Die Erfindung der Nation in entterritorialisierten Milieus
Commentary: Manfred Zeller (Bremen)

Panel II
Ethnicity and belonging
Этничность и принадлежность
Ethnizität und Zugehörigkeit
Uku Lember (Uppsala/ Tallinn):
Ethnicity, Ideology and Belonging in Russian-Estonian Mixed Families in Soviet Estonia during Late Socialism
Этничность, идеология и принадлежность русско-эстонских смешанных семей в период позднего социализма
Ethnizität, Ideologie und Zugehörigkeit russisch-estonischer gemischter Familien im Spätsozialismus
Nikolai Ssorin-Chaikov (St. Petersburg)
“Help to the peoples of northern borderlands”: rethinking late Soviet Siberian indigenous policies through the lens of gift theory
“Помощь народам северных окраин”: Советская политика по отношению к малочисленным народам Сибири через призму теории дара
“Den Völkern des Nordens helfen”. Die spätsowjetische Politik gegenüber den kleinen Völkern Sibiriens aus der Sicht der Theorie des Schenkens
Commentary: Matthias Uhl (Moskau)

Panel III:
Representations of nations in television and Radio
Изображение наций. Телевидение и радио
Repräsentationen der Nation in Fernsehen und Radio
Kirsten Bönker (Oldenburg):
Watching Television and Popular Culture: Televisualization of Multi-Ethnic Soviet Society
Телевидение и популярная культура: теле-визуализация мультиэтнического советского общества
Fernsehen und Populärkultur: Die Televisualisierung der multiethnischen Sowjetgesellschaft
Arkadi Miller (Berlin):
Music of the people. An analysis of Soviet radio listener’s letters of the 1960s
Musik der Völker der Sowjetunion. Hörerzuschriften an das sowjetische Radiokomitee in den 1960er Jahren
Музыка народов СССР. Анализ писем радиослушателей во Всесоюзный радиокомитет в 1960-е годы.
Commentary: Julia Obertreis (Erlangen)

Friday, February 17th, 2017

Panel IV:
Dissidence, Opposition, and Repression
Инакомыслие, диссидентство, подавление
Dissidenz, Opposition und Repression
Ewgeniy Kasakow (Bremen):
The White Book, 1979. Jewish-Dissident Sources as Anti-Zionist Propaganda
"Белая книга Антисионистского комитета советской общественности" -- случай использование текстов еврейских диссидентов в советской антисионистской пропаганде
Das Weißbuch, 1979. Jüdisch-dissidentische Quellen als antizionistische Propaganda
Manfred Zeller (Bremen):
The return of Soviet dissenters as a transnational event, 1986-1994
Die Rückkehr sowjetischer Andersdenkender als transnationales Ereignis, 1986-1994
Возвращение советских инакомыслящих как межнациональное событие, 1986-1994
Commentary: Maike Lehmann (Köln)

Panel V:
Melting pots? The ideology of people’s friendship in urban communities
Плавильные котлы? Идеология дружбы народов в городских сообществах
Schmelztiegel? Die Ideologie der Völkerfreunschaft in urbanen Gemeinschaften
Moritz Florin (Erlangen):
Unmaking Soviet citizens. Perestroika and the national question in Frunze
Отмена родины. Перестройка и национальный вопрос во Фрунзе
Das Ende des Sowjetbürgertums. Perestroika und die nationale Frage in Frunze
Stefan Guth (Bern):
From Kobzar to Akyn. How Nationality Mattered in the Atomic City of Shevchenko/Aktau
От кобзаря до акына. Значение национальности в атомном городе Шевченко/Ақтау
Vom Kobzar zum Akyn. Die Bedeutung von Nationalität in der Atomstadt Ševčenko/Aktau
Commentary: Sergey Abashin (St. Petersburg)

Panel VI:
Anti-colonialism and Islam
Антиколониализм и Ислам
Antikolonialismus und Islam
Alfrid Bustanov (St. Petersburg):
Ссора по-исламски: жалобы и анонимки в позднесоветском муфтияте
Muslims Quarrel: Complaints and Denouncements in the Late Soviet Muftiate
Zanken auf islamisch. Beschwerden und Denunziationen im Muftiat der späten Sowjetzeit
Artemy Kalinovsky (Amsterdam):
Central Asia and the emerging anti-colonial critique of the late Soviet era
Экономическое развитие и анти-колониальный дискурс в Таджикистане в поздне-советский период
Zentralasien und die Entstehung antikolonialer Kritik in der späten Sowjetära
Commentary: Moritz Florin (Erlangen)

Panel VII:
Music of the People
Музыка народов
Musik der Völker
Michel Abeßer (Freiburg):
A Paragon of Culture? Estonia and the Reinvention of Soviet Jazz in the 1950s and 1960s
Образeц культуры? Эстония и переосмысление советского джаза 1950-х и 1960-х годов
Ein kultureller Vorreiter? Estland und die Neuerfindung des sowjetischen Jazz in den 1950er und 1960er Jahren
Boris Belge (Tübingen):
How Soviet Music Became Russian, or: Reinventing the Avantgarde during Perestroika (1982-1991)
Как советская музыка стала русской. Новые понятия авангарда в перестройке (1982–1991 гг.)
Wie sowjetische Musik russisch wurde, oder: Die Avantgarde in der Perestrojka neu erfinden (1982–1991)
Commentary: Nikolaus Katzer (Moscow)

Kontakt

Manfred Zeller

Forschungsstelle Osteuropa an der Universität Bremen, Klagenfurter Str. 8, D-28359 Bremen

zeller@uni-bremen.de


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Englisch, Deutsch, Russisch
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