NewsNet News of the Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies June 2021 v. 61, n. 3

TABLE OF CONTENTS Revisiting the “Contours of Race, Racialization, and Race-Making” 2 in Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies Summing Up Poetry: 8 A Case Against Packaging

Supporting Precarious Scholars 12 in Eastern Europe: Addressing Barriers to Publishing in US & UK

New Lease on Life for Physiological Collectivism? 15 Reading Bogdanov in the Time of COVID

2021 ASEEES Dissertation Grant & 20 Internship Grant Recipients

22 Publications

2021 ASEEES Cohen-Tucker 24 Dissertation Fellowship Recipients

26 Affiliate Group News

27 Institutional Member News

28 Personages

31 In Memoriam

Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies (ASEEES) 203C Bellefield Hall, 315 S. Bellefield Ave Pittsburgh, PA 15260-6424 tel.: 412-648-9911 • fax: 412-648-9815 www.aseees.org

ASEEES Staff Executive Director: Lynda Park 412-648-9788, [email protected] Deputy Director/Director of Membership: Kelly McGee 412- 238-7354, [email protected] NewsNet Editor & Program Coordinator: Trevor Erlacher 412-648-7403, [email protected] Communications Coordinator: Mary Arnstein 412-648-9809, newsnet@pitt.edu Convention Manager: Margaret Manges 412-648-4049, [email protected] Administrative Assistant: Jenn Legler NEWSNET June 2021 1 412-648-9911, [email protected] Financial Support: Roxana L. Espinoza 412-648-4049, [email protected] field, and ASEEES as an organization. we found numerous intersecting and this type of ethnographic work can yield The theme of last year’s ASEEES overlapping threads as they pertain insight into how particular histories meeting was “Anxiety and Rebellion,” to race and racialization. This enabled and the contemporary moment and one of our conversations was us to conduct a rich conversation that shape lived experiences surrounding shaped by a type of anxiety that addressed the interrelated subjects racialization, marginalization, othering, scholars themselves can perpetuate of marginalization and othering, and dehumanization. Regarding when it comes to the subjects of and how these ideas shaped our dehumanization, the roundtable also race and racism. Our roundtable engagement with gender, religion, drew attention to silences that often participants called attention to this migration, and diaspora within our prevent authentic engagement on anxiety, specifically highlighting what region. this subject, whether the conversation is pertaining to Roma persons in the it means for us as scholars to conduct When and how does the language Balkans, to Africans in the former research on race in our region. In of whiteness, blackness, and Soviet Union, or to Black folks in the order to meaningfully address race otherness get employed across United States. and racialization, it is imperative our region? And how and when that scholars in our field be willing does this language get strategically From a more personal perspective, to discuss the tension between avoided or dismissed? How does this roundtable represented an being unable to engage vs. unwilling this inform us about the globality of intellectual shift from West Ohueri’s Soviet-era phenotype chart used by police to identify ethnicity to examine forms of racism and racialization? As sociologist Michelle first ASEEES conference in 2014. anti-blackness. Given more recent Christian argues, we cannot look At that time, she was an advanced global conversations and dialogue at racial dynamics and inequities graduate student presenting on Revisiting the “Contours of Race, about race and racialization, this in any given society as emanating racial belonging in Albania, but there Racialization, and Race-Making” in framing could create an opportunity solely from the logics, beliefs, and were no opportunities to collectively to investigate race and racism in structures of that society. Although discuss race and racialization, nor Slavic, East European, and Eurasian multiple forms, and move beyond white supremacy is not at all new was she able to connect with other Studies racism as unfortunate, unexpected, or “resurgent” (Speed 2020), its scholars conducting similar research. or not reflective of an entity’s true latent roots are being explored The roundtable in 2020 gave us a ELANA RESNICK, UC SANTA BARBARA, values, but instead as shaped by globally—and finally in SEEES fields. chance to reflect and dialogue about SUNNIE RUCKER-CHANG, UNIVERSITY OF CINCINNATI, global white supremacy and in need And the roots and histories of white race studies in the field, as well as the CHELSI WEST OHUERI, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS, AUSTIN of critical engagement. supremacy throughout the region opportunity to collectively strategize Several key questions animated have been discussed among local about addressing race within our communities of color for decades—if association. To advance dialogue about the applicability of critical theories of race and our discussion, including those not centuries—but have yet to enter racialization to Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies (SEEES) fields, six scholars pertaining to how we situate race In writing about race in SEEES fields, the traditionally white spaces of SEEE (including a scholar journalist), who work and write on race and racialization in as a historical category of social Elana Resnick acknowledges how she area studies. Central and Southeast Europe, Eastern Europe, Russia, and Central Asia, came organization and not just as a newly has been consistently confronted with together for the roundtable, “The Contours of Race, Racialization, and Race- emergent one in Eastern, Central Personal Narratives questions about the fundamental Making,” at the 2020 ASEEES Annual Convention. Roundtable participants actively and Southeast Europe, Russia, and Chelsi West Ohueri’s experience with premise of her research: does race challenged the entrenched silences about race, racialization, and “amnesia of Central Asia. Though roundtable long-term, ethnographic research in (or racial hierarchy) in Bulgaria even racial capitalism” (Bjelić, 2021) in Central and Southeast Europe, Russia, and Central participants were working in different the Balkan region has allowed her exist? Throughout her fieldwork, she Asia, and urged others, particularly those engaged in similar scholarly pursuits, areas across the Balkans and the to consider the complex registers was often asked to justify why race to push for the recognition of how racial logics and processes of racialization former Soviet Union, and though of racialization and belonging that is a relevant framework, support affect the various members of racialized, and otherwise minoritized, communities shaped by multiple disciplines emerge in everyday life, even in it with quantifiable numbers, and throughout geographies associated with SEEES fields. For this article, three of the including anthropology, cultural spaces that often cling to notions of account for why race is not just an roundtable participants, who work in the Balkans, reflect on their own research, studies, journalism, film and media racelessness. As many of the other “Americanization” of a local issue— their positionalities, and the significance of the roundtable to their scholarship, the studies, gender studies, and history, roundtable participants also noted, of what many of her non-Romani

NEWSNET June 2021 2 NEWSNET June 2021 3 interlocutors (academic and non- of some groups without the critical positions that minimize critical frames what language will these students which current scholarship too often Resnick has a recent (2021) article academic) categorized as “culture.” lenses necessary to understand them of knowledge and understanding. use to express their experiences continues to ignore or deny. in American Anthropologist stemming When she disagreed with the notion fully. Perpetuation of the myths of abroad where their racial positions from this research entitled “The Limits As an organization, the Association Sunnie Rucker-Chang is Assistant of Resilience: Managing Waste in the that the terms “ethnicity” or “culture” racelessness in Eastern, Central, and will inevitably define them much of Slavic, East European, and Professor of Slavic and East European Racialized Anthropocene.” more than at home? How will their could adequately account for the Southeast Europe, Russia, and Central Eurasian Studies is supporting and Studies and Diversity, Equity, and faculty leaders or advisors help them Citations: power differentials or perspectives of Asia does not diminish connections incorporating more programs and Inclusion Lead for the Institute for the Romani communities with whom work through their experiences? Research in Sensing at the U of Cincinnati. shared among marginalized initiatives that will hopefully result Bjelić, Dušan, “Abolition of a National There are both scholarly and She works, writes, and teaches primarily she worked, many non-Romani communities transnationally and in more inclusive and racially diverse Paradigm: The Case Against Benedict scholars dismissed her approach as the structures that support what is practical implications for our fields on racial and cultural formations and Anderson and Maria Todorova’s Raceless membership. The ASEEES Initiative minority-majority relations in Southeast not “emic” enough. They would assert typically their minoritized position. if addressing race and racialization Imaginaries,” Interventions: International for Diversity and Inclusion, ASEEES Europe. She is the co-editor of and that her reliance on “American notions Instead, these relational qualities are remains taboo. Without the adoption Journal of Postcolonial Studies (2021), support for the US Russia Foundation- contributor to Cultures of Mobility DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/136980 of race” was out of place in the region. of updated modalities incorporating dismissed as irrelevant or misplaced sponsored Undergraduate Think Tank and Alterity: Crossing the Balkans and 1X.2020.1863842. However, this phenomenon is part of and we continue to lack the means race and racialization in our fields, Beyond (forthcoming with Liverpool and Cybersecurity Simulation hosted Christian, Michelle. “A Global Critical what needs to be studied by scholars to meaningfully include these the answers to these questions will University Press, 2022), co-author by Howard University, and focused Race and Racism Framework: Racial of the region: denials of race and remain elusive. Roma Rights and Civil Rights: A perspectives into SEEES scholarship. articles highlighting the challenges of Entanglements and Deep and Malleable Transatlantic Comparison racialized hierarchies as assertions of The fervor to dismiss race, of creating community for students And that is where this roundtable (Cambridge, Whiteness.” Sociology of Race and Ethnicity 2020), and co-editor of and contributor white supremacy. racialization, and its effects actually of color in our fields, particularly comes in: it creates a new space 5, no. 2 (2019): 169-185. works against our field, however, as it to Chinese Migrants in Russia, Central This, however, was only the tip of when traveling abroad, show that for thinking about race in Europe Asia, and Eastern Europe Speed, Shannon. “The Persistence of White perpetuates the region as peripheral, (Routledge, the iceberg of the expertise regime ASEEES administration recognizes and Eurasia that works to unsettle 2011). Supremacy: Indigenous Women Migrants that has surrounded discussions of disconnecting it from global flows a lack of people of color among the the gatekeeping of SEEES. The and the Structures of Settler Capitalism.” Chelsi West Ohueri is sociocultural and power and racialized hierarchies in of information and even its own organization’s membership as well as variety of perspectives brought to American Anthropologist 122, no. 1 (2020): historical, transnational relevance. medical anthropologist and an Assistant 76-85. the region. Even when people use the in Slavic, East European, and Eurasian light issues of how to understand Professor in the Department of Slavic terms “race” and “racism” to analyze While the disciplines of our field Studies fields, and that they are doing race as a historically present—but and Eurasian Studies at the U of Texas, their own conditions, these concepts include various geographies, the work to create pathways to have often disavowed—category of Austin. Her scholarship and teaching and framings have been dismissed in histories, cultures, and sociocultural more inclusive and racially diverse social organization across Central are primarily concerned with the study widespread scholarship in and on the and political realities, those who membership. Given that these and Southeast Europe, Russia, and of racialization, marginalization, and region. For centuries, white scholars produce knowledge about our fields initiatives are specifically targeting Central Asia that has been changed, structural inequality. She has conducted extensive ethnographic research worked to proprietarily document— have long not been similarly “diverse.” students and professionals of color, exacerbated, and transformed CALL FOR ARTICLES without collaboration—Romani these new members will likely be by ongoing conditions of white throughout Albania and is interested in As I recently wrote in the Slavic and configurations of race and belonging Please consider submitting articles to be culture and language (for example). from minoritized communities who supremacy, migration, and religion. East European Journal Symposium among Albanian, Romani, and Egyptian published in future NewsNets. Articles are This approach has strategically “Working Towards Equity in Slavic will, inevitably, be knowledgeable The power in this approach is not communities in Southeastern Europe. typically brief essays on contemporary precluded Roma from the very circles about the dominant cultural idiom, just adding race to a pre-existing issues or matters of broad professional Language and Literature Programs: West Ohueri is currently completing her interest. They can include discussions and analytical authority that would Experiences from the United but what language will these students conversation but fundamentally ethnographic book project about this of new research, institutions, resources, transform the study of power, history, States,” SEEES fields are dominated use to express their positionalities, shifting the analytical paradigms research. etc. NewsNet is not a venue for extensive and politics in East Europe into one by scholars whose origins lie in experiences, and potential academic upon which studies of our regions research essays; most cover articles are Elana Resnick is an Assistant Professor 2,500 words in length. We encourage in which critical studies of race and unmarked majorities who identify interests in relation to their work in rely and to which they contribute. in the Department of Anthropology at members, including graduate students, racialization have a place. or code as “white,” and this lack of SEEES fields? That is not to assume This roundtable was inspiring, the U of California, Santa Barbara. She is who are interested in proposing an article to that all students of minoritized not only for the collaborations contact the NewsNet Editor, Trevor Erlacher Sunnie Rucker-Chang notes that broad racial diversity facilitates the currently working on a book manuscript communities will have an interest it has cultivated, but also for the about waste and race in Europe. Based ([email protected]). with race critical theories absent in continued promotion of majoritized in working on issues of race and possibilities of interdisciplinary and on fieldwork in Bulgaria conducted SEEES fields, consistent inequities positions and facilitates continued The views expressed in NewsNet articles silences about race. The discussion racialization, but, if they do, how will transnational work in East Europe and on city streets, in landfills, Romani are solely the views of the author and do not and attendant systemic disparities neighborhoods, executive offices, and necessarily reflect the views or policies of that followed the roundtable we provide them the frameworks the post-Soviet space as we reckon (in education, access to health care, at the Ministry of the Environment, the ASEEES or its staff. for analysis when the relevance of with the longstanding structures employment, and in other aspects highlighted that limited “diversity” book examines the juncture of material racial logics to our fields remains of white supremacy upon which of daily life) persist among members produces similar experiences and waste management and racialization. perennially challenged? Moreover, previous scholarship was built, and

NEWSNET June 2021 4 NEWSNET June 2021 5 LETTER

LETTER FROM ASEEES BOARD PRESIDENT SIBELAN FORRESTER which leads to my second topic. education. Unstable enrollments political and funding decisions. Those on Zoom rather than flying everyone Dear friends and colleagues, and effects of the pandemic have ASEEES members who are caught in to Pittsburgh. At the same time, There is too much to say about the The death of Vartan Gregorian negatively impacted both public the jaws of these changes should keep differences in access to the necessary growing precarity of our professions (President of the Carnegie Corporation and private institutions of higher an eye on the support the association is technology remain (my student whose to cover it here, and those issues are of New York) in April of this year reminds education; at many state institutions, offering, and should pass thoughts and Zoom connection kept freezing or 2021 ASEEES BOARD OF not unique to Slavic, East European, us that our allies in the wider world funding cuts have been imposed by suggestions along to the Board: we are winking out was not getting her and Eurasian Studies. They are issues DIRECTORS ELECTIONS are not immortal and that we need to politicians who seem to desire an elected to represent and serve you. money’s worth), and human beings that our association must confront continue advocating for our profession undereducated electorate. The rise of simply have not evolved to handle We are pleased to announce the for our own survival as an interrelated At the end of a crazy academic year set candidates for the 2021 election and for the pursuit of knowledge in business management at the helms of the physical impact of a lengthy Zoom set of disciplines that we believe are in broader craziness, let us ask: what for positions on the ASEEES Board of general. I feel that the scholarly interests universities is chipping away at faculty session. Importantly, a virtual event important as well as interesting. At good has come of the pandemic? It Directors: Vice President/President- ASEEES addresses have broadened and governance, where strategies based means a huge loss of serendipity, one end, many of our senior specialists has forced us to use, and become more Elect, two Members-at-Large, and grown better roots in the past three on manufacturing (is it?) are applied to no chance to chat with the person were hired during the Cold War or the adept in using, technologies for virtual Grad Student representative. We decades – the U.S. has seen a growth instructional staff and their “customers.” sitting next to you in a session before exciting years of perestroika, when teaching and communication. This thank them for their willingness to in serious study of Eastern European I see administrations treating graduate or after the papers, no recognizing a having a specialist at least in Russia change is good for financial as well as stand as candidates to serve on the and Eurasian as well as Russian and students and new PhDs like natural scholarly hero’s name on their badge (if not in other parts of the region) physical accessibility; it helps to address ASEEES Board. (former) Soviet languages and cultures resources, extracting what they need at and gathering the nerve to introduce was considered vital to a well-stocked at least some of the issues created Candidates for Vice President / (serious study that was often already the moment without concern for even yourself, or the pleasure of treating a department of history or political by precarity; raising virtual hands to President Elect found more widely in Canada). This the near future, in order to lower the former student who has entered the science. What happens when they ask questions in order promises more • Juliet Johnson (Political Science, makes us more responsible scholars, academic budget and have maximum profession to lunch at the conference retire and are replaced (if they are equal access in a discussion; virtual McGill U, Canada) teachers, and thinkers, responsive to flexibility to cut staff. The protection hotel. Or not at the conference hotel! replaced!) by someone who lacks that meetings increase possibilities for the information on the region that of tenure not only allows a scholar to We must take care going into the • Doug Rogers (Anthropology, Yale U) expertise? (The idea that “we won” the international collaboration and for the we get from colleagues, friends, and pursue and disseminate research with future to balance the new possibilities Candidates for Members-at-Large Cold War and can now prioritize other cross-fertilization among disciplines the media. The ASEEES Board has academic freedom but ensures that with proven ways of interacting with • Andrew Janco (Digital Scholarship things seems to have remained active that has always been a strength of received an increased number of scholar has the time to mentor students scholarly pretexts. Librarian, Haverford College) in many circles.) Even more urgently, our association. In recent decades calls for the association to sign on to over the longer arc of their developing • Rustis Kamuntavicius (History, the long-term shift from stable tenure- our fields have become even more So please plan to attend the convention letters of protest or to make its own careers and to explore intellectual Vytautas Magnus U, Lithuania) track jobs in academia to various kinds internationalized, with students this fall – either in person in New Orleans official statement, and the Committee connections and projects outside the of adjunct or temporary positions and colleagues who began their or in the later virtual segment. Both are • David Siroky (Political Science, on Academic Freedom and Advocacy narrower range of a set of courses threatens the careers but also the educations outside North America and packed with rich, thought-provoking, Arizona State U) has been busy. (I trust our members or papers and exams to grade. What basic well-being of a huge swath of the perhaps continue to teach and reside and entertaining panels and other • Kimberly Zarecor (Architecture, understand that making a statement will happen when the adjuncts have younger scholars in our region, who on more than one continent as well as events. Let’s enjoy the contact and learn Iowa State U) requires preliminary consultation, shrugged and left, when the graduate may be forced to leave the profession ASEEES members from other regions. from one another, while gathering ideas Candidates for Graduate Student gathering information, and agreeing students look at the job market and if the situation does not change. Many Many of these members would have for the future of our field. Representative on our formulation of a decision or a decide to take their knowledge, graduate programs, as well as ASEEES trouble affording a trip to the annual • Zachary Hicks (Slavic, UC statement.) There is an obvious need insights, and intelligence elsewhere, Sibelan Forrester itself, are striving to help students find conference, and virtual attendance Berkeley) to express a reaction in the case of when the undergraduates decline to is the Susan careers outside the academy, or in does not require a visa. This is an • Jeffrey Yelverton (Musicology, U academic issues – especially concerning enter the field? How will government W. Lippincott the so-called “alt-ac” world – and our enriching development that we should of Minnesota) an ASEEES member or a scholar who agencies or libraries find the specialists Professor of members outside the academy are a strive to nurture and expand through has attended our conferences abroad they need if the required knowledge Modern and For more information on the election treasured part of our membership. But technology as well as through more – but our own lives and work make is no longer being taught, or is being Classical including the candidate bios, visit our without teaching of the languages, traditional opportunities. No one can website. Information on how to vote clear that oppression, limitations taught in haste and exhaustion by an Languages literatures, arts, cultures, histories, and argue against the lower environmental will be emailed to current ASEEES on freedom of discourse, and legal adjunct who has to work a second or and Russian at politics of the region, what will happen impact when we travel less to do the members shortly. restrictions on social activities impact third job? This issue too is broader than Swarthmore to these bodies of knowledge in future same work! You can bet that from College. She is the societies we study in all kinds of SEEES, and we should seek alliances generations? now on the Executive Committee of the 2021 ASEEES ways. Then there are the political and with other learned societies and ASEEES will be holding its meetings Board President. institutional events in our own biomes, Let me focus for a moment on higher pursue advocacy that strives to impact

NEWSNET June 2021 6 NEWSNET June 2021 7 ruled by bad politicians often find that saw Rymbu both attacked and a much fuller spectrum of her work. themselves in the role of hero— praised for using explicit anatomical Yusupova—who has not lived in beacons of freedom, brave Davids language in poetry. “My Vagina” was Russia since 1994—is a complex against the menacing Goliaths an entirely political gesture: Rymbu and idiosyncratic personality with a of repressive politics. It is an old wrote it in support of Yulia Tsvetkova, trajectory that has lately run parallel story (a Cold story), but it keeps an artist and activist who has been to feminist concerns. At 54, she is the working for the publishers—and subject to arrest and intimidation for oldest poet in the anthology; some other defenders of vaunted Western her body-positive art and activism. of the younger poets have engaged democracy. This means American In the introduction, Rymbu points to her as a forerunner of the movement, readers, who tend to need some close engagement with physicality although she only started writing hand-holding when it comes to as one of the hallmarks of the new poems with an identifiably feminist literature in translation, often expect feminist poetry. While this is patently agenda within the last five or so years a specific kind of narrative, a certain true, women (and queer) poets have (basically on the same timeline as the type of voice, from foreign authors. been “writing the body” in Russian movement itself). In one of the poems These expectations, compounded long before the recent emergence of in The Scar, “The Center for Gender by publishers’ calculations, can turn feminist-identifying poetry. Problems,” the speaker confesses reading into a form of conscientious her real motivation for seeking out The other ten poets in the book consumerism, where buying a book Petersburg’s so-called Center for demonstrate a wide range of poetics, Summing Up Poetry: written by a certifiably repressed Gender Problems in the late 1990s: only some of them engaging directly person automatically renders the with feminist politics. Alongside I’m not that interested in writing A Case Against Packaging reader more enlightened. brutal evocations of gender-based for their feminist newsletter though maybe I am but not AINSLEY MORSE, DARTMOUTH COLLEGE While there is nothing wrong with violence from Egana Dzhabbarova, effective and legible packaging per Elena Kostyleva, Lida Yusupova, and that much not that much and During the pandemic year I worked on a couple of poetry-translation projects: F-Letter: se, I usually think of (and try to teach) self-deprecating feminist humor it’s so important so important New Russian Feminist Poetry, an anthology of work by twelve contemporary feminist poetry as something that cannot be from Stanislava Mogileva, there is to me to meet lesbians I want poets/poetesses (isolarii, 2020, co-edited with Galina Rymbu and Eugene Ostashevsky) summarized or easily defined; a way of Vasyakina’s sweeping meditation on to meet feminists too but and a book by one of those poets, Lida Yusupova (The Scar We Know, Cicada Press, 2021). thinking with language that produces her father’s death from AIDS, writing lesbians are more important Working on these books was extremely illuminating and rewarding, and they have more questions than answers. Some poetry, and battling the patriarchy. to me because maybe maybe been well received. F-Letter may have gotten more attention and press than any other book covers, meanwhile, give you an But you will also find the baroque, after I meet them a new life translation project I have worked on. While I’m glad to have helped to bring this poetry to answer right away—even if the book sexually and philosophically charged will begin for me I came to the a global audience, I am ceaselessly bemused by a process that often involves marketing is actually full of questions. hellscape of Lolita Agamalova’s center for gender problems and politics as much as literature. but not to write for feminism I F-Letter is a tiny-format book with “Dilige, et quod vis fac,” which in turn came only for myself yes I came While in grad school a fellow student once chuckled that you could look at the many a shiny, bright red cover. Rymbu’s contrasts sharply with the intimate, here because I want love and different poetic groupings of the early twentieth century (Futurism, Cubo-Futurism, introductory essay explains the domestic poetics of Ekaterina sex with a lesbian yes I came Ego-Futurism, Acmeism, Symbolism, etc.) as “brands” competing with one another on recent (re-)emergence of feminist Simonova and the many things left here for love that’s my problem the art market—proof, perhaps, that Russia was well on the way to full-blown bourgeois discourse in Russophone writing and unsaid by Nastya Denisova (just to I came here for love capitalism. Whether or not this model works for the pre-revolutionary era, we certainly argues for its urgency and relevance give a few examples). have full-blown capitalism in U.S. book markets today. I’ve become painfully aware of in contemporary Russian society. All anthologies suffer from issues of Even though these lines come in a the fact that translation is a hard sell; poetry is even harder (it is no accident that both Rymbu and Oksana Vasyakina, the selection and space, and this one is breathless rush of unpunctuated are often published by small independent presses like isolarii and Cicada). People do best known of the feminist poets in especially tiny: it only has room for one prose, they can be read from different not have a lot of time. What sells? Loud voices, clear messages (topical and/or “eternal”), Russia, take up the most space in the or two poems per poet. I am thrilled angles. Yusupova’s poem covers compelling personal stories. To a certain extent, this market logic has influenced what volume. One of the two long cycles by that Yusupova’s The Scar We Know the feminine lyric subject, physical people teach as well. Rymbu, “My Vagina,” was at the center came out virtually simultaneously threats against women, and lesbian In literature’s inevitable intersections with global politics, writers from distant lands of an internet scandal in summer 2020 with the anthology, because it offers sex (as well as the difficulty of finding

NEWSNET June 2021 8 NEWSNET June 2021 9 Three String Books is an imprint of New from Slavica PubliSherS Slavica Publishers devoted to transla- tions of literary works and belles-lettres David Schimmelpenninck van der David M. Griffiths, No Collusion! from Central and Eastern Europe, in- Oye et al., eds. Russian Internation- Catherine the Great and American In- cluding Russia and the other successor al Relations in War and Revolution, dependence, ed. George E. Munro, xvi states of the former Soviet Union. the language, especially poetic activism. But how do you “serve” a 1914–22, 1: Origins and War, 1914–16, + 717 p., 2020 (ISBN 978-0-89357-499- Russian language, to express such an poet like Gatina—or Anna Glazova, xxii + 446 p.; 2: Revolution and Civil 4), $44.95. Anna Starobinets. Look at Him, trans. War, xviii + 416 p., 2021 (ISBN 978- experience). But there’s also plenty or Polina Andrukovich, or Elena Guro The fledgling United States desper- Katherine E. Young, xii + 151 p., 2020 089357-436-9; 978-089357-437-6), ately needed more than its single ally, (ISBN 978-089357-503-8), $19.95. to say here about the cultural shifts (or Fet, for that matter)? With my $44.95. France, to pursue its war for indepen- In this groundbreaking memoir, Anna of the 1990s, and stereotypes and colleague Rebekah Smith from NYU/ Written by scholars from North Ameri- dence. Unwilling to engage in tradi- Starobinets chronicles the devastating hedonism and irony. Ugly Duckling Presse, we decided ca, Europe, Russia, and Japan and mak- tional European diplomatic behavior, loss of her unborn son to a fatal birth ing abundant use of Russian archives, the Americans developed a concept of to host a series of Zoom readings defect. A finalist for the 2018 Nation- The Scar We Know is hardly an these essays are diverse in approach: “militia diplomacy,” under which mer- al Bestseller Prize, Look at Him ignited and conversations by Russophone some focus on traditional “diplomatic chants would be sent to foreign ports exhaustive selection of Yusupova’s писька, такая мохнатая a firestorm in Russia, prompting both women poets (some featured in the history,” while others adopt new “in- to initiate friendly trading relations. high praise and severe condemnation work—it barely scratches the surface coochie, so furry, so fuzzy ternational history” by placing Rus- Not fully realizing Empress Catherine anthology, some not) that would for the author’s willingness to discuss of her enormous, ongoing cycle of sia’s relations with the world in their II’s intention to maintain absolute neu- long-taboo issues of women’s agency писька, невиноватая highlight just poets—acknowledging social, intellectual, economic, and cul- trality in order to mediate peace be- “Verdicts” (poems built from the over their own bodies, the aftereffects coochie, you’re not to blame them as women and inviting them to tural contexts. Arranged in roughly tween Great Britain and its breakaway of abortion and miscarriage on marriage grisly material of Russian court chronological order, book 1 covers the colonies, the Americans sent to St. Pe- писька speak to this status, but without any and family life, and the callousness and documentation), and does not late imperial period (1914–mid-1916), tersburg, uninvited and unannounced, ignorance displayed by many in Russia idea what they might say or choose while book 2 examines the 1917 revo- a would-be ambassador. The empress include any of her early work from the coochie in situations like hers. to read. What resulted was riveting, lutions and the Civil War (1918–22). refused to collude in any way. 1990s or prose experiments. Still, the что мир так устроен вокруг controversial, articulate, evasive, book does justice to a poet and her that this world is built like it is Slavica Publishers [Tel.] 1-812-856-4186 breathtaking, brief, capacious— Indiana University [Fax] 1-812-856-4187 complex trajectory, one that cannot Still, it is hard to imagine her work and impossible to summarize. (But 1430 N. Willis Drive [Toll-free] 1-877-SLAVICA be distilled into a keyword. I wish Bloomington, IN, USA [email protected] in a feminist anthology. The F-pismo available to watch on the Jordan each of the anthology poets could be 47404-2146 http://www.slavica.com brand of feminism is theoretically Center YouTube channel.) similarly well represented—but who inflected. Leading figures like is going to publish ten more books of Rymbu and Vasyakina, as well as Ainsley Morse teaches in the Russian contemporary poetry in translation? other writers affiliated with thedepartment at Dartmouth College and And what about all the fascinating is a translator of Russian and former collective, have variously engaged Vol. 22, no. 2 (Spring 2021) poets who are not in anthologies, with feminist and queer theorists Yugoslav literatures. Her research focuses some of whom actively resist labels like Hélène Cixous, Monique Wittig, on the literature and culture of the post- and affiliations? war Soviet period, particularly unofficial Articles and Judith Butler. Gatina’s years of EkatErina Boltunova or “underground” poetry, as well as the Miroslav Maksimović, Pain, trans. association with the theory-mad (and Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History The Last King of Poland I found out about Yusupova from the John Jeffries and Bogdan Rakić, viii + avant-garde and children’s literature. http://kritika.georgetown.edu poet, visual artist, and set designer male-dominated) scene around the Yuki Murata 104 p., 2021 (ISBN 978-089357-508-3), Multiple Paths to Autonomy Dina Gatina, who gave me Yusupova’s Petersburg literary journal Translit left $19.95. her permanently exasperated with Erina t. MEgowan book Ritual C-4 in 2013. Gatina, who “Writers Live Only in Moscow and Leningrad”? The fourteen sonnets of Pain deal with Kritika is dedicated to critical a historical event from August 1941, attempts to apply theory to daily life MatthEw E. lEnoE grew up in the small city of Engels inquiry into the history of Russia when the entire Serbian population of on the Volga river, writes despairing, (otherwise understood as the stuff of and Eurasia. The quarterly journal Emotions and Psychological Survival in the Red Army, the village of Miostrah were massacred poetry). features research articles as well 1941–42 by their Muslim neighbors. Among obscene, and hilarious poems and as analytical review essays and Classics in Retrospect songs, tightly constructed, bursting extensive book reviews, especially the more than 180 slaughtered women There’s a Russian expression: chto of works in languages other DaniEl PEris and children were all the members of with subtle and incisive wordplay, and eto takoe i s chem ego ediat—literally, than English. Subscriptions and Custiniana Maksimović’s mother’s immediate fam- previously published volumes often apologetically elliptical. She has Review Article ily. Thirteen years of age, Maksimović’s what on earth is that and what available from Slavica—including, mother miraculously survived and also been writing (and illustrating) as of 16, no. 1, e-book editions olEg v. khlEvniuk do you eat it with. F-Letter offers a (ePub, MOBI, PDF). Contact Archives of the Terror joined the anti-fascist partisan forces. female bodily experience and, by all our business manager at slavica@ beautiful range of poetic diversity, Review Essay Using her tragedy as a paradigm for a means, raging against the patriarchy, indiana.com for all questions served under the familiar sauce of regarding subscriptions and alExanDEr FilYushkin national trauma, Maksimović created for years: political repression and (feminist) eligibility for discounts. In Search of a New Face for Muscovy a work that both contributes to the Serbian culture of remembrance and oversteps the boundaries of memorial literature as it celebrates the triumph of poetry over historical evil.

NEWSNET June 2021 10 NEWSNET June 2021 11 if it could not be replicated on a larger institute, rather than the university Thus, our first task was to identify scale. After a few e-mails and a meeting as a whole, is assessed, which in some target journals from the with ASEEES, the idea for this short turn determines state funding.1 punktoza list with high points and essay was born: a description of my Parametryzacja forces both individuals decode their “scope and mission” experience mentoring one academic and departments (or institutes) statements, as well as go through with an eye toward creating a formal to prioritize an accumulation of recent issues. We then spent time mentoring program supporting points. So-called “punktoza scores” figuring out the structure of recently vulnerable scholars in Slavic Studies. are issued through a massive published articles in the journal on which they decided, such as how When we began our conversations, document, altered periodically, and much space was generally used for A. had already completed quite a are available on Poland’s Ministry of literature review, how empirical, if bit of excellent research, produced Education and Science website. Its a methodological discussion was multiple publications in Polish, and current iteration reserves the highest required, and so on. Some of this had a fluent command of English. number of points for U.S. journals. was “mentoring” on my part but a I was familiar with their research In other words, it differentially lot of it was processed together in “Intellectual Monopoly Capitalism and the University” by Françoise Foliot area, although it was not identical values both Polish and U.S. journals conversation. We then went through to mine. I was also familiar with according to the governing regime’s successive drafts, meeting once a the conventions for publishing in priorities regarding nationalized week for one or two hours. Near the Polish journals, so I understood the historiography and related Supporting Precarious Scholars in Eastern end of the process there was the patterns and structure of their drafts disciplines. The government has, for infamous “Scholar One Manuscript” and writing style. We decided that example, assigned a low number of Europe: Addressing Barriers to Publishing interface with which we had to it would not be a co-authored piece points to Zagłada Żydów, an excellent grapple. Four months from our first and that I would not contribute journal on the Holocaust (20), and a in US and UK Journals punktoza discussion, the manuscript anything to the content. A’s ultimate high number to various U.S. journals was submitted, and the reviews have JANINE HOLC, LOYOLA UNIVERSITY MARYLAND goal was to understand U.S. (for example, Slavic Review has 140). since arrived. A. is confident they can publication conventions so that they Combined with the ever-present The news from Poland on academic freedom is not good. Litigation against scholars Jan move on to their next piece. And I could continue without guidance in possibility of one’s contract not Grabowski and Barbara Engelking, ongoing attacks on Jan Gross, and renewed commitments learned in a very precise way exactly the future. The main purpose of our being renewed for low productivity, to nationalized historiography at state institutions have been circulating through our social how unequal our academic systems experiment was to decode the often- publishing in a U.S. (or U.K.) journal media and mainstream news outlets. Those of us specializing in Poland and in contact with are and what it means to work in a hidden conventions of U.S. journal is almost required for professional colleagues there also know that these news stories are just the tip of the iceberg. Academics— setting in which academic freedom publishing, a process I myself had survival—for individuals and for who had always been in an economically precarious position—feel even more vulnerable as does not function. to learn earlier in my career. These entire departments. The high status the government creates new policies that assess their publication and teaching by its own preconditions helped make the of U.S. and U.K. journals in academic So how did our experience work in politicized standards. Compounding this shift is the overall climate encouraging excessive partnership work. publishing also reminds us of the terms of the nuts and bolts? scrutiny directed at the work of anyone challenging the official stance on Polish history. equity implications of demanding Scholars are vulnerable elsewhere as well, especially in Hungary, Belarus, and Russia. Why was a publication in the U.S. fluent English, a theme developed in • Because A. was unsure of how any so crucial? The answer lies in the the “native speakerism” scholarship overheard conversations would I know about these policies and the structural vulnerability they create from my government’s academic scoring in critical linguistics. In fact, not be received at their university acquaintances in Poland who are also scholars. The pandemic prevented travel, so I have system, informally called “punktoza” only fluent English but a specialized department, we spoke while they been communicating more and more through new technologies and rediscovering old by academics, a recently created academic English is another barrier were at home. This meant they did ones (or ones I had been unaware of, like free Facebook calling). Our conversations have assessment regime that assigns value that journal editors are familiar with not have access to Zoom, recent become unhurried, and more personal. Through one of these conversations, my academic to specific journals, book presses and but that does not actually reflect the versions of Adobe, or recent versions friend—whom I will call A. (they/them/their) to preserve their anonymity—and I began to conferences. Punktoza is embedded quality of the research itself. of Word. discuss the importance of publishing in U.S. journals and the difficulties of decoding exactly in “parametryzacja,” the Polish version what these journals require. I started to give A. some tips, which then blossomed into a • We decided to use Skype and set of accreditation for universities. In this full-on partnership in which I mentored them through the publication process for a single a regular time to meet. For us it was system—designed by the Ministry 1 An excellent description is available at manuscript. This process was so transformative, so enriching for both of us, that I wondered https://oko.press/lista-czasopism-wedlug-czarn- Saturday morning (U.S. time) before of Education—each department or ka/.

NEWSNET June 2021 12 NEWSNET June 2021 13 my family was up and about. used in Poland. available for guidance through the Scholar One submission form. Most • We used Google Docs, which worked • There were also painful moments steps, however, require an ongoing perfectly. We could look at the when A. told me they could not human interaction. document simultaneously while on use particular terms and had to Skype and keep track of changes. A. avoid referring to specific pastNot everyone wants to give up an could easily work on it wherever they events for fear of being targeted hour a week for more academic labor, were. It did not require any updated by the government, conservative especially after this extraordinarily software and I could type in idiomatic colleagues, or challenged by others at difficult year and a half. There is also expressions or Americanized versions their university. I could see firsthand the sensitive issue of the possible of terms while we were speaking in real the psychological and intellectual exploitation of these scholars’ work, time. That said, I did not translate their labor required to dance around the and so some oversight might be writing, as they wrote well in English. academic regime in place. necessary. But my hope is that there are others in the field who have • We were not working on a deadline. The reviewers’ comments were already published and are in stable This allowed us to cancel when needed another issue. Their informalities, Alexander Bogdanov, left, play chess with Lenin with Gorky watching on. positions, and who might wish to (which happened a few times) and colloquialisms, confusing sentence contribute to designing a mentoring also to talk about my own research, structures and mix of description, system to support our colleagues learn new Polish expressions, share positive remarks and requests for New Lease on Life for Physiological struggling in settings of nationalized teaching experiences, and the like. revision meant yet another type of precarity. Many of us are searching Collectivism? Looking back, this was important to translation was again required from for ways to address the oppressive creating a relational dynamic with me for A. Example: “The author notes systems in the very settings from Reading Bogdanov in the Time of COVID some mutuality and reciprocity. in passing...” was understandable to A. which we have built our CVs and in a literal sense but not in the context FELIX HELBING, UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH • The heavy lifting for A. included publications, and I thank ASEEES for of a review. In addition, I shared with changing the narrative’s structure, opening up this possibility. Consider the following a thought experiment in the spirit of McKenzie Wark’s A. my approach to documenting organization, shifting from passive challenge to theory for the Anthropocene: “What if we treated it not as high theory, revisions: that formal academic Janine Holc is Professor of Political Science constructions to active voice, assuming with pretensions to legislate or interpret other genres, but as low theory, as something language is not required and often at Loyola University Maryland. She has a non-Polish audience, and becoming vulgar, common, even a bit rude—having no greater or lesser claim to speak of simply a phrase such as, “agreed, published research on Poland on topics more aware of citational practices— the world than any other?” (Wark 2019, 52). My entry into low theory juxtaposes correct date inserted” was sufficient. including democratization, gender politics, whom to include, whom to leave and Holocaust memory. Her current project convalescent plasma as a prophylaxis against COVID-19 with Aleksandr Bogdanov’s out. Most important was the need to In the end, we each had a deepened is on Polish Jewish girls and women in slave 1920s blood transfusion experiments. Bogdanov sought to overcome the “limitations emphasize the unique contribution understanding of how academia labor during World War II. of individuality” (Bogdanov 2018, 211) in the most literal sense of transcending of the work rather than how well it fit functions in our respective home the borders imposed upon consciousness by individual material embodiment. He with what we already know. countries. I also felt that more scholars envisioned a unity that extended into the body itself, joining people in a comradely could benefit from a similar process. collective that functioned for the freedom and benefit of all its denizens. Calls for • There were also small technical Index of Advertisers Journal editors, ASEEES, and people the investigation of convalescent plasma as a treatment of and prophylaxis against details that mattered. For example, American Councils/ACTR 30 like Andrzej Tymowski have been COVID-19 echo this early twentieth-century desire for a community that works for the choice of keywords shifted to Kritika/Slavica/ Three Strings Books 11 working with academics in other U of Texas at Austin MA Program 18 the common good. What surprising connections might there be between these match a more global audience. (For a countries on these very processes. But phenomena? journal in Poland you do not need the In addition to articles and news columns, some editors have also told me that NewsNet also features a limited number of keyword, “Poland.”) As noted above, advertisements from various organizations The use of convalescent plasma as treatment against infection can be traced back they continue to receive manuscripts the interface for submission is difficult presenting scholarly publications, products, to 1890, when von Behring and Shibasaburo used it as a treatment for diphtheria based on excellent research but are services, or opportunities of interest to those to decode for any of us. The rules at in the Russian, Eurasian, and Central European (Marano 2015, 153). Since then, it has been employed as a treatment and prophylaxis in no shape for publication. Some fields. Please contact [email protected] for rates, play here are which boxes are best to for various viral and bacterial illnesses, from the 1918 influenza pandemic to MERS of what we struggled with could be specs and production schedule. fill in and which can be ignored. One as recently as 2012 (Bloch 4). There is over a century of evidence testifying to the easily fixed, such as making a video box asked for a “cc e-mail,” a term not effectiveness of convalescent plasma as a protective tool. After the proliferation of

NEWSNET June 2021 14 NEWSNET June 2021 15 antibiotics, however, this method fell pathogen without preventing it from this could intersect with his concept an organized society required that the one” (Bogdanov 1984, 86). Martian out of favor (WHO 2017, 2). Today’s replicating, and this can also assist in of physiological collectivism, which current dominant world attitude of collectivism is not just metaphorical— preferred approach is to use“genetically the prophylactic and treatment effect brings me to the second part of this bourgeois individualism be overcome mental or political—but literally engineered antibodies,” as this is more of passive antibody therapy (Bloch discussion. Bogdanov is typically and buried in the past. extends into the Martian body. readily scalable (Healy 2020). At the 2020, 4). The degree of immunity known as Lenin’s early rival for control In Bogdanov’s view, the best When, almost two decades later, beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic will depend on the composition and of the Bolshevik faction of the Russian opportunity for overcoming this petty Bogdanov employed the term and in other times of acute crisis, when number of antibodies contained Social Democratic Labor Party, the individualism lay within the working “physiological collectivism” in relation development of a vaccine is a long way within the plasma, with larger amounts forerunner of systems theory for class. Like many other theorists of his to his experiments in mutual blood off, convalescent plasma therapy has of neutralizing antibodies presumably his concept of Tektology, or, with time, Bogdanov observed that the exchange he harkened back to been able to provide a viable stopgap leading to a longer-lasting immunity Gorky and Lunacharsky, a prominent seeds of collectivism were already this moment in Red Star. After his measure to save the lives of those most (Casadevall 2020, 1545). originating figure of Proletkul’t. For contained within the proletarian Schematic of the use of convalescent sera for departure from Proletkul’t in 1921, at risk. the moment, I will focus on Bogdanov COVID-19 In crises such as the current one, worldview. He argued it was necessary he devoted himself to elaborating his the philosopher and Bogdanov the Convalescent plasma is, simply the use of convalescent plasma in to foster this collectivist tendency in theory of physiological collectivism on science fiction writer, as it is these roles put, “plasma collected from individuals, passive antibody therapy would be all aspects of proletarian life with the transfusions (Bogdanov 1984, 86). the basis of mutual blood exchange, that are most relevant. following resolution of infection and immediately accessible and available aim of establishing a new culture and Leonid notices the Martians live an performing informal experiments on development of antibodies” (Bloch for implementation while a vaccine Bogdanov published three major everything that entails—proletarian extraordinarily long time, without the himself and a close circle of associates. 2020, 3). Its use as treatment is referred remained some distance in the future. philosophical works: Empiriomonism, arts, proletarian science, a society horrible burden of senescence. When Even by the standards of his time, to as passive antibody therapy, wherein The employment of this prophylactic The Philosophy of Living Experience, organized in service to cooperation and he asks Netti why, she informs him it these experiments were considered the immune plasma is administered measure could mitigate mortality rates and Tektology. Nikolai Krementsov collective wellbeing. Bogdanov assigns is not a characteristic of the species, unscientific and of dubious value to someone recently exposed to a and provide protection to the most at- describes Bogdanov’s approach to huge importance to the collective— nor entirely a function of improved due to their small sample sizes, lack pathogen in order to prevent infection risk populations. On April 13, 2020, the knowledge: “In Russian, the word it is not simply a political concept living conditions, but an effect of of control groups, and so on. In 1926, or to treat oncoming symptoms. The FDA issued a guidance authorizing the for ‘science’ is nauka, and, like its but extends into the workers. As he mutual blood exchange “whereby however, Bogdanov was appointed consensus seems to be that the earlier use of convalescent plasma in treating German counterpart Wissenschaft, wrote in 1897, in the new society “each each individual receives from the director of the Soviet Union’s first a patient is treated with convalescent COVID-19 patients in the form of nauka means a systematic pursuit of worker will be actually on an equality other a number of elements which Institute of Blood Transfusion, where plasma, the better the outcomes will clinical trials using IND (Investigation knowledge in any and every possible with the rest as conscious elements of can raise his life expectancy. Such an he remained until his death due to be. Therapy administered before day New Drug Application) protocols to area. So Bogdanov’s notion of science one sensible whole” (Bogdanov 2013, exchange involves merely pumping complications from a transfusion 14 yields the best results (Cunningham determine the safety and efficacy of included—and was based upon— 13). The worker’s relation to society will the blood of one person into another procedure in 1928. not be like that of a bird to the flock 2020). Given this knowledge, what the approach against COVID-19. To not just natural sciences but also and back again by means of devices The value of Bogdanov’s blood but like that of a cell to the body. The exactly is plasma doing once inside the date, there are few clinical studies philosophy, social sciences, and the which connect their respective transfusion work lies on the theoretical socially organized society, to borrow patient? on the efficacy of convalescenthumanities” (Krementsov 2011, 117). circulatory systems... The blood of level. What does it mean for a collective plasma as prophylaxis and treatment For Bogdanov, scientific inquiry could his term, would function like a body one person continues to live in the It is useful against bacterial to manifest “physiologically?” In a because it is so often employed only not be divided into a series of separate whose many organs worked together. organism of the other, where it mixes and viral infection because of its serialized piece originally published as an emergency measure during disciplines. Philosophy and empirical with his own blood and thoroughly antibodies. There are, however, But how does blood exchange between 1921-23, Bogdanov wrote pandemics (Bloch 2020, 10). Roback science formed part of the same regenerates all his tissues” (Bogdanov different types of antibodies, not all of figure into Bogdanov’s notion of that advances in medical science and and Guarner, in an article recently knowledge practice in pursuit of the 1984, 85). Leonid wonders why this which are equally useful in treating or the collective? In 1908, Bogdanov technology had made it possible for published in JAMA Network, point to same goal—understanding the natural sort of procedure is not performed immunizing others. A 2017 report by published his first science fiction novel, the human organism to fight against its the establishment of a “stockpile of world to improve the human position on Earth, as blood transfusion is a the WHO Blood Regulators Network Red Star. The story is a classic utopian own decline “through the joint efforts” frozen, pathogen-reduced plasma” within it. Bogdanov envisioned a known concept frequently used to stated that “the potential efficacy tale, in that an outsider visits an ideal of multiple organisms (Bogdanov collected from convalescent Ebola society organized according to the treat sickness and injury. Netti says the of convalescent plasma or serum society and observes its inhabitants. 2018, 207). He referred to this later patients after a recent outbreak as “labor point of view” (Wark 2015, 23), ideology of individualism still reigns will depend on the extent to which Here, earthling Leonid tours Mars with as “direct physiological conjugation” a potential model for responding to wherein competition for survival was on Earth, whereas on Mars “in keeping antibodies generated during the Netti, a doctor for whom he develops by which he meant organ and tissue COVID-19. not an intraspecies fight amongst with the nature of our entire system, recovery of the donor would directly confusing romantic feelings. In Red transplants, like skin grafts to treat ourselves, but rather humanity’s our regular comradely exchanges of neutralize a virus or otherwise mediate Naturally, as a Slavist with an interest Star Bogdanov introduces readers to burn victims, blood transfusions to collaborative project against a hostile life extend beyond the ideological an effective immune response” (WHO in Aleksandr Bogdanov, I could not the Martian practice of “comradely prevent death from blood loss or natural world. The construction of such dimension into the physiological 2017, 3). Antibodies can also bind to a help but think of how something like exchanges of life,” or mutual blood provide immunity to disease. For him,

NEWSNET June 2021 16 NEWSNET June 2021 17 ASEEES PROGRAM UPDATE ASEEES launched two pilot programs this spring, the Initiative for Diversity and Inclusion (IDI) and the Exploring Career Diversity Conversation Series. The IDI provides structural blood exchange and other medical donor contributes to strengthen and lie to say I am optimistic this crisis will Plasma for the Prevention and Treatment support for our community of BIPOC students, scholars, and professionals to network, interventions that borrowed from improve the wellbeing of the recipient lead to change, but I find it helps, at of COVID-19.” The Journal of Clinical Investigation, April 2020. www.jci.org, share their experiences, and participate in an exclusive, forthcoming mentor program. donor organisms represented a form of organism, creating a new potential least, to look at the past and imagine doi:10.1172/JCI138745. Over 50 undergraduate and graduate students, professors, and working professionals collaboration and cooperation among donor in a chain linking everyone what alternative configurations might Bogdanov, Alexander. Red Star: The First Bolshevik have received complimentary two-year ASEEES membership and access to the BIPOC living members of a collective. In his undergoing this process. Is this not a now be possible with the benefit of Utopia. Edited by Richard Stites and Loren Scholars in SEEES ASEEES Commons discussion group. Eligible participants include time, these moments of physiological version of the “comradely cooperation” some hindsight. R. Graham, Translated by Charles Rougle, Indiana University Press, 1984. BIPOC students, scholars, and professionals in the US who are working on topics in conjugation were one-sided and Bogdanov hoped would one day form Eastern Europe, Russia, and Eurasia in or outside the academy or those who have an Felix Helbing is a PhD student in Slavic ---. “Tektology of the Struggle Against Old Age.” therefore not living up to the potential the basis of society? Calls by members of Literature at the University of Pittsburgh Russian Cosmism, edited by Boris Groys, MA or PhD in the field but are working in unrelated areas or disciplines. contained within the process. His work the scientific and medical community translated by Anastasiya Osipova, MIT Supported by the Committee for Careers beyond Academia, the Exploring Career with a background in digital advertising Press, 2018. in mutual blood exchange between the for the mobilization of existing blood and video game localization. His research Diversity Conversation Series consisted of five informal sessions, conducted via Zoom young and old at the Institute of Blood bank infrastructure and establishment ---. The Selected Works of Aleksandr Bogdanov. Prism focuses on the interaction of technology Key Press, 2013. breakout rooms, during which participants spoke to professionals in secondary Transfusion was, in his own words, an of protocols on the use of convalescent and the working body in the writings of Casadevall, Arturo, and Liise-anne Pirofski. “The education, higher education outside the tenure track, government and government- effort to “transgress the limitations of plasma to respond to future pandemics Aleksandr Bogdanov and Aleksei Gastev, Convalescent Sera Option for Containing affiliated organizations, non-profits and program management, and business and individuality by establishing a living illustrate both the need and potential with an eye to its contemporary relevance as COVID-19.” The Journal of Clinical consulting. Many of the 25 featured speakers were long-time ASEEES members who accord between two previously for comradely cooperation in the the human relationship to technology again Investigation, vol. 130, no. 4, 2020, pp. earned MAs and PhDs within disciplines in Russian, East European, and Eurasian 1545–48. separate individualities” (Bogdanov twenty-first century. The construction becomes a pressing concern. His additional Studies and who are currently working outside the professoriate. Approximately 50 Cunningham, Anne Catherine, et al. “Treatment of 2018, 211). of a network to connect people interests include videogaming in the post- graduate student or recent graduate members registered for the Conversation Series. Soviet space, biohacking, and early Soviet COVID-19: Old Tricks for New Challenges.” physically, in a manner of speaking, in Critical Care, vol. 24, no. 1, March 2020, p. ASEEES hopes to host this series again in spring 2022. Could passive antibody therapy gender politics. a system of mutual support could be 91. BioMed Central, doi:10.1186/s13054- employing convalescent plasma be 020-2818-6. a positive development. The isolated Works Cited a new lease on life for physiological Healy, Melissa. “How the Blood of Coronavirus individualism that has calcified in Bailes, Kendall E. “Alexei Gastev and the Soviet collectivism? The process does, after Survivors May Protect Others from ASEEES Happy Hour Series American society over the last several Controversy over Taylorism, 1918-24.” COVID-19.” Los Angeles Times, March 20, all, entail the literal absorption of Soviet Studies, vol. 29, no. 3, 1977, 373-94. decades is showing its limitations 2020, https://www.latimes.com/science/ another person’s organic material. The Bloch, Evan M., et al. “Deployment of Convalescent story/2020-03-20/how-blood-from- more clearly than ever. It would be a people-who-survived-covid-19. THE ASEEES JULY HAPPY HOUR SERIES IS A Krementsov, Nikolai. A Martian Stranded On Earth: GREAT WAY TO CONNECT WITH Alexander Bogdanov, Blood Transfusions, COLLEAGUES THIS SUMMER! and Proletarian Science. University of Get your MA with us! Chicago Press, 2011. JOIN US FOR INFORMAL CONVERSATION IN Marano, Giuseppe, et al. “Convalescent Plasma: New BREAKOUT ROOMS, EACH GEARED TOWARDS A GENERAL FIELD WITHIN SEEES, CREEES offers prestigious FLAS Fellowships Evidence for an Old Therapeutic Tool?” for language and area studies, as well as in-house Blood Transfusion, 2015. DOI.org (CSL EVERY THURSDAY IN JULY FROM 4-5PM EDT. scholarships for the study of Polish, Czech, and JSON), doi:10.2450/2015.0131-15. Russian, and Teaching Assistant appointments “Recommendations for Investigational COVID-19 BYOB AND DISCUSS EVERYTHING FROM that pay for a full time course load of tuition plus Convalescent Plasma.” FDA, April 2020. www. SCHOLARSHIP AND NEW BOOKS TO POST- a stipend and full health benefits! fda.gov, https://www.fda.gov/vaccines- COVID TRAVEL AND RESEARCH PLANS. ASK blood-biologics/investigational-new-drug- QUESTIONS, GET TO KNOW EACH OTHER, ind-or-device-exemption-ide-process- Dual Degree Programs offered with AND SHARE INSIGHTS AND IDEAS! MA in Russian, cber/recommendations-investigational- East European, & Eurasian Studies: • Master of Public Affairs covid-19-convalescent-plasma. • Master of Global Policy Studies Roback, John D., and Jeannette Guarner. • Master of Arts in Media Studies 1 July: East-Central European Studies • J.D. Law “Convalescent Plasma to Treat COVID-19: • Master of Business Administration Possibilities and Challenges.” JAMA, vol. 323, 8 July: Ukrainian Studies For PhD candidates in other UT programs, no. 16, April 2020: 1561–62. jamanetwork. 15 July: Central Asian & Caucasian Studies we offer a Portfolio Program. Languages offered: Bosnian/Croatian/Montenegrin/Serbian, Bulgarian, com, doi:10.1001/jama.2020.4940. Czech, Polish, Romanian, Russian, Ukrainian, and Yakut. 22 July: Russian Studies Wark, McKenzie. Capital Is Dead: Is This Something Worse? Verso, 2019. 29 July: Graduate Student Happy Hour More reasons to love us: UT is home to The Blanton Museum of Art, Harry Ransom Center, & Texas Memorial Museum. Austin proudly puts on both the SXSW and ACL music festivals, and is known for its abundant outdoor beauty and active social scene. ---. Molecular Red. Verso, 2015. WHO Blood Regulators Network. Position Paper To register for one or more of these on Use of Convalescent Plasma, Serum, or Immune Globulin Concentrates as sessions, please click through to our Learn more at: liberalarts.utexas.edu/slavic/ an Element in Response to an Emerging Members Site. Virus. 2017, https://www.who.int/ bloodproducts/brn/. NEWSNET June 2021 18 NEWSNET June 2021 19 ASEEES Awards $1.17 Million 2021 ASEEES DISSERTATION GRANT & INTERNSHIP GRANT RECIPIENTS in Grants and Fellowships Since 2019 SUMMER DISSERTATION and State-building in Abkhazia” and the Police in Interwar • Konstantin Georgiev, Rice U, WRITING GRANT • Tuna Basibek, U of Washington, Czechoslovakia” Anthropology, “Environmental • Jessica Bachman, U of Near and Middle Eastern Studies, • Lidia Tripiccione, Princeton U, Science after Socialism: $715,100 $120,000 Washington, History, “Reading “Empires in War and Peace: The Slavic Languages and Literatures, Sociopolitical Change and Research Internship Grants Soviet Books in Postcolonial Caucasian Communities in the “Dis-locating Russian Formalism: Environmental Science in Post- India, 1951-1991” Russian-Ottoman Borderland, Beyond Literary Theory” Soviet Siberia” • Felix Cowan, U of Illinois at 1825-1875” • Angela Wheeler, Harvard U, • Taylor Zajicek, Princeton U, $ 90,000 $ 30,000 Urbana-Champaign, History, • Alison Curry, U of North Carolina Graduate School of Design, “Trial History, “The Black Sea’s Cold Dissertation Writing First Book Subvention “On the Path of Truth and at Chapel Hill, History, “Tradition and Era: Socialist and National War: Geopolitics, Science, Progress: The Imperial Russian or Necessity? Sanctuary or Narratives in Soviet Urban and Environment, 1925-1995 Penny Press, 1908-18” Sorrow? The Role of the Jewish Heritage Planning, 1953-1990” $148,300 Convention Travel • Alexander McConnell, U of Cemetery in Poland, 1919-1945” INTERNSHIP GRANT Michigan, History, “Soviet • Joanna Dobrowolska, U of DISSERTATION RESEARCH GRANT IN • Spencer Abbe, U of Oregon, Humanism after Stalin, 1953-1991” Illinois at Chicago, History, WOMEN AND GENDER STUDIES Department of History • Sandra Russell, U of Massachusetts “From Neighbors to Rivals: • Giulia Giamboni, UC Santa • Rusana Cieply, UC Berkeley, Amherst, Comparative Literature, The Shifting Attitudes in Rural Barbara, History, “The Politics Anthropology With continued generosity from our donors, “Embodiment and Gendered Communities of Volhynia and of Charity. Political, Gendered, • Shawn Conroy,OSU, History Subjectivity in Ukrainian Women’s Eastern Galicia, 1930-1943” and Material Uses of Charity • Caroline Elkin, Johns Hopkins we can maintain and hope to increase our Film, Poetry, and Prose during • Zukhra Kasimova, U of Illinois in Fourteenth-Century Eastern U, School of Advanced high level of grant funding for graduate Perestroika (1985-1991)” at Chicago, History, “Uzbek, Mediterranean” International Studies • Brendan McElmeel, U of Karakalpak, and Soviet: • Jeffrey Fredrich, U of Wisconsin- students, scholars in the region, and other Washington, History, “Comrades Multinational in Form, Hybrid in DISSERTATION RESEARCH GRANT IN Madison, Russian, East members. Please consider contributing in Love: Intimacy and Communist Content, 1941–1981” LGBTQ STUDIES European, & Central Asian Morality in Soviet Institutions and Studies through our numerous opportunities to • Zachary King, U of Chicago, • Anton Svynarenko, U of Illinois Everyday Life, 1945-1975” Slavic Languages and • Felix Helbing, U of Pittsburgh, give. Donations can be made in honor or in at Chicago, Polish, Russian, Slavic Languages & Literatures • Daria Semenova, U of Illinois Literatures, “Gained in and Lithuanian Studies, at Urbana-Champaign, Slavic Translation: Modernism and • Emily Kanner, Harvard U, Slavic memory of a mentor, scholar, or colleague “Queer Childhood in Russian Languages and Literatures Languages and Literatures, “At Translation in Soviet Russia, Modernism” who made your success possible. Home and Away: Community 1927-1937” • Aristide LaVey, U of Rhode Island, Library and Information Belonging in Polish, Russian, and • Vladislav Lilic, Vanderbilt U, JOSEPH BRADLEY AND CHRISTINE Studies Ukrainian Adventure Fiction, History, “The Laboratory of RUANE DISSERTATION RESEARCH • Dante Matero, Columbia U, 1918-1960” Statehood: Imperial Law, Quasi- GRANT IN RUSSIAN STUDIES Harriman Institute PLEASE DONATE • Anastasiia Strakhova, Emory U, Sovereignty, and International • Nurlan Kabdylkhak, UNC at • Rachel Mohr, Georgia Tech, History, “Selective Emigration: Order in the Balkans, 1856-1912” Chapel Hill, History, “Islamic International Affairs Border Control and the Jewish • Kate Mower, UC Riverside, Revival of the Kazakh steppe • Amelia Parlier, U of Pittsburgh, You can contribute to: Escape in Late Imperial Russia, History, “‘In These Veins under the Tsars” Katz School of Business 1881-1914” Roman Blood Still Flows’: • Cordelia Ponczek, U of Oxford, • RESEARCH AND SCHOLARSHIP Transnationalism and the Black UNDERSTANDING Russian and East European • EXPERIENCE AND ENGAGEMENT Sea World” DISSERTATION RESEARCH GRANT MODERN RUSSIA GRANT Studies • SUSTAINABILITY • Gehad Abaza, UC Santa • Jonathan Parker, U of Texas • Alex Craver, Northern Illinois U, • Alexandra Steiner, Stanford Barbara, Anthropology, “Syrian at Austin, History, “Policing History, “The Roots of Empire U, Center for Russian, East If you are interested in planned giving for the War-Time Migration, Citizenship, the Nation: State-Building and Industry” European and Eurasian ASEEES Legacy Society, please contact Lynda Park, Studies Executive Director, at [email protected]

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The Akunin Project: The Mysteries and Histories Polish writers of the twentieth century, people and their hopes for liberation from discourses of statehood, this book offers a Democratic Republic, and the democratic Bekasova (White Horse Press, Feburary of Russia’s Bestselling Author, edited by Elena including Zbigniew Herbert, Czesław Miłosz, Habsburg oppression. gateway into scholarly explanation of a key Federal Republic of Germany up to 1990 2021,) offers new perspectives on the V. Baraban and Stephen M. Norris, was and Bruno Schulz. The book concludes with region in Eastern Europe. – in terms of their experiences with and environmental history of lands that have published by University of Toronto Press in autobiographical essays that describe her In Valeria Sobol’s new book, Haunted Empire: responses to nonconformity, dissent, come under Russian and Soviet rule. February 2021. This is the first book to study parents’ dramatic flight from Poland at the Gothic and the Russian Imperial Uncanny (NIU Mixed Messages: Mediating Native Belonging opposition, and resistance and the role Through case studies of northwestern the fiction and popular history of Grigorii outbreak of the war, her own exile from Press/Cornell, September 2020), she brings in Asian Russia, by Kathryn E. Graber, was played by those factors in each case. Russia, the book highlights the importance Chkhartishvili, one of the most successful Poland in 1969, settling in New York City, and together theories of empire and colonialism published by Cornell University Press in of local environments and the specificities writers in post-Soviet Russia. Bringing building her career as a scholar and leading with close readings of canonical and less- August 2020. Focusing on language and On Civilization’s Edge: A Polish Borderland of individual places in understanding the together scholars of literature, history, and poet of her generation. studied literary texts as she explores how media in Asian Russia, particularly in Buryat in the Interwar World, by Kathryn Ciancia, human-nature nexus. The authors’ first-hand culture, The Akunin Project explores the Gothic horror arises from the threatening territories, Mixed Messages engages in was published by Oxford University Press experience complements and supplements author’s bestselling adventure novels and God Save the USSR: Soviet Muslims and ambiguity of Russia’s own past and present, debates about the role of minority media in December 2020. This work offers a story their research in textual sources. recent histories of the Russian state. The the Second World War, by Jeff Eden, was producing the effect Sobol terms “the in society, alternative visions of modernity, of nation-building from the ground up. book includes translations of five short published by Oxford University Press in April imperial uncanny.” The book reconstructs and the impact of media on everyday Readers can eavesdrop on peasant rumors at Tatar Empire: Kazan’s Muslims and the Making works previously unavailable in English as 2021. During World War II, Stalin ended the a powerful discursive tradition that reveals language use. Graber demonstrates that the Polish-Soviet border, read ethnographic of Imperial Russia, by Danielle Ross, was well as an interview with the author. state’s persecution of religion. Religious the mechanisms of the Russian imperial language and the production, circulation, descriptions of isolated marshlands, published by Indiana University Press in leaders were tasked with rallying Soviet imagination that are still at work today. and consumption of media are practices by and scrutinize staged photographs of 2020. Ross bridges the history of Russia’s Faster, Higher, Stronger, Comrades! Sports, citizens to a “Holy War” against Hitler. A which residents of the region perform and everyday life. The book invites readers to imperial project with the history of Russia’s Art, and Ideology in Late Russian and Early revolution in Soviet religious life ensued: Focusing on international law and negotiate competing possible identities. consider how fears of national weakness Muslims. Ross reconstructs the interaction Soviet Culture, by Tim Harte, was published villages celebrated once-banned holidays amendments to the 1993 Russian and competitions for local power affect among Russian imperial policy, nonstate by University of Wisconsin Press in July 2020. and state-backed religious leaders used Constitution in July 2020, William Butler’s No Collusion! Catherine The Great And the treatment of national minorities, how actors, and intellectual developments This book traces how physical fitness had an their new positions to consolidate power International Law in the Russian Legal System American Independence, by David M. more inclusive definitions of the nation are within Kazan’s Muslim community and also even broader impact on culture and ideology over their communities and to petition for (Oxford University Press, 2020) considers Griffiths and edited by George E. Munro, was themselves based on exclusions, and how considers the evolving relationship with in the Soviet Union than previously realized. further religious freedoms. This book argues what role treaties and the generally- published by Slavica Publishers in October the very distinction between empires and Central Asia, the Kazakh steppe, and western From prerevolutionary writers and painters that the religious revolution was fomented recognized principles and norms of 2020. Empress Catherine II brought Russia nation-states is not always clear-cut. China. Tatar Empire offers a Muslim-centered glorifying popular circus wrestlers to Soviet by the state and by religious Soviet citizens. international law play under Russian law. to the forefront among European powers. narrative of Russian empire building, making photographers capturing athleticism as a Special attention is devoted to investment Her creation of a League of Armed Neutrality The Parallel Universes of David Shrayer-Petrov: clear the links between cultural reformism means of satisfying their aesthetic ideals, the The Habsburg Empire under Siege: Ottoman protection treaties and the relationship was intended to guarantee the security of A Collection Published on the Occasion of and Kazan Tatar participation in the Russian nation’s artists embraced sports in inventive Expansion and Hungarian Revolt in the Age between the Russian Constitutional Court maritime shipping. Not realizing Catherine’s the Writer’s 85th Birthday, edited by Roman eastward expansion. ways. Though athletics were used for of Grand Vizier Ahmed Köprülü (1661–76), by and the European Court of Human Rights. intention to maintain absolute neutrality Katsman, Maxim D. Shrayer, and Klavdia doctrinaire purposes, Harte demonstrates Georg B. Michels, was published by McGill- in order to mediate peace between Great Smola, was published in January 2021 by Cathy McAteer authored Translating Great that at their core, they remained joyous Queen’s University Press in March 2021. Made in Yugoslavia: Studies in Popular Music, Britain and its breakaway colonies, the Academic Studies Press. This book brings Russian Literature: The Penguin Russian physical activities capable of transforming During the seventeenth century Hungary edited by Danijela Š. Beard and Ljerka V. Americans sent to St. Petersburg, uninvited together scholars of Jewish poetics, exilic Classics (Routledge BASEES Series, 2021), everyday realities. rose up against the Counter-Reformation, Rasmussen, was published by Routledge in and unannounced, a would-be ambassador. literature, and Russian and Soviet culture which focuses on the cohort of translators the Habsburg military occupation, and war June 2020. The book includes an overview and history. In addition to essays and an who worked with Penguin in the 1950s to The Ghost of Shakespeare: Collected Essay, by taxes. Michels explores these grassroots and background on popular music in Nonconformity, Dissent, Opposition, and interview with Shrayer-Petrov, the volume bring out the first batch of Penguin Russian Anna Frajlich and edited by Ronald Meyer, revolts that threatened the Habsburgs’ hold Yugoslavia, followed by chapters covering Resistance in Germany, 1933-1990: The features a detailed bibliography and a Classics. She she continues her survey was published by Academic Studies Press in over the Hungarian borderlands. Offering a Zabavna-Pop; Rock, Punk, and New Wave; Freedom to Conform, by Sabrina Ramet, was pictorial biography. through the following decades, examining November 2020. This volume takes its name trans-imperial perspective that reassesses Narodna (Folk) and Neofolk Music; and the published by Palgrave in October 2020. such hot spots as the race to publish from Frajlich’s essay on Nobel Prize laureate the complex relationship between Politics of Popular Music Under Socialism. This book contrasts three very different Place and Nature: Essays in Russian Solzhenitsyn in English or the fates of Wisława Szymborska, but informs Frajlich’s Hungarians, Habsburgs, and Ottomans, this Exploring the role played by music in incarnations of Germany – the totalitarian Environmental History, edited by David women translators like Babette Deutsch. approach as she considers the work of major book portrays the resistance of ordinary Yugoslav art, culture, social movements, and Third Reich, the communist German Moon, Nicholas B. Breyfogle and Alexandra

NEWSNET June 2021 22 NEWSNET June 2021 23 2021 STEPHEN F. COHEN ROBERT C. TUCKER law and empire, metropole and periphery, development. Also, urban migration spread represented as containing the basis for a through a study of legal reform in the Baltic Russian Jews across the wide expanse of the revolutionary transformation of modernity. DISSERTATION FELLOWS provinces. Russia’s progressive judicial imperial domains, allowing their business Through interpretations of four major writers reform, announced in 1864, incited tensions relationships to form a crucial ligature in of various styles and backgrounds, Lawton over the issue of legal homogenization in the the long-distance circulation of capital traces how early Soviet literary aesthetics Baltics, where German elites controlled the throughout the Empire. Such economic arose from, and intervened in, the attempt The CTDF Program for Russian Historical Jennifer Goetz, Columbia U, History, of Russian Orthodox Christian pilgrimage legal system. In the 1860s and 1870s, some networks of coreligionists served as both a to construct a new, anti-capitalist industrial Studies supports the next generation of US “Developing Soviet Photography, 1937-1963” to the Holy Lands, from the Treaty of Küçük central officials, including Baltic Germans, solid foundation and a limiting constraint for modernity. The authors’ work anticipates scholars to conduct their doctoral dissertation Goetz’s dissertation examines Kaynarca in 1774 in which Ottomans granted enabled litigants and defendants to Russian Jewish speculators living under the many of the concerns of the current “new research in Russia. This program is sponsored photography as hobby and art in the Soviet Russians access to the Holy Lands, to the participate in court procedures in their native Tsarist regime, in which ascribed corporate materialist” turn in the humanities and social by the KAT Charitable Foundation, which we Union. Despite prominence in the 1920s, by dissolution of pilgrimage networks ushered languages. In seeking to designate central identities determined social orders and where sciences. Lawton’s project offers a revitalized thank for its generous support. the late 1930s art photography existed on the in by war in 1914. His analysis links pilgrimage judicial institutions as appellate instances, anti-Jewish legal restriction had intensified in history of early Soviet literature from the margins of Soviet culture. Still, from 1945 until to the constructions and rearrangements of they perceived the supra-ethnic central the 1880s. Nadel’s dissertation follows these standpoint of its materialist poetics. DISSERTATION RESEARCH FELLOWSHIPS 1963 the Soviet state increasingly supported imagined communities bound by religion, government as a more impartial arbiter. Russian Jews, who, while negotiating the an amateur camera industry. Why did the post- ethnicity, and empire. As pilgrimage evolved Samuel Fajerstein, Indiana U - Bloomington, Monson’s project examines why, in 1889, power dynamics of minority life, adapted James Nealy, Duke U, History, “The Shchekino war Stalinist state economically encourage over the century, it brought together peasants History, “Between Cooperation and officials decided to assume responsibility for their commercial activities to the demands Method: Socialist Modernity and Labor, private photography while discouraging and princes, monks and muzhiks animated Contestation: Agricultural Interactions in the the interpretation and application of Baltic of financial capitalism and proved integral to 1960s-1980s” state-regulated professional photography? by the same yearning for the Holy Lands and U.S.A. and U.S.S.R., 1917-1991” civil law. The project will explore how this the financial infrastructure of the largest land As the Cold War transformed into a Goetz’s hypothesis is that the Soviet state united by their experiences. He suggests Fajerstein’s project contends that arrangement resulted in Russian inflected empire in the world. struggle centering on socioeconomic factors, invested in the camera industry in response they articulated a “Russianness” rooted in agricultural relations between the Soviet interpretations of local law, or non-native the Soviet Union sought to improve economic to a perceived growth in popular demand ethnicity and a cultural heritage particular to Union and the US constitute one of the most pluralism. Since many of these jurists were DISSERTATION COMPLETION FELLOWSHIPS efficiency. One manifestation of this change for amateur photography, as well as to their empire but connected to the Orthodox significant pieces of the global developmental highly educated and often proponents of was the “Shchekino Method,” a constellation competition with camera producers abroad. peoples and places dispersed from the puzzle. Utilizing materials from archives in the individual rights, as well as belonging to Dominick Lawton, UC Berkeley, Slavic of factory-level managerial and organizational As photography became more accessible, Balkans to the Red Sea. Jeske recovers notions US and Russia, the dissertation will examine various non-Russian ethnic groups, Monson’s Languages and Literatures, “Revolts of strategies that resembled tactics typically it became, in the eyes of Soviet artists and of belonging fostered among Russians and these agricultural interactions from 1917- research may contradict previous claims Things: The Poetics of Materialism in Russian associated with capitalist systems. Tracing critics, a less viable artistic medium. The state foreign coreligionists, readers and writers, 1991, identifying periods of heightened that they arbitrarily and incompetently Revolutionary Literature, 1909-1939” the Shchekino Method from its origins economic support for private photography travelers and the home-bound. In showing agricultural transfer and assessing each period interpreted Baltic civil law. Lawton’s dissertation provides a through its dispersal across the Soviet Union, supplied and trained the photographers how pilgrimage enabled ethnic Russian for its domestic, international, and global critical history of how industrial development the dissertation challenges the “stagnation” who participated in the resurgence of public Orthodox Christians to articulate their own significance. As each state examined and James Nadel, Columbia U, History, “Jewish and economic construction, as refracted trope in contemporary historiography of the photography during the Thaw from 1953 visions of modernity, he contributes to reacted to the other’s agricultural systems, Speculation: Russian Jews and Financial through Bolshevik materialist ideology, Soviet Union and instead examines the Soviet to 1963, showing an important continuity ongoing revisions of the history of Russian transfers of policies and technologies forged Investment in Late Imperial Russia, 1870- shaped the aesthetics of early Soviet system’s capacity to change. In doing so, it between two periods. Empire. paths across the globe that are perceivable 1917” literature. Lawton’s project investigates how seeks to place the history of Soviet labor into today. From food storage technologies, to At the end of the nineteenth century, writers gave shape to new “Soviet objects,” conversation with that of Europe, the United Luke Jeske, U of North Carolina at Chapel Patrick Monson, Princeton U, History, “The global grain prices, to fertilizer production, the Jews made inroads into the Russian Empire’s industrial products which would resist States, and Japan. Hill, History, “Orthodox Pilgrimage and the Multiple Meanings of Legal Pluralism in current global food system was formed along financial sector, becoming a significant commodification. Amid the violent ruptures Forging of Russian Identity, 1774-1914” Imperial Russia’s Baltic Provinces, 1860-1917” the fine line between agricultural contestation presence on the novel commodity and stock that the early twentieth century brought to Jeske’s project examines the evolution This project analyzes the interplay of and collaboration in the US and USSR. exchanges made necessary by industrial Russia, even simple things were artistically

NEWSNET June 2021 24 NEWSNET June 2021 25 AFFILIATE GROUP NEWS INSTITUTIONAL MEMBER NEWS

experience in the leadership of cultural defended dissertations in the academic year Title VIII Summer Research Scholars • Amb. Alexander Vershbow (2001-2005) institutions, including her previous roles as AATSEEL 2020–2021. The submitted work should THE KENNAN INSTITUTE • Thomas Rotnem, Associate Director and • Amb. John Beyrle (2008-2012) founder and director of Grad. She takes on have been completed within the last two AT THE WILSON CENTER Professor, School of Government and • Amb. Michael McFaul (2012-2014) executive leadership at a pivotal moment • Amb. John F. Tefft (2014-2017) AATSEEL CONFERENCE AND AWARDS academic years and should not have been George F. Kennan Fellows International Affairs, Kennesaw State U. in Pushkin House’s 67-year history, as it • Amb. Jon Huntsman Jr. (2017-2019) The AATSEEL national meeting is a forum published yet. If the essay is a dissertation Kennan Fellows will be based in DC for three- “The Impact of the Northern Sea Route prepares to resume live-audience events for scholarly exchange of ideas in all chapter, it should be accompanied by the month residencies and will have access to Project upon Human and Environmental at its Bloomsbury Square residence and Security in Russia’s Arctic Regions” Please visit the Monterey Initiative in Russian expand digital access to events for a growing areas of Slavic and East/Central European dissertation abstract and table of contents. the Library of Congress, National Archives, • Paul Werth, Professor, Dept. of History, Studies webpage for videos and transcripts. global, online audience. languages, literatures, linguistics, cultures, Expanded versions of conference papers and policy research centers in DC, as well as Listen to the podcast version of the interviews the opportunity to meet with key experts UNLV. “Russia’s Enclosure: A History of Sudakova succeeds Clem Cecil, who and pedagogy. The Program Committee are also acceptable if accompanied by a here served as Executive Director from 2016 until and officials. Kennan Fellows are expected the World’s Longest Border” invites scholars in these and related areas to description of the panel and the candidate’s June 2020. Since last June, Rebecca Ostrovsky to participate in discussions with the policy form panels around specific topics, organize conference paper proposal. Candidates MIDDLEBURY INSTITUTE OF and Rafy Hay provided interim leadership and academic communities, including PUSHKIN HOUSE roundtable discussions, propose forums should clearly indicate the format of the INTERNATIONAL STUDIES AT of cultural programming and content, speaking engagements, conferences, on instructional materials, and/or submit essay submitted. Essays/chapters should MONTEREY while Alina Gainard oversaw operations. and other activities. Upon completion Pushkin House announces the appointment proposals for individual presentations for the be up to 10,000 words double-spaced, Preslava Fentham-Fletcher transformed of the fellowships, the grantees become On the eve of the 2021 Russia-United of Elena Sudakova as its new Executive including citations. Candidates should the development effort, while Alexander 2022 conference. The next annual AATSEEL alumni, for whom Kennan will continue States Summit in Geneva, MIIS is pleased Director. Sudakova brings a wealth of clearly indicate their institutional affiliation, Karpeyev curated the music program. conference will be held at the Sheraton to offer opportunities for collaboration to share The Ambassadorial Series. It is a Philadelphia Downtown in Philadelphia, current email and postal addreses. Questions and engagement. There are no citizenship compilation of conversations with eight Pennsylvania, February 17-20, 2022.. can be directed to the Committee Chair, requirements for this grant. outstanding American diplomats who Forthcoming in Summer 2021 Slavic Review To submit a proposal: click here. Narcis Tulbure. Please send a copy of the Applicants can apply for the served at various points of time as U.S. When submitting abstracts, members are essay, any accompanying documentation fellowship as individuals or as part of a ambassadors to the Soviet Union and, after CRITICAL DISCUSSION FORUM ON RACE AND BIAS its dissolution, to the Russian Federation. encouraged to renew their membership. (as both Word and PDF), and CV to Narcis team. If applying as a team, applicants • Introduction by Joy Carew & Christina Kiaer The Series provides nuanced For questions about conference proposals, Tulbure. Applicants are not required to be must be citizens of at least two different • “When Race Is a Language and Empire Is a Context,” by Marina Mogilner analyses of crucial aspects of the U.S.-Russia contact Program Committee Chair, Ainsley members of SRS in order to apply. Deadline countries. The goal of such joint fellowships relationship, through the personal reflections • “A Moment of Reckoning: Transcending Bias, Engaging Race and Racial Formations for submissions is 15 July 2021. Morse. is to promote collaborative research projects of the ambassadors. This project is conceived in Slavic and East European Studies,” by Sunnie Rucker-Chang & Chelsi West Ohueri AATSEEL awards prizes to among US, Russian, and Ukrainian experts. as a service to scholars and students of • “The Invisibility of Race in Sociological Research on Contemporary Russia: A outstanding publications in: Literary and/or Kennan Fellowship Teams will: Produce joint Decolonial Intervention,” by Marina Yusupova SLOVAK STUDIES SOCIETY American diplomacy vis-à-vis Russia. The Cultural Scholarship, Best First Book, Edited paper(s) for policy-relevant publications; interviews, released as videos, podcasts, and • “Reading Race in Slavic Studies Scholarship through a Digital Lens,” by Katherine Multi-Author Scholarly Volume, Translations present work at DC, Russia, and/or Ukraine a transcript, form a unique resource for those M. H. Reischl, Susan Grunewald, Andrew Janco, Hilah Kohen, and Antonina into English, and Language Pedagogy and CfS: SLOVAK STUDIES ASSOCIATION events; and conduct meetings and engage who want to better understand the evolving Puchkovskaia Linguistics. For more on the specific eligibility ARTICLE PRIZE with policymakers in DC. The next deadlines relationship between the two countries. • “When Pushkin’s Blackness Was in Vogue: Rediscovering the Racialization of requirements of the individual prizes, and At its annual meeting during the ASEEES is September 30. Please see the website for In eight, hour-long videos, the ambassadors Russia’s Preeminent Poet and His Descendants,” by Korey Garibaldi and Emily Wang the application. for recent recipients of the prizes, click here. conference, the Slovak Studies Association recall their experiences in strikingly personal • “Race-ing the Russian Nineteenth Century,” by Edyta M. Bojanowska Nominations should be forwarded to Yuri will award a prize for the best article or book terms. They share private photos, insights • “Exotic Aesthetics: Representations of Blackness in Nineteenth-Century Russian Title VIII Short-Term Scholarships from high-stakes negotiations, and reflections Leving, Chair of the Publications Committee. chapter about Slovakia in the humanities Painting,” by Maria Taroutina Title VIII-Supported Short-Term Grants, on the challenges and dangers they Nominated works must have been and social sciences published in 2018 or • “Sphinx upon the Dnieper: Black Modernism and the Yiddish Translation of Race,” by which allow U.S. citizens whose policy- sometimes faced. The ambassadors discuss Eli Rosenblatt published between 2019-2020. For the prize later. All submissions must be in English, relevant research in the social sciences or a range of geopolitical issues including the • “Racism, the Highest Stage of Anti-Communism,” by Rossen Djagalov in language pedagogy, works nominated but they can be published anywhere in the world. The publication’s author or authors humanities focused on the countries of Soviet Union’s breakup and the tense months • “A Cold War Cold Case: What Huldah Clark Can Teach Us about Teaching Soviet must have been published within the three Eurasia, to spend up to one month using that preceded it, the 1991 attempted coup, are to be members in good standing of the History,” by Brigid O’Keeffe preceding calendar years. Nominated the library, archival, and other specialized President Yeltsin’s 1993 standoff, the early SSA (to join, contact Carol Skalnik Leff. First • “Rereading Russia through the Contact Zone of HBCUs,” by Kelly Knickmeier authors must be AATSEEL members. resources of the DC area, while in residence years of President Vladimir Putin, Russia’s Cummings and B. Amarilis Lugo de Fabritz year membership is free.) response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the at the Kennan Institute. The application • “The Afterlife of Soviet Russia’s “Refusal to be White”: A Du Boisian Lens on Post- SOCIETY FOR The submission deadline is July 1st 2008 Russo-Georgian war. The ambassadors deadline is September 30, 2021. Please see Soviet Russian-US Relations,” by Christy Monet 2021. Send entries and any questions to also discuss nuclear, cyber, and economic ROMANIAN STUDIES the website for more details. • “Subjects, Subjectivities, and Slavic Studies: A Design for Anti-Racist Pedagogy,” by Edward Snajdr, Prize Committee Chair. The cooperation, the impact of sanctions, and Erin Katherine Krafft THE SOCIETY FOR ROMANIAN STUDIES SSA Awards Committee consists of Susan how social media and other technology The Kennan Institute welcomes: • “The Contingent Problem: A Counter-Narrative on Race and Class in the Field of GRADUATE STUDENT ESSAY PRIZE Mikula (Benedictine University), M. Mark changed their ability to communicate with Title VIII Research Scholars Slavic Studies,” by Louis Howard Porter The single-author work must be written Stolarik (University of Ottawa), and Edward • Lee Singh, PhD Candidate, Dept. the Russian people, among much else. in English by a graduate student in any Snajdr (City University of New York). of History, UC Riverside. “Ballet for The videos are hosted by Jill social science or humanitiesdiscipline on a Socialism’s Sake (and Beyond)” Dougherty, former CNN Moscow bureau ARTICLES chief, and include: Romanian or Moldovan subject, broadly and • Anna Whittington, Mellon Postdoctoral • “Kalmyk DPs and the Narration of Displacement in Post-World War II Europe,” by • Amb. Jack F. Matlock (1987-1991) inclusively understood. Fellow, Washington U in St. Louis. “Repertoires Elvira Churyumova & Edward C. Holland The competition is open to current of Citizenship: Inclusion, Inequality, and the • Amb. Thomas R. Pickering (1993-1996) • Amb. James F. Collins (1997-2001) • “The Man Who Struck the Judge with a Fly Swatter: Justice and Performance in MA and doctoral students or to those who Making of the Soviet People” Contemporary Kazakhstan,” by Nari Shelekpaev NEWSNET June 2021 26 NEWSNET June 2021 27 PERSONAGES

Michael David-Fox will become Francine Hirsch received a 2021 Alexis Lerner accepted a position as • Lilya Kaganovsky, for “Fifty The Institute for Citizens & Scholars Director of Georgetown’s Center for Certificate of Merit for a Preeminent Assistant Professor of Political Science Years of Soviet Women’s Cinema, announced the selection of eight Eurasian, Russian, and East European Contribution to Creative Scholarship (Russian and East European Politics) at 1929–1979,” which supports the WW Dissertation Fellows in Women’s Studies (CERES) on July 1, 2021. from the American Society of the United States Naval Academy. research and writing one chapter Studies for 2021. Among them is International Law. Hirsch received the of a book examining the role of Svetlana Ter-Grigoryan. She is Emily Greble and Tara Zahra Certificate of Merit for her recently The National Endowment for the women and attitudes regarding a doctoral candidate in history at were named Guggenheim Fellows. published book, Soviet Judgement Humanities (NEH) announced $24 gender in the development of the Ohio State University whose Greble’s research explores how the at Nuremberg: A New History of the million in grants for 225 humanities the Soviet film industry. dissertation explores how debates Balkans challenge presumptions International Military Tribunal after projects across the country. These on sexuality reflected and propelled about European history while World War II (Oxford University Press, grants support a diverse range of The American Council of Learned social, cultural, and political reform Zahra’s current projects include a 2020). exemplary humanities projects, the Societies 2021 Mellon/ACLS and revolution in the last years of the co-authored history of World War following by ASEEES members: Dissertation Completion Fellows Soviet Union. I in the Habsburg Empire (with Alana Holland was awarded a • Jonathan Brunstedt, for “The include Mariia Koskina, PhD Pieter Judson), and a history of Postdoctoral Fellowship in Advanced Soviet-Afghan War and the Candidate in History (SUNY The American Council of Learned deglobalization in interwar Europe. Holocaust Studies at American Shadow of Vietnam,” which Binghamton), for her research, Societies (ACLS) announces the Geneviève Zubrzycki was also University in conjunction with the supports research and writing “Giving a Green Light to winners of the 2021 ACLS Fellowships, named a 2021 Guggenheim Fellow. United States Holocaust Memorial toward a monograph examining Development: State and Personal including Maria Vinogradova, for Zubrzycki plans to use the award to Museum in Washington, DC, the cultural legacies of the Encounters with Nature in Cold War “On the Public Rails,” which offers complete a book on nationalism and Vietnam (1961–75) and Soviet- Siberia.” the first scholarly study of organized the Jewish revival in Poland. https:// The Andrew Carnegie Fellows Program Afghan (1979–89) wars. Soviet amateur cinema. www.gf.org/fellows/all-fellows. provides philanthropic support for • Marko Dumancic, for “From Małgorzata Mazurek received scholarship in the humanities and social Ordinary Men to War Criminals,” tenure at Columbia University where ACLS named 28 new Mellon/ACLS The American Council of Learned sciences that addresses important which supports research and she heads the Polish Studies program. Community College Faculty Fellows Societies (ACLS) announces the and enduring issues confronting our writing towards an article for 2021. Among them is ASEEES 2021 Fellows of the Luce/ACLS society. This year’s fellows include analyzing the function of gender Valeria Sobol (U of Illinois) was member Kenneth J. Yin, for “Making Program in Religion, Journalism & Jeanne-Marie Jackson. Her project, in defense strategies during war promoted to full professor and Literary History: The Emergence International Affairs. The fellowships “J. E. Casely Hayford and the Legacy crimes tribunals following the also appointed as the LAS Dean’s and Development of Soviet Dungan support exceptional scholars in the of Gold Coast Sovereignty,” looks Yugoslav Civil Wars in the 1990s. Distinguished Professorial Scholar for Literature.” humanities and social sciences who toward two closely linked projects on Tatyana Gershkovich, for “The 2021-2022. are pursuing research on the roles the nineteenth-century Gold Coast • Legacy of Leo Tolstoy Inside religion plays in public life around the Fante writer and statesman J. E. Casely and Outside Russia, 1920– Joshua Tapper, a doctoral candidate world and who are poised to enrich Hayford. The first is an intellectual 1928,” which supports archival at Stanford University, is the recipient public understanding of religion biography that weaves together research in Moscow and writing of the Ruth and David Musher / JDC through media engagement. Among the eclectic political, theological, of two chapters of a book on Archives Fellowship. Tapper will trace this year’s fellows is Sean Griffin, and literary influences on and of his the reconstruction and the the revival of Jewish institutional and Lecturer of Russian and Religion, written work, and the second is a new reinterpretation of Tolstoy’s works political life, cultural organization, Dartmouth College, for his project annotated edition of the first African by Communists in the Soviet and a multi-denominational religious “The Unpredictable Past: Orthodoxy novel written in English, Hayford’s Union and by Russian émigrés sphere in the final years of the Soviet and Memory in Post-Soviet Russia.” 1911 opus, Ethiopia Unbound. who fled Russia after 1917. Union (1985–1991).

NEWSNET June 2021 28 NEWSNET June 2021 29 IN MEMORIUM

Rachel Feldhay Brenner (1946-2021), work forward into the 1930s with seven Armenia, and Portugal. His story is told in Harvey L. Temkin and Barbara Myers additional volumes of economic history his autobiography, The Road to Home: My Temkin Professor in Hebrew Language under the general title, The Industrialisation Life and Times, published in 2003. and Literature and Elaine Marks Professor of Soviet Russia. Davies’ papers are housed At the Corporation, Gregorian STUDY ABROAD of Jewish Studies at the University of in the Special Collections department of focused the foundation’s grantmaking on Wisconsin-Madison, passed away in the University of Birmingham. aiding the development of innovative ideas February 2021. Davies obtained his BA from and transformative scholarship. During Brenner published widely in Israeli, the University of London and a PhD in his presidency, CCNY awarded more than Polish, Holocaust, and Canadian Jewish Commerce and Social Science from the 10,000 grants totaling some $2.8 billion. literature, including A.M. Klein, The Father University of Birmingham. His first post Excerpted from text provided by Thomas of Canadian Jewish Literature: Essays in the was at the University of Glasgow, where H. Kean, Chair, Board of Trustees, Carnegie Poetics of Humanistic Passion (1990) which he would remain until his return to the Corporation of New York was awarded The Jewish Federation of University of Birmingham in 1956. Davies Greater Toronto Literary Scholarship Award. was appointed a professor of Soviet William Riegel Schmalstieg (1929-2021) Her Holocaust literature book-length study, Economic Studies in 1965. was Sparks Professor Emeritus of Slavic GO BEYOND ORDINARY WITH AMERICAN COUNCILS The Ethics of Witnessing: The Holocaust in In 1963, Davies was named the first and Baltic Linguistics and head of the Polish Writers’ Diaries from Warsaw, 1939- director of the Centre for Russian and East Department of Slavic Languages at Penn For over 45 years, American Councils has been a leader in innovative 1945 (2014), was awarded ASEEES’s USC European Studies (CREES), a post which State University. overseas study and research programs in Russia, Eurasia, and the Book Prize in Literary and Cultural Studies. he would retain until 1978. Davies retired Born in Sayre, Pennsylvania, he She had just completed the monograph in 1989 and was named Senior Fellow and followed his father’s dictum to study Balkans. From language immersion to research fellowships, American Polish Literature and the Holocaust: Emeritus Professor by the university upon Russian due to that nation’s expanding Councils offers programs to advance your education and career. Eyewitness Testimonies, 1942-1947 (2019). his departure from active teaching. world role after WWII, Schmalstieg received Brenner’s work was recognized For more information, see his obituary. his BA from the University of Minnesota and by the US Memorial Holocaust Museum his MA at University of Pennsylvania, where where she was a Fellow on three separate he became interested in Lithuanian. With Title VIII Research Fellowships American Councils Study Abroad Vartan Gregorian, an educator, historian, occasions. Brenner held fellowships in humanities scholar, and recipient of the the Korean Conflict looming, Schmalstieg’s Conduct fully-funded research for 3-9 Study a one of several Eurasian Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Presidential Medal of Freedom, died on range of language skills, from Arabic to months in 22 countries throughout languages while immersing yourself in Studies (2001), and was a Visiting Professor April 15, 2021, in New York City at age 87. Sanskrit, helped land him a job at the Eurasia and Eastern Europe. Funded by the culture of Russia, Central Asia, or at Hebrew University for the Mosse Faculty Gregorian served as the twelfth National Security Agency’s language the U.S. Department of State’s Program East or Southeast Europe. Offered for Exchange Program (2004). She was Senior president of Carnegie Corporation of New school. While at NSA, Schmalstieg served Fellow at the Institute for Research in as a 2nd lieutenant in the Army, teaching for Research and Training on Eastern the summer (8 weeks), semester, or York at the time of his death. During his the Humanities (2028-2013). Her awards languages to counter intelligence officers. Europe and the Independent States academic year, as well as online. tenure, beginning in 1997, he championed include a Canadian Studies Research Grant the causes of education, immigration, and He headed back to Penn where he finished of the Former Soviet Union (Title awarded by Social Sciences and Humanities his PhD in linguistics. VIII). Add up to 10 hours of language Languages offered: Albanian, international peace and security. Gregorian Azerbaijani, BCS, Chechen, Dari, Farsi, Research Council of Canada and US was a naturalized United States citizen Schmalstieg settled at Penn State instruction through the Combined National Endowment Fellowship (1990). University in 1964 until his retirement in Georgian, Kazakh, Pashto, Romanian, whose experiences in a new country helped Research & Language Training The University of Wisconsin-Madison 2001. His teaching concentrated on Slavic Russian, Tajiki, Turkish, Ukrainian, shape him, including his belief in the great Program (CRLT). awarded her the Kellet mid-career award linguistics, Russian, Old Church Slavic as Uzbek importance of immigrant civic integration (2011), the Hilldale award (2015), and the to the health of American democracy. well as courses in Baltic languages and WARF Elaine Marks named professorship Gregorian was devoted to higher linguistics, primarily Lithuanian. When (2019). education and was president emeritus Lithuania regained its independence Excerpted from text provided by H-net. of Brown University and the former in 1991, the Lithuanian government officially honored Professor Schmalstieg Robert William Davies, British historian, provost of the University of Pennsylvania. In addition, Gregorian is renowned for for his accomplishments in the study of writer, and professor of Soviet Economic the Lithuanian language. Full details, including eligibility requirements, deadlines, scholarships, and Studies at the University of Birmingham, revitalizing The New York Public Library during his presidency in the 1980s. The Excerpted from his obituary. applications, are available at: died in April 2021 at the age of 95. A collaborator and co-author with recipient of more than 70 honorary studyabroad.americancouncils.org historian E. H. Carr on two volumes of his degrees and dozens of significant awards, 14-volume History of Soviet Russia, Davies he was decorated by the governments of the United States, France, Italy, Austria, Questions? Contact us: [email protected] is best known for having carried Carr’s

NEWSNET June 2021 30 NEWSNET June 2021 31 53rd Annual ASEEES Convention

Nov. 18-21, 2021 Dec. 2-3, 2021 New Orleans, LA Virtual Convention

EXHIBIT & ADVERTISING INFO Each year 60-70 publishers, universities, and non-profit organizations exhibit JOIN US during the annual ASEEES Convention. The 2021 ASEEES Annual Convention We also offer advertising space in will feature virtual and in-person panels, the Convention Program and on the roundtables, film screenings, plenaries, Virtual Convention Platform. lightning rounds, and exhibitors. This format will allow for many who cannot attend in- person to still participate during the virtual components of the Convention. BECOME A SPONSOR Consider sponsoring the ASEEES • TO REGISTER Convention. This is a great opportunity • FOR HOTEL INFORMATION to show support for the Slavic, East • TO RENEW OR START MEMBERSHIP European, and Eurasian studies and • TO VIEW PROGRAM be recognized online and at the convention by all attendees.

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