CREECA Lecture Series Podcast

“Mixed Messages: Mediating Native Belonging in Asian Russia” with Kathryn Graber, Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Indiana University Bloomington. Lecture co-sponsored by Indiana University. Description: Focusing on language and media in eastern Siberia, Mixed Messages (Cornell University Press, 2020) engages debates about the role of minority media in society, alternative visions of modernity, and the impact of media on everyday language use. The book demonstrates that language and the production, circulation, and consumption of media are practices by which residents of the region perform and negotiate competing possible identities. What languages should be used in newspapers, magazines, or radio and television broadcasts, and by whom? What kinds of publics are and are not possible through media? How exactly do discourses move into, out of, and through the media to affect everyday social practices? In this book talk, Kathryn Graber will address these questions through her ethnography of the Russian Federation’s Buryat territories, a multilingual and multiethnic region on the Mongolian border with a complex relationship to both Europe and Asia. Bio: Kathryn E. Graber is an assistant professor of Anthropology and Central Eurasian Studies at Indiana University Bloomington. A linguistic and sociocultural anthropologist, she researches minority language politics, multilingualism, mass media, materiality, and intellectual property in Russia and Mongolia. She is the author of Mixed Messages: Mediating Native Belonging in Asian Russia (Cornell University Press, 2020) and co-editor of Storytelling as Narrative Practice: Ethnographic Approaches to the Tales We Tell (Brill, 2019). Graber’s award-winning writing on Buryatia has appeared in journals such as Slavic Review, the Journal of Linguistic Anthropology, Language & Communication, and Inner Asia, as well as in Russian collections. Since 2014 she has been researching how value is negotiated in the Mongolian cashmere industry, based on fieldwork at sites along the commodity chain. Her research has been funded by agencies including the National Science Foundation, the US Department of Education/Fulbright-Hays, and the Social Science Research Council. Dr. Graber is also an award-winning teacher, teaching courses at IUB that bridge anthropology and area studies. She holds an A.B. in Anthropology and Linguistics (University of Chicago), M.A. in Russian and East European Studies (University of Michigan), and M.A. and Ph.D. in Anthropology (University of Michigan). She previously held postdoctoral fellowships at the Kennan Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and at IUB.

"The Gendered Ambiguity of the Postcommunist Transitions" with Janet Elise Johnson, Professor of Political Science and Gender/Women’s Studies at Brooklyn College; Katalin Fábián, Professor of Government and Law at Lafayette College; and Mara Lazda, Professor of History at Bronx Community College. LECTURE DESCRIPTION: Kristen Ghodsee’s 2017 New York Times op-ed and subsequent popular book, "Why Women Have Better Sex under Socialism"(2018), now translated into 12 other languages, is the latest foray into a central and longstanding debate as to whether the transition in Central-Eastern Europe and Eurasia was bad for women. Drawing upon four decades of gender scholarship of this region with more than 200 million women, we build on and move beyond this unanswerable question to examine why and how assessments have been and remain contradictory. Extending critical theory’s concept of intersectionality and interweaving the legacies of colonialism and informality, we ground our analysis and assessment in the concept of ambiguity. Ambiguity helps us make sense of the varied perspectives of women in this region–as shaped by class, race, ethnicity, sexuality, age, and ability–and the varied and complicated processes of democratization, economic reforms, and redefining borders and alliances. This presentation comes out of our collaboration on "The Routledge Handbook to Gender in Central-Eastern Europe and Eurasia" (forthcoming July 2021), which reflects on and advances the interdisciplinary, transnational, and multidimensional study of this part of the world. Over the last three decades, gender has become an integral, if derided, component of the study of the region across the social sciences. This study is also an important element of the decentering of the West in women’s, gender, and sexuality studies, especially with its nuanced and innovative theorizing on the intersections of class, ethnicity, and race outside of western frameworks. SPEAKER DESCRIPTIONS: Janet Elise Johnson is a Professor of Political Science at Brooklyn College, City University of New York, USA. Her books include The Gender of Informal Politics (Palgrave 2018), Gender Violence in Russia (Indiana University Press 2009), and Living Gender after Communism (Indiana University Press 2007). In the last few years, she has published articles in Slavic Review, Human Rights Review, Journal of Social Policy Studies, Politics & Gender, Perspectives on Politics, Journal of Social Policy, and Aspasia as well as online in The New Yorker, The Washington Post’s Monkey Cage, and The Boston Review. Katalin Fábián is a Professor of Government and Law at Lafayette College, Easton, PA USA. Her books include Contemporary Women’s Movements in Hungary: Globalization, Democracy, and Gender Equality (Woodrow Wilson Center Press and Johns Hopkins University Press, 2009), Domestic Violence in the Postcommunist States: Local Activism, National Policies, and Global Forces (Indiana University Press, 2010), Democratization through Social Activism: Gender and Environmental Issues in Post-Communist Societies (Tritonic Romania, 2015), and Rebellious Parents: Parents’ Movements in Central-Eastern Europe and Russia (Indiana University Press, 2017). Mara Lazda is Associate Professor of History at Bronx Community College, City University of New York, USA. Her regional focus is on Latvia, with broader research interests on the intersections between gender, nationalism, and transnationalism in historical and contemporary contexts. Her articles have appeared in the Journal of Baltic Studies, the International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society, and Nationalities Papers. She has served as the President of the Association of Baltic Studies (2014-2016), a coordinator of the Gender and Transformation: Women in Europe workshop at New York University, and an editor for Aspasia: The International Yearbook of Central, Eastern, and Southeastern European Women’s and Gender History.

“Promoting US Policy in Eurasia—A Practitioner’s View” with Caroline Savage, career Foreign Service Officer and non-resident fellow at Georgetown’s Institute for the Study of Diplomacy. LECTURE DESCRIPTION: Foreign Service Officer and REECAS alumna Caroline Savage will talk about her extensive career in international affairs. Savage will discuss various topics relating to her academic and professional career, including her work in public diplomacy as a Foreign Service Officer, how she has utilized her foreign language and area studies training in her professional life, and her experience facilitating inter-agency coordination. Conversation moderated by CREECA Director Ted Gerber. SPEAKER DESCRIPTION: Caroline Savage is a career Foreign Service Officer who served most recently as Director of the U.S. Department of State’s Foreign Press Center. As non-resident fellow at Georgetown’s Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, her focus is diverse diplomacy leadership in foreign affairs, a project she began during her tenure as Virginia and Dean Rusk Fellow at ISD from 2018-2019. Prior to Georgetown, she served as Public Affairs Officer at U.S. Embassies Azerbaijan and Mozambique. In Washington assignments, she was Director for Russia and Central Asia on the National Security Council and Political-Military Officer in the U.S. Department of State’s Office of Russian Affairs. She also served previously in Belarus and Luxembourg. A native of Wauwatosa, Wisconsin, she graduated from Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, then received master’s degrees in Russian, East European, and Central Asian Studies and Political Science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her languages are French, Russian, Portuguese, and Azerbaijani.

"Since 1989 – Poland’s Democratic Experience" with Donald Pienkos, Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. LECTURE DESCRIPTION: In 1989, Poland, thanks primarily to the efforts of the Solidarity movement, emerged from 44 years of Soviet domination to establish a new system of representative democratic government. Given its people’s extremely difficult situation at that time, coupled with Poland’s failed experience with democratic governance in the years after its national rebirth in 1918, few observers were hopeful about the chances for democratic governance after 1989. Why they were proven wrong, how Polish democracy has developed over the past three decades, and what we can learn from Poland’s experience – both from its successes and its challenges – are covered in this talk. SPEAKER DESCRIPTION: Donald Pienkos is Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. He has published extensively on Poland’s politics and was a founder of UW-Milwaukee’s programs in Russian and East European Studies and Polish Studies. In the 1990s he worked for Poland’s admission into NATO. A past president and national director in a number of academic bodies and organizations focused on Poland, including the Polish Institute of Arts and Sciences of America and the Polish American Congress, he was awarded the Officer’s Cross of Service from the President of Poland in 2010. He holds his Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin (1971).

"Guns to Butter: Economic Perceptions and Policy Preferences in Russia" with Maria Snegovaya, Visiting Scholar at George Washington University and a postdoctoral scholar at the PPE program at Virginia Tech. LECTURE DESCRIPTION: Scholars on “rally ’round the flag” often argue that by invoking the danger of external threats in times of economic hardship, leaders can rally the public around the government in a way that would otherwise be impossible. Alternative streams of the literature suggest that a darkening economic reality (“butter”) may weaken the impact of patriotic euphoria (“guns”). Snegovaya conducted an experimental survey to measure changes in foreign policy preferences among respondents exposed to negative economic priors in Russia. In line with the earlier findings on this topic, this analysis shows that participants who encounter negative economic primes report significantly less support for assertive foreign policy narratives. In this lecture, Snegovaya will demonstrate how continuing economic strain may limit the Kremlin’s ability to divert public attention from internal problems through the use of assertive rhetoric. SPEAKER DESCRIPTION: Maria Snegovaya (Ph.D., Columbia University) is a Visiting Scholar at George Washington University and a postdoctoral scholar at the PPE program at Virginia Tech. She is a comparative politics, international relations, and statistical methods specialist. The key focus of her research is democratic backsliding in Eastern Europe, as well as Russia’s domestic and foreign policy. Her research results and analysis have appeared in policy and peer-reviewed journals, including West European Politics, Journal of Democracy, and Post-Soviet Affairs. Her research has been referenced in publications such as the New York Times, the Economist, and Foreign Policy. She is frequently invited to give talks at U.S. universities and think tanks.

"On Civilization’s Edge: A Polish Borderland in the Interwar World" with Kathyrn Ciancia, Associate Professor of History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. LECTURE DESCRIPTION:As a resurgent Poland emerged at the end of World War I, an eclectic group of Polish border guards, state officials, military settlers, teachers, academics, urban planners, and health workers descended upon an eastern borderland province that was home to Ukrainians, Poles, and Jews. Its aim was not simply to shore up state power in a place where Poles constituted a minority, but also to launch an ambitious civilizing mission that would transform a poor Russian imperial backwater into a region that was at once modern and Polish. By tracing how these men and women recast imperial hierarchies of civilization—in which Poles themselves were often viewed as uncivilized—within the borders of their nation-state, Kathryn Ciancia offers a new story of Polish nationalism that is both locally grounded and global in scope. SPEAKER DESCRIPTION: Kathryn Ciancia is an Associate Professor of History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where she has taught since 2013. She holds a BA from Oxford University, an MA from University College-London, and a Ph.D. from Stanford University. Her first book, On Civilization’s Edge: A Polish Borderland in the Interwar World, has just been published by Oxford University Press. She is now at work on a new book about the role of Poland’s global consular network in policing the boundaries of citizenship between the end of World War I and the beginning of the Cold War.

“Soviet Judgment at Nuremberg: Revisiting the International Military Tribunal on its 75th Anniversary” with Francine Hirsch, University of Wisconsin – Madison. Please note that this CREECA Lecture was given as part of the Area Studies Lecture Series presented by the 2018-2021 U.S. Department of Education Title VI National Resource Center and Foreign Language and Area Studies grant recipients for Russia, Eastern Europe, and Central Asia.

"Toxic Crimes Project: Legal Activism Against Environmental Destruction in the Conflict in Eastern Ukraine" with Dr. Freek van der Vet, Erik Castrén Institute of International Law and Human Rights. LECTURE DESCRIPTION: War often destroys the environment – either directly when armies poison foliage as a military strategy or indirectly, when toxins leak from bombed industrial sites. In the “Toxic Crimes Project,” we examine how rights advocates—lawyers, experts, and activists—protect the environment from wartime environmental destruction, how they promote the idea that the environment has legally enforceable rights, and how they expand international legal mechanisms (at the ICC and ILC) to protect the environment during war. In this lecture, Van der Vet presents case studies from the project. Based on several pilot-interviews with lawyers and NGO activists, the lecture examines legal activism against environmental destruction during the conflict in Eastern Ukraine. The Donbas region in Eastern Ukraine is one of Europe’s most heavily industrialized areas. Before the conflict broke out, the region already coped with heavy pollution from its industry and coal sector. Some of these heavy industry sites have been unstable or fraught with safety issues. Many of these industrial sites in the Donbas region are located in the immediate vicinity of the front line of the conflict. The ongoing conflict in Ukraine has damaged many of these sites, for instance the Zasyadko coal mine and the Lysychyansk oil refinery, polluting the air and contaminating water supplies, and, as a result, damaging human health and ecosystems for years to come. SPEAKER DESCRIPTION: Dr. Freek van der Vet is a University Researcher at the Erik Castrén Institute of International Law and Human Rights, University of Helsinki Finland. Van der Vet’s research interests include international litigation at human rights courts, legal mobilization under authoritarianism, and environmental destruction during war. He is the Principal Investigator (PI) of “Toxic Crimes Project: Legal Activism against Wartime Environmental Destruction” (funded by Kone Foundation and Academy of Finland); a research group investigating how lawyers and experts seek accountability for wartime environmental destruction. In his previous projects, he worked on legal mobilization against disinformation and trolling in Russia, the legal defense of treason suspects and NGOs in Russia, and litigation at the European Court of Human Rights on behalf of victims from the Chechen conflicts. He is a member and co-founder of ActInCourts (Activists in International Courts; funded by SSHRC, Canada), a network of scholars and human rights practitioners working on regional human rights courts. His academic work has appeared in Law & Society Review, Law & Social Inquiry, Europe-Asia Studies, The International Journal of Human Rights, Social & Legal Studies, Human Rights Review, Review of Central and East European Law, among others. He completed visiting fellowships at the University of British Columbia (Canada) and the University of Copenhagen (Denmark).

This podcast is a recording of the CESSI Virtual Alumni Panel which took place on October 24. Featured Alumni were Kiiyha Gray, Katka Showers-Curtis, Stu McLaughlin, and Matt Brown. The first part of the panel is a brief introduction to CESSI while the second part is a Q&A with our panelists.

"Perestroika's Dark Side: Nationalism, Racism and Crisis on Moscow Streets at the End of the Soviet Union" with Jeff Sahadeo, Professor at Carleton University. LECTURE DESCRIPTION: Migration from the Soviet South (Caucasus and Central Asia) to the capital, Moscow, dramatically increased in the 1980s. Newcomers sought to take advantage of top-quality education, professional opportunities and to trade as economic conditions in their homelands grew more challenging. Street traders from Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan and elsewhere, whose fruit and flowers fetched much higher prices than they might at home, came to symbolize a changing Soviet Union for Moscow’s residents. Mikhail Gorbachev’s efforts to bring openness (glasnost) and economic restructuring (perestroika) to the USSR brought initial enthusiasm to Soviet citizens, who hoped for increased social mobility and economic opportunity. As reforms faltered, however, as prices rose and shortages appeared in the planned economy, the goods and services provided by these Soviet southerners became at once more important and more resented by Moscow’s Slavic majority. Nationalist and racist ideas, percolating under the surface alongside increased south-north movement, burst into the open in the late 1980s and changed life plans of many of these southern migrants. Based on oral histories of the time, this presentation reveals connections between mobility, nationalism and racism in Moscow and across the USSR. By 1990, when hope for progress ebbed, the Soviet maxim of the Friendship of the Peoples evaporated and migrants no longer considered Moscow “their” capital. SPEAKER DESCRIPTION: Jeff Sahadeo is a Professor at the Institute of European, Russian and Eurasian Studies and the Department of Political Science. His presentation is drawn from his recent book, Voices from the Soviet Edge: Southern Migrants in Leningrad and Moscow (Cornell University Press, 2019). Professor Sahadeo is also the author of Russian Colonial Society in Tashkent, 1865-1923 and the co-editor of Everyday Life in Central Asia, Past and Present. His current research examines the intersection between nature and society through a study of rivers in tsarist and Soviet Georgia