"Legends of the Underground: Ivan Jirous, Egon Bondy, and the Prehistory of Czech Dissent"
Jonathan Bolton, Associate Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures, Harvard University
Date and Time: Thursday, April 8 at 4:00 p.m.
Location: 206 Ingraham Hall, 1155 Observatory Drive
Sponsor: CREECA
About the lecture: Professor Bolton's presentation will consider the beginnings of Charter 77, one of the most influential and philosophically sophisticated of dissident movements in East Central Europe during the 1970s and 1980s. One of the most common narratives about the birth of Czech dissent suggests that it emerged in response to the 1976 trial of a rock group called The Plastic People of the Universe; opposition intellectuals perceived the regime's persecution of rock music as part of a broader offensive against political and cultural freedom, and came together to draft Charter 77. On this account, the Plastic People served as little more than a catalyst, mobilizing writers and other intellectuals to articulate their opposition to the regime. In fact, the culture of the music underground -- a largely working-class and youth culture -- played a much more important role in the formulation of a Czech dissident platform. This talk will examine a number of misconceptions about the "trial of the Plastics," as well as the writings of two key members of the music underground, Ivan Jirous and Egon Bondy. It will suggest how a better appreciation of the underground's oppositional role can help us rewrite the standard narratives of dissent under Communist rule.
About the speaker: Jonathan Bolton received his Ph.D. in 2001 from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, and he was a Junior Fellow at Harvard's Society of Fellows from 2002-2004. He has published articles on contemporary Czech fiction and poetry, Czech-Jewish literature (including the entry on Czech literature for the YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe), and Czech political discourse of the interwar period. He has selected and translated a volume of poetry by the contemporary Czech poet Ivan Wernisch, In the Puppet Gardens: Selected Poetry, 1963-2005, and has also edited a volume on English and American New Historicism for Teoreticka knihovna, a Czech series on literary theory that is used widely in university classes. He is currently completing a book entitled Worlds of Dissent: The Plastic People of the Universe, Charter 77, and Czech Culture under Communism.
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"Eurasian Security Dilemmas: Russia's Energy Statecraft and the Contours of the Great Game Redux"
Adam Stulberg, Associate Professor in the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs, Georgia Tech
Date and Time: Wednesday, April 14 at 4:00 p.m.
Location: 120 Ingraham Hall, 1155 Observatory Drive
Sponsors: Center for World Affairs and the Global Economy and CREECA
About the lecture: The Russia-Georgia conflict ignited debate over the strategic posture of a “re-energized” Russia: Is it prepared to integrate with the world or venture down the path of a self-isolated bully in Eurasia to the detriment of global energy security? Will Moscow exploit its energy dominance for neo-imperialist ends, or will global market pressures trump the pull of realpolitik? Typically, this policy debate is traced to broader controversy between realism and its critics over the utility and practice of energy as a weapon of state power.
Upon closer inspection, however, it appears that the conventional debate and its application to Russia is misplaced by presenting a false dichotomy between globalization and international security. The focus on Russia’s recent assertiveness distorts its energy prowess and neglects Moscow’s mixed success with energy diplomacy in Eurasia, including bouts of inadvertent escalation. Furthermore, the record of Russia’s variable success not only poses analytical challenges for extant theories of statecraft, but highlights important differences among offensive and defensive realists concerning the motivation, explanation, and appropriateness of aggressive behavior.
This talk seeks to fill this analytical void by advancing an alternative argument for energy statecraft. To explicate the distinction between offensive and defensive realism and the puzzle of Russia’s mixed success at wielding natural gas and oil as instruments of strategic leverage, attention is drawn to energy security dilemmas. Specifically, there are market/infrastructure and domestic regulatory conditions that can blur delineation of strategic from commercial energy strategies, and that can advantage pursuit of politically motivated objectives over strictly commercial ventures. As these conditions directly shape the transparency of intentions and modalities of energy security, as well as affect the costs and risks of aggressive action for states and firms alike, they create windows either of opportunity for commercial engagement or of strategic vulnerability. These claims are explored in critical cases of Russia’s contemporary pipeline diplomacy towards Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan. Viewing the renewed contest over Caspian hydrocarbon supply through the prism of “energy security dilemmas” illuminates nuanced dimensions to interdependent Eurasian energy relations, as well as strategic challenges and opportunities for contending with Russia’s global energy resurgence.
About the speaker: Adam N. Stulberg specializes in international relations; Russian/Eurasian politics and security affairs; and science, technology, and international security policy. His current research focuses on the implications of different types of “principal-agent” problems for explaining energy statecraft in Eurasia, strategic confidence-building in South Asia, credible bargaining for cooperative security, military transformation, nuclear fuel supply guarantees, and decentralization and control in the nuclear sector. Professor Stulberg served as a Political Consultant in Residence at RAND from 1987-1997 and as a Senior Research Associate at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies (CNS), Monterey Institute of International Studies (1997-1998). Since 1997, he has worked closely with Senator Sam Nunn drafting policy recommendations and background studies on future directions for the U.S. Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, building regional and energy security regimes in Central Asia and the South Caucasus, and engaging Russia’s regional power centers. In addition, Professor Stulberg was a post-doctoral fellow at CNS (2000-2001) and has been a consultant to the Carnegie Corporation of New York (2000-present) and the Director of the Office of Net Assessment in the Office of the U.S. Secretary of Defense (2000-present). Professor Stulberg’s books include: Well-Oiled Diplomacy: Strategic Manipulation and Russia’s Energy Statecraft in Eurasia; Managing Military Transformation: Agency, Culture, and Service Change (with Michael D. Salomone); and Preventing Nuclear Meltdown: Managing Decentralization of Russia’s Nuclear Complex (with James Clay Moltz and Vladimir A. Orlov, eds). He also has published articles in Security Studies, Foreign Affairs, Europe-Asia Studies, Orbis, The Nonproliferation Review, Geopolitics, Survival, and Contemporary Security Policy.
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"Islamic court in documentation and traditions: Excursus to Medieval Central Asia"
Elyor E. Karimov, Professor of History, Institute of History, Uzbek Academy of Sciences
Date and Time: Thursday, April 15 at 4:00 p.m.
Location: 206 Ingraham Hall, 1155 Observatory Drive
Sponsors: Central Asian Studies Program and CREECA
About the lecture: In contemporary Central Asia it is very popular to talk about the restoration of Muslim traditions in a society under Islamic law or Sharia traditions. People are talking about restoration of the true spirit of Islam because of disappointment in the current state of society; many regulations and laws don’t work or don’t respond to people’s needs. As a result, citizens look to the past or to the experience of close and more successful neighbors like the United Arab Emirates or Malaysia.
But what do people know about Islamic courts? Not much.
The Islamic courts in Central Asia that operated for centuries, until the beginning of 20th century, were based on Muslim (Sharia) law and dealt with many aspects of day-to-day life, including politics, economics, banking, business, contracts, family, sexuality, hygiene, and social issues.
During the years of 1998-2002, Professor Karimov organized several archaeographic expeditions to different regions of Central Asia and collected a significant number of historical documents dating from the 17th to the early 20th century. The main bulk of the documentary materials is constituted by different kinds of Qazi (i.e. Islamic judge) juridical deeds.
These documents will help us to understand the different aspects of the Sharia Muslim Court activity in Central Asia.
About the speaker: Elyor Karimov is a professor of history and the head of the Department of Medieval and Ancient History at the Institute of History, Uzbek Academy of Sciences, in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. During the 2009-10 academic year he is a residential fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C. Professor Karimov’s areas of expertise include Middle East and Central Asian Studies; History of Islam and Sufism, Medieval and Contemporary History and Culture; and Written Sources, Oral Histories, and Archives Documents. In 2008, his latest book was published in English, Uzbek and Russian under the title The Kubraviya Waqf (17th-19th Centuries): Written Sources on the Late History of the Kubravi Sufi Brotherhood in Central Asia / Tashkent. For many years he has collaborated with colleagues all over the world, supported by a series of research grants and fellowship awards that have enabled him to travel widely in Europe and the U.S. He has carried out extensive field research in Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and southern Kazakhstan.
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Russian Folk Music Concert
Zolotoj Plyos
Date and Time: Friday, April 16 at 7:00 p.m.
Location: B10 Ingraham Hall, 1155 Observatory Drive
Sponsors: Slavic Department Graduate Student Organization, Russian Student Association, and CREECA with financial support from the Associated Students of Madison
About the event: Zolotoj Plyos, the colorful and popular Russian folk ensemble, is returning to Madison with a new concert program. Zolotoj Plyos was formed in 1994 and has traveled the world collecting and preserving the rich tradition of Russian folk music. Their lively performances feature colorful folk costumes and a large variety of authentic folk instruments, including the balalaika, lozhki, and garmoshka. They have won a number of prestigious music competitions throughout Europe, and have also performed at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. The members of Zolotoj Plyos—Alexander Solovov, Elena Sadina, and Sergei Gratchev—are all graduates of the Saratov Music Conservatory.
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Screening and Discussion of the Polish film Katyń
Milan Hauner, Honorary Fellow in the Department of History, UW-Madison
Date and Time: Wednesday, April 21 at 7:00 p.m.
Location: 104 Van Hise Hall, 1220 Linden Drive
Sponsor: CREECA
About the event: The film will be introduced by historian Milan Hauner, whose own research focuses on the 1940 Katyń massacre and the subsequent Soviet and Allied denials. Professor Hauner will explain the differences between fictitious versions of the event (such as this film and the Andrzej Mularczyk novel it was based on) and the actual historical facts. He will also discuss the role that the Katyń massacre has played in modern Polish history and in Russo/Soviet-Polish relations. A more in-depth discussion will follow the film.
Professor Hauner is a Modern History Specialist with PhD's from Prague (1968) and Cambridge (1972), who has included in his research on WWII the Katyń massacre, and its denial by the Allies. Born in Germany and brought up in Czechoslovakia, he left the country after the Soviet invasion in 1968, and later came to the US in 1980, where he became an Honorary Fellow in the department of History at UW-Madison. He has taught at American, British, German, Czech, and Central European universities and institutes, for example as a Fulbright visiting professor at the University of Leipzig in 1998-99. His research and publications deal mostly with German, Czech, and Central European history, as well as India, Afghanistan, Central Asia, Eastern Europe, and Russia.
About the film: Katyń describes the tragedy of several generations in modern Poland. The film follows the story of three Polish families whose lives are torn apart when their country is attacked by Nazi Germany and, 17 days later, by the Red Army, and their relatives taken prisoner. These men, remembered in the film as fathers, sons, and brothers, are executed on Stalin's orders in the Spring of 1940. The film underlines the tragic circumstances surrounding the struggle for Polish independence both during and after the war. It was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the 80th Academy Awards.
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"Stalin and his Team: A New Look at Stalinist High Politics"
Sheila Fitzpatrick, Professor of Russian History, University of Chicago
Date and Time: Thursday, April 22 at 4:00 p.m.
Location: 5243 Mosse Humanities (Curti Lounge), 455 North Park Street
Sponsor: Alice D. Mortenson-Michael B. Petrovich Chair in Russian History
About the lecture: TBA
About the speaker: Sheila Fitzpatrick is the Bernadotte E. Schmitt Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Chicago's Department of History. She is primarily a historian of modern Russia. Her recent work has focused on Soviet social and cultural history in the Stalin period, particularly everyday practices and social identity. She is currently working on projects on Soviet society under Khrushchev, displaced persons in Germany after the Second World War, and the Australian Left. In 2002, she received a Mellon Foundation Distinguished Achievement Award. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the Australian Academy of the Humanities and is a past President of the American Association for Slavic and East European Studies. Professor Fitzpatrick's most recent publication is titled Tear off the Masks! Identity and Imposture in Twentieth-Century Russia.
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"Technology and Vision in Tarkovsky's Andrei Rublev"
Robert Bird, Associate Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Chicago
Date and Time: Thursday, April 22 at 4:00 p.m.
Location: 4070 Vilas Hall (Parliamentary Room), 821 University Avenue
Sponsors: Department of Communication Arts and the Cinematheque
About the lecture: In conjunction with this lecture, the Cinematheque is offering a special screening of Andrei Rublev on Friday, April 23 at 7:30 p.m. in 4070 Vilas Hall. For more information, please see
http://cinema.wisc.edu/series/2010_spring/events.htm#andrei.
About the speaker: TBA
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Law’s Locations: Textures of Legality in Developing & Transitional Societies
UW Law School Conference
Date and Time: Friday, April 23 through Sunday, April 25
Location: UW Law School, 975 Bascom Mall
Sponsors: Global Legal Studies Center, Wisconsin International Law Journal & the Research Circle on Role of Law in Developing and Transition Countries, CREECA
About the conference: Scholars have been turning their attention to the role law plays in developing and transitional countries with greater frequency in recent years. The new scholarship builds on strengths of earlier traditions of research in this area, but also breaks in important ways from past approaches. Perhaps the most significant shift is the move away from generalizing and generic accounts of the 'rule of law' towards contextualized analyses of how law actually works in specific times and places. The most exciting scholarship emerging in this field today insists on thick, historically rooted description as the essential basis for understanding the role of law in these countries. This conference
examines how the move toward richly contextualized accounts of the role of law is challenging conventional understandings, and forging new knowledge about how law actually works in developing and transitional countries.
For more information, please visit http://law.wisc.edu/gls/laws.locations.conf.april2010.html (UW NetID may be required).
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"Kaleidoscopic Odessa: History and Place in Contemporary Ukraine"
Tanya Richardson, Assistant Professor of Anthropology, Wilfrid Laurier University
Date and Time: Thursday, April 29 at 4:00 p.m.
Location: 206 Ingraham Hall, 1155 Observatory Drive
Sponsor: CREECA
About the lecture: This talk explores how the cultivation of a cosmopolitan sense of place in Odessa generates tensions and contradictions in the formation of commonsense understandings of Ukraine as a nation and state. Places are like kaleidoscopes in the way that they refract history and geography. Ukraine’s many localities share fragments of imperial, national, ethnic, religious, and social histories, yet the salience and influence of these histories on the present differs radically. Odessa is a place where residents’ historical consciousness of pluralism and former state regimes is especially strong and where that consciousness has remained a powerful tool of the social imagination in the Soviet and post-Soviet periods. Richardson argues that while the Odessan experience is seen by locals and non-locals alike as unique, that uniqueness is in a way exemplary of something that is quite typical for Ukraine. By examining the co-presence and interplay of different histories in walking groups, the neighbourhood of Moldovanka, and the Odessa Literature Museum, she provides a portrait of the constitution of Odessa as a distinct locality and contests over its location in the cultural geographies of nation and empire.
About the speaker: Tanya Richardson is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology at Wilfrid Laurier University located in Waterloo, Ontario. Professor Richardson received her Ph.D. in 2005 from the University of Cambridge in Social Anthropology. In 2009, Professor Richardson was an Anthropology and Archaeology Committee nominee for the SSHRC Aurora Prize and she also received the Merit Award from the Wilfrid Laurier University. Professor Richardson’s most recent field work includes the ethnography of the politics and history of biodiversity conservation in the Lower Danube (Vilkovo, Ukraine) and the investigation of how Odessans living in New York and Odessa constitute their city through collecting coins, postcards, and medallions. Kaleidoscopic Odessa: History and Place in Contemporary Ukraine, which was published in 2008, is her first book.
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