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‘Imagined Geographies’ Symposium 2:- 13 and 14 February 2025


The second symposium in the ‘Imagined Geographies’ series, jointly organised by UEA’s East Centre, New Area Studies Centre and School of Global Development looks at the imagined geographies of East-Central Europe and the former Soviet space. It will be held in the UEA Council Chamber on Thursday 13 and Friday 14 February 2025. Attendance is free of charge but we request that everyone register in advance. To register to attend in person, please e-mail eastcentre.his@uea.ac.uk . Online registration (Zoom):

Day 1

Day 2

Programme

Thursday 13 February 2025 (all times GMT)

09.30 – 10.00

Registration (tea + coffee)

10.00 – 10.15

Brief welcome + announcements (Francis King, co-director, UEA East Centre)

10.15 – 11.30

Session 1 (Hungary)

·         Gábor Gergely, Lincoln. Természetes fény/Natural Light (Nagy, 2021): Historical representation as the projection of the fantasy of (Hungarian) military presence in contested territory

·         Róbert Kerepeszki, Debrecen. Imagined Underworld? Crime Perception and Localisation of ‘Sinful’ Areas in the Early 20th Century Budapest

11.30 – 12.00

Coffee break

12.00 – 13.15

Session 2 (Caucasus)

·         Shafag Dadashova, Baku. Imagined Geographies and Post-Soviet Identities: Collective Memory and the Formation of National Identity in Azerbaijan

·         Atinati Mamatsashvili, Ilia, Tbilisi. The Black Sea ‒ a geographic and imaginary space

13.15 – 14.15

Lunch break

14.15 – 15.45

Session 3 (Poland + Lithuania)

·         Wieslawa Duzy, Warsaw; Francis Harvey, Leipzig. Dividing territory. Explaining changes in administrative units in Polish territory drawing on boundary objects concept

·         Kristina Vorontsova, Krakow. “My window... to Asia”: Imagined Geography of the East in Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky's Uzbek Impressions

·         Jason Wagner, Michigan. Moyshe Kulbak’s Raysn: A Yiddish Poem in the Context of a Multilingual Lithuanian Literary Tradition

15.45 – 16.15

Coffee break

16.15 – 17.15

Session 4 (Romania + Black Sea)

·         Roxana Elena Doncu, Bucharest. The Communist Appropriation of the Black Sea: ideology and aesthetics

·         Eyüp Özveren, Ankara. Attachment to a Sunken Island at the Bottom of the Danube River: The Resurgence of Adakale as an Imagined Geography as if it were far from the Black Sea

 

Friday 14 February 2025 (all times GMT)

09.30 – 11.00

Session 5 (Siberia)

·         Victoria Fomina, St Andrews. Belonging Elsewhen: Post-industrial Geographies and The Search for a New Frontier Myth in Russia’s Far East

·         Jesko Schmoller, Berlin. The throbbing heart of the grassland: Turning Toratau into a sacred place for the Bashkir people 

·         Elena Volzhanina, Aberdeen, Mapping of Indigenous Peoples by Northern Entitlement Territorial Expeditions in the 30s of the 20th century

11.00 – 11.30

Coffee break

11.30 – 12.30

Session 6 (Ukraine)

·         Tatjana Hofmann, St Gallen. The Geopoetic Crimean Club and its Bosphorus Forum. A review for the future.

·         Hanna Perekhoda, Lausanne. Bolsheviks’ imagined geographies: making and unmaking borders in revolutionary Ukraine (1917-1920)

12.30 – 13.30

Lunch break

13.30 – 15.15

Session 7 (Siberia/Central Asia)

·         Alina Bychkova, Nottingham Trent. Climate change crisis vs. identity concerns in post-Soviet states: the case of Central Asia.

·         Chechesh Kudachinova, Berlin. “Power of the Place or the Place of Power? Mapping the “Altay­Mania” in Russian Popular Geographies”

·         Alla Savelieva, Colorado. Borderlands: Imagined Geographies in Husky’s Musical Chronotopes

15.15 – 15.45

Coffee break

15.45 – 16.45

Session 8 (Church)

·         Anastasiia Akulich, Leeds. Expansion and Division: Indigenous Clergy and Fractured Geographies of the Russian Orthodox Mission in China, 1860s-1930s

·         Hanna Mazheika, Turku. Serving a Church in Exile: the Reformed Parish of Kojdanów during the Muscovite Occupation, 1655-1661

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3 December

Tom Parfitt – High Caucasus: A Mountain Quest in Russia’s Haunted Hinterland