Everyday World Governance: Soviet Citizens and International Organizations During the Cold War
Thursday, 14 March, 2024 13:15 - 14:45 CEST

Highlighting the forgotten stories of Soviet citizens who contributed to the nuts-and-bolts operations and lesser-known activities of world governance, the talk will illustrate the UN’s importance for a group of Soviet "one-worlders," who used the world body to imagine and work for a better world amidst the realities of the Cold War.

Creolizing Transylvania. Between European Interimperiality and Global Coloniality
Thursday, 25 January, 2024 13:00 - 14:30 CEST

The talk counteracts the notion of Europe as a geographically, culturally, religiously, and racially coherent entity by focusing on one of Europe's subaltern formations, Transylvania. Its location on the European continent, yet in the rural periphery of several of Europe's imperial powers, renders it a unique candidate for the larger decolonial project of…

Psychiatry of the ‘in-between’ world: Revolution and re-imagining the psyche in socialist Yugoslavia
Thursday, 18 January, 2024 13:00 - 14:30 CEST

This seminar explores the relationship between psychiatry and political ideology in the context of the Cold War and non-alignment. It focuses on the importance of revolution and ideas of radical reform for the development of socialist psychiatry in Yugoslavia.

Combating Waste Colonialism in Bosnia and Herzegovina
Thursday, 14 December, 2023 13:00 - 14:30 CEST

Examining hazardous waste as a symptom of the never-ending transition of socialist Bosnia and Herzegovina into a so-called capitalist liberal democracy repoliticises the process of ‘wasting’ environments and human lives, revealing it as part and parcel of such transition.

“Our Native Cinderella”: Balkan Bees within Global Economies of Breeding and Racialization
Thursday, 16 November, 2023 13:00 - 14:30 CEST

This lecture explores how fin-de-siècle beekeepers in the Yugoslav region imagined and attempted to carry out the racial reclamation of their local honeybees. It is ultimately part of a larger labor and environmental history of the post-Ottoman Balkans, which examines how transnational capital and new national states reshaped the relationship between local…

Doing Business: A Cultural History of Late Socialist and Postsocialist Entrepreneurship
Thursday, 12 October, 2023 13:00 - 14:30 CEST

Although the 1990s in Eastern Europe are often associated with a business “boom”, entrepreneurial behaviours did not arrive overnight and have longer histories. This is the case also for Czechoslovakia. The seminar makes a case for studying private enterprise from a cultural history perspective, suggesting that this topic represents a useful prism for…

The Prediction Machine: Futurology and Neoliberalism in British Government
Thursday, 22 June, 2023 13:00 - 14:30 CEST

When the Von der Leyen Commission took office in December 2019, the new President, Ursula von der Leyen, pledged to put "Foresight" at the heart of her agenda for Europe. But what is Foresight, where did it come from, and how did it attain such political prominence?

Feeling Change: On writing an emotional history of Perestroika
Thursday, 11 May, 2023 13:00 - 14:30 CEST

Perestroika and transformation have to be considered as part of larger histories and re-integrated into the arguments and theories developed for late socialism and theories developed for late socialism. The Transformative Seminar is going to be a very first exploration of a new research project: a history of emotions relating to a ‘long’ Perestroika.

Science to Byt: The Urban Landscapes of Knowledge in the Cold War USSR
Thursday, 20 April, 2023 13:00 - 14:30 CEST

Following the outbreak of the Cold War, the Soviet political establishment became fascinated with visions of a universal scientific literacy to promote the progress to Communism. This task shaped the late Soviet city and, in essence, represented a response to one of the most important questions of modernity: how to use the urban environment to produce…

Ghosts of War: Nazi Occupation and Its Aftermath in Soviet Belarus
Thursday, 09 March, 2023 13:00 - 14:30 CEST

How do states and societies confront the legacies of war and occupation, and what do truth, guilt, and justice mean in that process? The talk examines people’s wartime choices and their aftermath in Belarus, a war-ravaged Soviet republic that was under Nazi occupation during the Second World War.

What Do We Learn About War And Peace From Women International Thinkers?
Thursday, 26 January, 2023 13:00 - 14:30 CEST

In this talk, Prof. Sluga's focus is specifically on 20th century texts that address war and peace by women thinkers categorisable as both international and ‘European’, drawing in accessible Russian-language examples.

Contested Language Use in Ukraine
Thursday, 19 January, 2023 13:00 - 14:30 CEST

What does it mean for Ukrainian citizens to choose to speak Ukrainian or Russian? This talk will focus on the impact of the ongoing war on language, and the role of language in the Russo-Ukrainian war.