Russian and East European Studies
Friday, April 16, 2021 - 9:30am to 5:00pm
A virtual event
<br>Friday, April 16, 2021</br>
18th Undergraduate Research Conference of the Department of Russian and East European Studies, University of Pennsylvania
A Virtual Event
Zoom link:
https://upenn.zoom.us/j/95577577137?pwd=N3FuU1NUVGZUZXdBYlNnc214OTFKZz09
Meeting ID: 955 7757 7137
Passcode: 743390
CONFERENCE PROGRAM
(Abstracts at end)
Panel 1 9:30–10:25 (Topics in Literary Scholarship)
Paper 1: Jan Nowak (International Relations and REES ’21)
“The Subversive ‘60s: Evolving Portraits of the Revolutionary in 1860s Imperial Russia”
Paper 2: Connie Lin (Huntsman Program ’24)
“Platonov's Returns: Rediscovering Self and Community in Post-War Soviet Russia”
Questions and Discussion
Break: 10:25–10:40
Panel 2 10:40-11:50 (Topics in History and Social Research)
Paper 3: Ekaterina Kokovikhina (History, Higher School of Economics, St. Petersburg, ’21)
“‘How Many Faces Does the Disco Have?’: Transformation of the Phenomenon of Diskoteki Under the Late Socialism
Paper 4: Allison Gorokhovsky (Huntsman Program and REES ’21)
“Characterizing Russia’s Nostalgia: Rebuilding a National Identity on Past Ideals”
Paper 5: Jan Nowak (International Relations and REES ’21)
“PiS, Policy, and the Politics of Nationalism: An Analysis of the Influence of Russophobia on the Foreign Policy of Poland’s Law and Justice Party”
Questions and Discussion
CONFERENCE ABSTRACTS (in the order of presentations)
Paper 1: Jan Nowak (International Relations and REES ’21)
The Subversive ‘60s: Evolving Portraits of the Revolutionary in 1860s Imperial Russia
In 1862, Russia was introduced to “the nihilist” in the form of Evgeny Vasil’evich Bazarov, the hero of Ivan Turgenev’s novel Fathers and Children. Caustic, intelligent, arrogant, and radical in his beliefs, Bazarov embodied a vision of the nascent generation of Russians who rejected the romantic inclinations of their fathers. Just one year later, Nikolai Chernyshevsky countered Turgenev’s vision, introducing an original representation of radicals and socialist utopia in his novel What Is to Be Done?. Chernyshevsky’s imagination of the “special type” presented a view of “the revolutionary” by a revolutionary himself. These literary portraits of radical political activists––idealizing asceticism, uncompromising dogmatism, and absolute allegiance to the cause––influenced contemporary and future anti-regime activity in tsarist Russia. New portraits of “the revolutionary,” in turn, shifted the image of revolution itself. Thus, in this presentation, I seek to comparatively analyze conceptions of “the revolutionary” between Turgenev, the cosmopolitan liberal Westernizer, and Chernyshevsky, the radical intellectual hailing from a provincial seminarian background. How did the image of Bazarov, “the nihilist,” serve as an ideological touchstone for Chernyshevsky’s portrayal of revolutionaries in What Is to Be Done?? Where is the shadow of Bazarov cast in one of the most politically influential novels in Russian history? In comparing the two novels, I apply a comparative character analysis of Turgenev’s principal nihilist, Evgeny Bazarov, and Chernyshevsky’s revolutionaries––Lopukhov, Kirsanov, and Rakhmetov––in order to illustrate the influence of liberal and conservative thought on the chronological development of the portrait of the ideal revolutionary. In this manner, I argue that “nihilism” as a reactionary construct influenced the identities, values, and methods of nihilists and revolutionaries themselves. Ultimately, the larger scope of this thesis will delineate the evolution of “the revolutionary” as he was conceptualized in 1860s imperial Russia.
Paper 2: Connie Lin (Huntsman Program ’24)
Platonov's Returns: Rediscovering Self and Community in Post-War Soviet Russia
This paper seeks to dissect the roots of the sense of community estrangement felt by the main characters in Andrei Platonov’s short stories “The Return” and “The River Potudan.” These two stories are ripe for comparison since they are both about the experience of a soldier returning from the war and their subsequent struggle to find a sense of belonging in their hometown. However, the protagonists are also foils of each other--Nikita from “The River Potudan” is trying to build a new life from scratch and suffers from emasculating selflessness while Alyosha feels like a stranger with his existing family and judges them harshly through a “barrier of pride and self-interest.” The methodology of the research is to examine in-depth and compare the tensions in the relationship the protagonists have with others (father-son, wife-husband, and self-society at large) in order to explore the reasons behind the unspoken barriers between the returning soldier and their community. The significance of the research is to highlight the differences between expectations and reality of community life in the Soviet Union by analyzing the disappointment both Nikita and Alyosha feel upon returning which drives them towards a desire for escapism. The research analysis yields the conclusion that Alyosha’s veneer of pride was a defense mechanism that helped him cope through the difficulties of war and find camaraderie in the army but became a barrier to readjusting to family life. By contrast, Nikita’s emasculating selflessness stems from a combination of childhood class insecurity and an inability to find self-identity after years of deriving a sense of collective identity from the Red Army. While Alyosha had to overcome his defensive selfishness to unearth the love he has for his family, Nikita had to gain his strength to love by regaining his ability for selfish desire.
Paper 3: Ekaterina Kokovikhina (History, Higher School of Economics, St. Petersburg, ’21)
‘How Many Faces Does the Disco Have?’: Transformation of the Phenomenon of Diskoteki Under the Late Socialism
Both discotheques as a platform for socialization and the “disco” genre itself became an essential part of youth culture under late Socialism. It spread in the Eastern Bloc countries as a fashionable trend of Western culture. The phenomenon of discotheque has not yet received a thorough examination in contemporary scholarship: the existing research is mostly dedicated to the institutionalization of the phenomenon “from above.” However, there was a strong intertwining between the “official” and “popular” aspects of the phenomenon and they cannot be separated from each other. For example, the discotheque organizers played a dual role: on the one hand, they were the last piece in the chain of the Soviet bureaucratic system and had to follow recommendations and guidelines for official events. On the other hand, they were also the immediate participants of the discotheque and were primarily interested in making the events as enjoyable as possible for the visitors.
The subject of this study is the integration of the discotheques into the leisure culture of late Socialism on different levels. I inquire why dance floors, which were highly popular in the postwar period, were replaced with discotheques; who participated in these events, and how organizers and visitors clandestinely avoided official regulations.
I aim to demonstrate how the increased popularity of the discotheque reflects its double appeal for both the young generation and the socialist leadership. In particular, it met the basic needs of the young people for socialization and acquaintance with Western culture. At the same time, it helped fight the increase of crime and alcohol abuse among the youth, which the party leadership deemed as a serious problem.
Paper 4: Allison Gorokhovsky (Huntsman Program and REES ’21)
Characterizing Russia’s Nostalgia: Rebuilding a National Identity on Past Ideals
This paper builds on past research regarding core values and programs of the Soviet Union to characterize the current nostalgia experienced by Russian citizens and its role in current Russian politics. It begins with a discussion of Russia’s imperial origins and the Western-looking transformation that occurred throughout the 18th and 19th centuries by which Russia, in an attempt to avoid becoming the junior political partner, developed an internal ideology that placed Russian nationality on a pedestal (a widespread belief that persists to this day). Under the Soviet regime, Russian national identity underwent a transformation. Based on polling conducted by the Pew Research Center and The Levada Center, as well as global scholarly work, the paper brings forward five pillars that upheld the Soviet national identity: morals rooted in Soviet education; a unifying vision against Western hegemony; pride in Soviet artistic, scientific, and cultural accomplishments; reliance upon social programs including housing and pensions; and the achievement of the Soviet Union’s “global power” title. However, the absence of these tenants, coupled with the financial hardships of the 1990s and well-known public corruption, has discouraged civic engagement and political participation among Russian citizenry (especially the youth) since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Recognizing the political danger in a country that has an expansive territory, a great diversity of individual cultures, and is lacking a unifying national identity, the Putin administration has pursued two strategic goals to capitalize on the nation’s nostalgia for the select facets of Soviet life described above. First, Putin has continued to emphasize the importance of Russia’s territorial integrity, down to the very soil and natural resources that continue to support the Russian economy. The annexation of Crimea is a direct extension of this line of thinking. Second, he has stressed Russia’s pivotal role in opposing Western hegemony, perpetuating the Soviet-era belief that Russia is a direct competitor to the United Stated and, therefore, a “global power”. While these actions have continued to sow mistrust between Russia and the West and have considerably slowed down Russian economic growth as a result of sanctions, they have been widely successful in legitimizing Putin’s hawkish international policy and have bolstered his domestic approval ratings.
Paper 5: Jan Nowak (International Relations and REES ’21).
PiS, Policy, and the Politics of Nationalism: An Analysis of the Influence of Russophobia on the Foreign Policy of Poland’s Law and Justice Party
In recent years, East European states such as Poland and Hungary have trended strongly toward illiberalism, exhibiting revivals of populist-nationalism. Representative of global shifts against the liberalism of the post-Cold War era, the future of globalization and liberal international institutions have become the object of academic debate. Contemporary discourse on populist-nationalism attempts to identify the roots of this phenomenon, seeking primarily to explain the underlying nature of nationalism in political movements. However, existing literature lacks a nuanced analysis of the influence of national historical memory on the foreign policy platforms of modern populist-nationalist political parties. This thesis consists of a representative case study of Poland in the years 2015-2020. I analyze the influence of Polish nationalist phobia of Russia––hereafter termed, “Russophobia”–– on the foreign policy of Poland’s dominant populist-nationalist political party, Law and Justice, or PiS. To this end, I firstly conduct an analysis of Russophobia in the rhetoric of the Law and Justice party. Next, I conduct evaluations of the party’s bilateral military and energy policy toward the Russian Federation, identifying Russophobia as a key foreign policy imperative. I argue that a Russophobic national memory of historical Russo-Polish relations continues to influence foreign policy in Poland. This research will contribute to an understanding of the relationship between history, nationalism, and domestic formulations of contemporary foreign policy, shedding light on the relevance of historical memory on states’ perceptions of international relations.
