Dear All,

Please join us Friday, November 10 for the Interdisciplinary Approaches to Russia, Eastern Europe, and Central Asia (REECA) workshop!

The paper topic is:

“Russian Identity as Affect: Nontransparent Minds, Modern Physiology, and National Characters in Late Turgenev”

Description/abstract:

Turgenev’s peasant stories have long been considered as the first authentic representation of peasant consciousness, and scholars have argued that Turgenev typified some of the qualities of the peasant character (spontaneity, love of freedom, readiness for victimhood, patience, humility), presenting them as traits of Russian national character. This paper interprets Turgenev’s innovative representation of peasants, linking ideology and narrative in the text. The paper will explore how “Russianness” manifests itself not only discursively (in the characters’ speech), but also on the narrative level: as an affective state; in conclusion, the author will use Fredric Jameson’s idea about the centrality of affect in nineteenth-century realism to elucidate how in Russia literary form was successfully deployed for the representation of national identity.

Author: Alexey Vdovin, Associate Professor of Philology (HSE-NRU, Moscow)

Discussant: Christy Brandly, PhD Student in Political Science (UChicago)

November 10, 2017

11:00pm-12:20pm in Foster Hall, Room 103

University of Chicago

A light breakfast will be served. You are welcome to bring your own.

The paper is forthcoming and will be made available on our website under the ‘Papers’ tab.  Password: reeca17av

For more information, visit our website: https://voices.uchicago.edu/reeca/

Please contact me (christymonet@uchicago.edu) if you have any questions about this workshop or if you believe you may need assistance.