Contributor archive

Articles written by Irina Sandomirskaja

Valentina Izmirlieva:“The Church has promoted specific ‘martial’ strategies of scriptural exegesis to justify military aggression”

The projection of imperial power through overtly religious pageantry, symbols and narratives has been a key element of Russia’s identity politics under Putin, informing the Kremlin’s aggressive international policies, but also shaping the domestic perceptions of Russia’s global role.  In a conversation with Irina Sandomirskaja, Valentina Izmirlieva explores the utility of the Russian Orthodox Church in this process, and the significant transformations within the Orthodox sphere that facilitate the radical militarization of Russian society. She also discusses the role and future of multidisciplinary area studies as such, and in particular Slavic Studies.

By Irina Sandomirskaja September 18, 2024

1991-2021: THIRTY YEARS AFTER

The Centre for Baltic and East European Studies, CBEES, arranges a series of multidisciplinary roundtables during 2021 with a focus on the 30 years period since the dissolution of the Soviet Union.

By Irina Sandomirskaja January 18, 2021

“There is no heritage”

Irina Sandomirskaja in a conversation with philosophers Jean-Luc Nancy and Peter Trawny on the subject of nationalism and cultural heritage.

By Irina Sandomirskaja December 30, 2019

The missing of history in heritage H.G. Adler's novel The Wall

The property of the disappeared first becomes mere “things” without name, use, or status. Then they turn into museum artifacts of ethnographic, aesthetic, or historical value (at least those of them that are not stolen by the “conquerors” nor rejected by the experts). Then, again, with the collapse of the museum project, what used to be displayed as cultural heritage turns again into “just things”. They burden their custodians who only wish to get rid of them.

Essay by Irina Sandomirskaja December 30, 2019

Introduction. The property of missing persons Cultural heritage, value, and historical justice

In general, social disasters always result in the disproportionate excess of things: while humans perish en masse, artifacts survive in the form of market commodities and museum exhibit; as human life extinguishes in catastrophes, the life of objects gets more and more active in market exchanges, expropriations, and lootings. The history of Eastern Europe in the 20th century has witnessed many such episodes.

Essay by Irina Sandomirskaja December 30, 2019

Scattering, collecting, and scattering again The invention and management of national heritage in the USSR

It is here claimed that it is practically impossible to determine whether the collector and connoisseur in question (namely Igor Immanuilovich Grabar, 1879—1960) was, indeed, saving his objects from scattering and destruction — or contributing to their further enslavement by exploiting them in a capacity that was radically alien, if not inimical, to their nature.

Essay by Irina Sandomirskaja June 18, 2018

Bakhtin as Praxis. Academic Production, Political Activism, and Artistic Practice

The purpose of the conference was to establish new points of contact between the actively developing traditional Bakhtin studies (in literature, language, and cultural theory), on the one hand, and those new directions in research that have discovered the importance of Bakhtin’s ideas in new applications in the humanities, social sciences, education, artistic research, and art practices.

By Irina Sandomirskaja October 9, 2014

Andrey Bely Prize

Irina Sandomirskaja, professor of cultural studies at CBEES, Södertörn University, was awarded the most prestigious Russian prize for literary scholarship, […]

By Irina Sandomirskaja April 16, 2014

The post-Soviet Europe and its “beyond”

The theme of the conference, "Beyond Transition", reflects a critical phase in current research on Eastern Europe and highlights the need for theoretical and methodological revision noted by many.

By Irina Sandomirskaja January 24, 2014

What Did the Father Say?

Comment on Pussy Riot: Reflections on Receptions The story of innocence and corruption, bad motherhood and bad influences presented in […]

By Irina Sandomirskaja December 20, 2012