contributors

Articles by Alexandra Talaver and Yulia Gradskova

1. The personal is political Volodymyr Zelensky in the spotlight of the international mainstream media

   In this article, I focus on the mainstream media coverage of the background of Volodymyr Zelensky, candidate for the position of President of Ukraine and, subsequently, the sixth President of Ukraine. The elections provoked a splash of international interest in Ukraine because of the unexpected candidate, a comedy actor with no prior political experience. This research shows that not only the professional, but also the ethnic background of Volodymyr Zelensky became an important topic in the international media during the presidential campaign and the elections of the President of Ukraine in 2019. Mentions of Zelensky’s Jewish background were supported by references to certain stereotypical views about the history of Ukraine, and his elections were covered as an unexpected breakthrough – either from the Soviet or from the anti-Semitic past.

2. “The war has become a serious challenge for religious actors in Ukraine”

   Viktor Yelensky, professor of religion, in a conversation with Yuliya Yurchuk on the position of religions in Ukraine, and different religious actors in the ongoing military conflict in a broader perspective.

3. “The role of religion in peacebuilding is undervalued”

   Tetiana Kalenychenko, an expert in religion and conflict resolution, in conversation with Yuliya Yurchuk on how religion can be an instrument in conflict transformation.

4. Electoral effects of the tomos

   To what extent did Poroshenko’s efforts in creating an independent and canonical Orthodox church translate into national electoral support? A survey conducted before the first round of elections and a dataset of parish transitions to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU) are employed to address this question. The data suggest that the Tomos did increase support for Poroshenko. However, this effect was small. Drawing on the literature in micro-to-macro transition, I propose the hypothesis that actual transitions of parishes at the level of precincts were a necessary condition to ensure a link from the general support for the Tomos to electoral support for Poroshenko.

5. Church independence as historical justice Politics of history explaining the meaning of the Tomos in Ukraine 2018–2019

   This essay explores how the politics of history in the time of conflict between Russia and Ukraine empowered various actors of Ukrainian public life, from the president to religious leaders, to advocate for an independent Orthodox church as “long-awaited historical justice.” By deconstructing historical narratives employed in 2018–2019, it argues that church independence was placed within a broader context of decolonisation and overcoming the Soviet legacy.

6. Introduction The role of religion in the Ukrainian political landscape Religion in Ukraine: political and historical entanglements

   The purpose of this theme section is to put the question of religion into the focus of the studies which approach different aspects of Ukrainian reality today and show how an analysis of an intricate interplay between religion, politics, and society can help us better understand this reality. The articles and interviews show the importance of including religion in the studies of societies and look closer into complex entanglements that reveal religious traces, sometimes in the most unexpected places.

7. Negotiating modernism The Yugoslavian Pavilion at the Stockholm Fair 1950

   In 1949–1950, the Yugoslavian Chamber of Commerce commissioned architects Vjenceslav Richter (1917–2002) and Zvonimir Radić (1921–85) together with artists Ivan Picelj (1924–2011) and Alexandar Srnec (1924–2010) to shape several pavilions at various international trade fairs; in Stockholm twice. This text departs from a rich photographic documentation of the 1950 fair, discussing how and why Yugoslavia turned to modernism, why the artists shaped the pavilion the way they did, how it was received in Sweden. It also places the pavilion in a political context. As Yugoslavia was expelled from the Eastern Bloc in 1948, it had to find new alliances. The turn to modernism could be seen as a sign of this, but such reading also risks diminishing the role of modernism, leaving it as something that belongs to the liberal democracies in the West. The text argues against such narrow reading. It also discusses the role art history has played in forming a quite stereotype image of modernism and finally, it uses Roland Barthes “myth” as a way of looking at modernism from a multiple perspective.

8. Losing the Past Social Melancholy and Modernizing Discourse of Cultural Heritage Preservation

   How can the loss of connection with history be experienced and expressed? The relationship with the past is difficult to capture and describe, although at some historic moments the emotional connection with the past becomes pivotal. This article introduces the debates on loss and cultivating the sense of losing the past in modernizing Russia in the late 19th – early 20th century. It contributes to the history of emotions, analyzing the discourse on the disappearance of Russian cultural history cultivated by intellectual and artistic circles around the journals Mir Iskusstva, Starye Gody and Iskusstvo in the late Russian Empire, and tracing distinct voices that problematized the relation to earlier times in Russia and promoted the preservation of Russian cultural and historical monuments. The article concludes that the discourse of losing the connection with Russia’s own past played an important role in forming the discourse and practices of Russian heritage preservation.

9. “THE GYPSY QUESTION” AND ITS ANSWERS Anti-Roma propaganda in the press of the District of Galicia 1941–1944

   This study offers the first analysis of anti-Roma propaganda in the District of Galicia (Distrikt Galizien, the DG), a part of the General Government (Das Generalgouvernement, the GG), by studying the dailies and several periodicals published in the District. It constitutes the first step in studying anti-Roma propaganda in the GG. While the wartime anti-Roma propaganda employed the pre-war images of Roma, those were manipulated, distorted and radicalized in accordance to the needs of the Nazi regime in the DG. The radicalization in the press paralleled introduction of regulations with anti-Roma edge and scaling up of Roma persecution in the GG. By 1943, the propaganda pieces alluded to solving “the Gypsy question” in the way that “the Jewish question” had been solved.

10. Jānis Lipke. A hero of Latvian history

    This article will present the story of Jānis (Žanis) Lipke, a Latvian man living an ordinary life who became a national hero by saving fifty-five Jews from the brutality of the Nazi regime.

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