Physical Violence in Late Socialism: (Dis-)Entangling Statehood, Labor, and the Nation

Conference venue: Regensburg (Germany)
Period: Apr. 19 - 21, 2012
Deadline for submitting abstracts: Oct. 31, 2011
Deadline for submitting full papers: TBA

By stressing the notion of physical violence and its significance for state legitimacy, the project seeks to contribute to the general discussion of late socialist societies. The first annual conference will explore physical violence within two core fields related to the legitimatory strategies and discourses of communist statehood: the social and the national. By contextualizing physical violence within these highly ambiguous fields, we aim to contribute to the dismantling of powerful stereotypical narrations and images of state socialism; for example, the remnants of binary mental maps coined by the Cold War or interpretations that have emerged on the grounds of post-socialist nation-(re)building.

These are the two main headings underwhich papers should fit:

We invite proposals striving for a situational and contextualised “thick description” of practices, experiences, and representations of physical violence from the perspective of the historical actors, both in terms of subversive strategies and the expression of state authority. Violence is to be approached through a quadruple lens as exercised, suffered, observed and/or imagined.

The conference language is English. Proposals should be no longer than 300 words. Please also include a short biographic note and your institutional affiliation, as well as your contact details.

Dr. Sabine Rutar
Südost-Institut
Landshuter Str. 4, 93047 Regensburg
Germany
e-mail: rutar@suedost-institut.de