04/05/2023
* News from our team that has long been in the making and that we gladly share now that it's official *
We wish to inform you that starting from January 1, 2024, Russian Literature will change its name to Slavic Literatures. This means that all publications that appear in our journal after this date, will appear under this new name. With this new title, we do more justice to the transnational expertise of our contributors. The plural 'literatures' also highlights the pluriformity and variety of literary cultures and practices (in the broadest sense – that is, including, say, film scripts, memes, and cartoons) that our contributors study.
In adopting our new name, we neither plan to discontinue the journal’s rich history in Russian literary studies nor to boycott Russian authors or scholars. Nor do we endorse easy usage of the term ‘Slavic’ as a catch-all phrase for the hugely varying local literary practices that our contributors study. By naming ourselves Slavic Literatures, we do take inspiration from critical discussions that took flight in Slavic studies in the wake of the all-out Russian invasion of Ukraine. These discussions are difficult and still ongoing – but they address systemic imbalances in our field that deserve our close and serious attention.
For more information, we refer readers, authors, and friends of the journal to an online announcement and open-access editorial in which I explain our choice for the new name in some more detail; I share links to both in the first comment.
Thank you in advance for continuing to consider our journal for publications and for continuing to support and read us! We look forward to staying in touch in the near and further future.
With the new name comes a new look. What you see below is a sample cover (no actual upcoming volume), with a random selection of titles from existing publications in our journal.
10/03/2023
Three Slavic job offers at Université Libre de Bruxelles, attached to research-center "MODERNITAS":
***
- Postdoc Slavic Modernism in an interdisciplinary setting (fixed term for 1.5 years).
https://euraxess.ec.europa.eu/jobs/80027
- Postdoc Russian/Slavic modernism in an interdisciplinary setting (fixed term for 1.5 years).
https://euraxess.ec.europa.eu/jobs/80026
- PhD scholarship: Russian/Slavic Modernism and Comparative Literature & Culture (4 years).
https://euraxess.ec.europa.eu/jobs/80028
Qualified applicants of all nationalities are welcome.
PhD scholarship (Russian/Slavic and Comparative Literature & Culture)
Workplace: Université libre de Bruxelles (Solbosch) Department: Languages and Letters/Slavic Languages and Letters Research centres: MODERNITAS, PHILIXTE Website unit: https://ltc.ulb.be/
04/11/2022
"Memories and Memory in New Russian Literary Journalism" by Grzegorz Czerwiński.
The article focuses on the issues of memories and memory in new Russian book reportage. The research is based on work by opposition journalists: Yulia Yuzik (born 1981) and Valery Panyushkin (born 1969). The article’s basic assumption is that in the case of literary journalism, the memory of informants and the reporter’s own memory are the main source of factual data, alongside documents and material testimonies. This memory is subject to distortion and filtration – it changes over time and is subject to social influences. The analysis is based on theoretical works by Paul Connerton, Aleida Assmann, Paul Ricœur, and others. The article also draws attention to the fact that the way in which passages of reportage – which are based on the narrative of memory – are shaped in formal terms may resemble memoir and autobiography. The main thesis of the article is the belief that the role of the journalist consists not only in juxtaposing various points of view (their own, the informants’ points of view), but also in confronting the memories of individual witnesses.
Memories and Memory in New Russian Literary Journalism (Illustrated with Reference to Reportage Books by Yulia Yuzik and Valery Panyushkin)
The article focuses on the issues of memories and memory in new Russian book reportage. The research is based on work by opposition journalists: Yulia…
04/10/2022
"The Two Sides of Besprizornost’: Representations of Child Homelessness in Respublika SHKID and Pedagogicheskaia Poema" by Diana Antonello.
This article examines how the discourse about the re-education of besprizorniki, street urchins, became closely interconnected with the debate around the concept of the New Soviet Man in the 1920s and 1930s. This made child homelessness the ideal field in which to test different pedagogical approaches and the power of either the individual or the collective in the process of reforging human souls. By comparing two prototypical novels on besprizornost’, Respublika SHKID (The Republic of SHKID, 1926) and Pedagogicheskaia poema (Pedagogical Poem, 1933–35), this article analyzes how the discourse on children’s re-education and conversion was portrayed differently in literature, reflecting the changes in Soviet society under Stalin and in the approach to street urchins and children in this period.
The Two Sides of Besprizornost’: Representations of Child Homelessness in Respublika SHKID and Pedagogicheskaia Poema
This article examines how the discourse about the re-education of besprizorniki, street urchins, became closely interconnected with the debate around …
16/09/2022
"Russian Literary Incantations". Guest-edited by Aleksey Yudin (Ghent University).
This thematic cluster of articles examines contemporary incantation texts – whether literary, parodied, or falsified – from the repertoire of pseudo-healers or neo-pagans. It also explores the influence of mythology and traditional verbal magic on poetic texts, including an analysis of one philosophical-literary methodology that sought to restore to poetry its original mythological-magical meanings. An extensive introduction to this cluster examines the functioning of traditional folklore magic and the differences between incantations and folk prayers. It takes an approach to folklore magic in terms of performativity theory. It concludes that verbal magic has not disappeared from modern culture, and has even mostly retained its traditional forms in new circumstances – so long as the necessary performative context remains.
Russian Literature | Russian Literary Incantations | ScienceDirect.com by Elsevier
Read the latest articles of Russian Literature at ScienceDirect.com, Elsevier’s leading platform of peer-reviewed scholarly literature
08/07/2022
Our new special issue is devoted to Aleksey Kruchenykh and the intricacies of his Futurist life-writing (album art and other matters).
Russian Literature | Aleksey Kruchenykh | ScienceDirect.com by Elsevier
Read the latest articles of Russian Literature at ScienceDirect.com, Elsevier’s leading platform of peer-reviewed scholarly literature