Post-Socialist Memory in a Global Perspective: Postcolonialism, Post-transition, Post-trauma

The Post-Socialist and Comparative Memory Studies (PoSoCoMeS) working group is part of the Memory Studies Association. Our goal is to bring together researchers, activists, and practitioners working in and on post-socialist countries. We call for trans-regional comparative studies that connect Eastern Europe and Africa, Southern America and Asia, and result in broad conceptualizations of post-socialist memories.

The PoSoCoMeS group was constituted in 2018 in order to establish a platform for the exchange of ideas between scholars from different disciplines working on post-socialist memory studies. During the third annual MSA conference in Madrid, we organized 14 panels, which attracted a broad audience. We have already published two newsletters informing about our activities, and now we are organizing the first PoSoCoMes conference. It will take place on September 24-26, 2020, in Chisinau, Moldova. One of the purposes of this conference is to allow scholars and practitioners from the post-socialist countries of Europe and Eurasia to discuss common issues. Travel to Moldova is visa-free for citizens of over 100 countries. All participants in the conference need to be members of the MSA, however, sponsored memberships are available. There will be no registration fee for the conference, and we are hoping to raise funds to offer scholarships to a small number of participants from low-income countries. Applications from those living outside the former socialist world and working in comparative memory studies involving questions of (post)socialism are also very welcome.

We invite submissions of panels, sessions, round tables, workshops, and individual papers covering different aspects of post-socialist memories. We are especially interested in papers using comparative approaches and studying cases from different regions.

We are inviting proposals for panel and poster sessions for early-career researchers (Ph.D. and advanced MA students), including discussions of thesis proposals. Alternative formats are also welcome.

Possible topics of submissions include:

- Post-socialist writing/ writing memories of (post)socialism
- (Post)socialism in art, film and visual culture
- Museums and memories of socialism
- Nostalgia and Ostalgie
- Difficult memories of post-socialist pasts
- Transitional justice in post-socialist countries
- Memory activism connecting post-socialist countries
- Post-socialist and postcolonial entanglements of memory
- Politics of memory and memory wars in post-socialist countries
- Media and Internet shaping memories in and across post-socialist regions
- Theorizing comparative memory studies
- Post-socialist memory in Global South
- Non-alignment and memory
- Ideology and everyday life of (post)socialism
- Memory and oral history
- Transitional justice in post-socialist contexts
- Memories of transitional periods

We are organizing a stream on the adaptation of cosmopolitan Holocaust memory culture in Eastern Europe. Please note if you are applying to this stream.

Paper proposals should include abstracts no longer than 250 words and information about the presenter (affiliation and short biographies). Panel and roundtable proposals should include an abstract no longer than 250 words and a complete list of participants, titles of their papers, and names of discussants and/or moderators.
Please, send your submission through the google form or to posocomesgmail.com
Submissions are due January 15, 2020.

Program committee:

Zuzanna Bogumił, The Maria Grzegorzewska University, Warsaw, anthropology
Diana Dumitru, Ion Creangă State University, history
Oksana Dovgopolova, Odessa National University, history / philosophy
Aleksei Kamenskikh, Higher School of Economics in Perm, history/ philosophy
Wulf Kansteiner, Aarhus University, history/memory studies
Daria Khlevnyuk, Higher School of Economics, Moscow, sociology
Lana Lovrencic, Zagreb, heritage studies / history of art
Olga Malinova, Higher School of Economics in Moscow, political science
Ksenia Robbe, University of Groningen, literary & cultural studies
Bin Xu, Emory College of Arts and Sciences, sociology