International Workshop

Social and Cultural History of Sport and Physical Culture in the
Soviet Union
September, 5th - 6th, 2008

Helmut-Schmidt-Universität/Universität der Bundeswehr Hamburg

Physical culture and sport in the Soviet Union shaped and realised the
socialist idea of man. In the area of sport, discourse on technological
change, the leading scientific disciplines of physiology, biology,
medicine and hygiene, as well as efforts to mechanize and perfect the
human body and its capabilities were intertwined. But sport as an
instrument of state-controlled "social engineering" was also a potential
source of social discontent. Therefore, sport could be seen as a
barometer of slowly evolving states of social exhaustion. The central
focus of this workshop is therefore the complex relationship between the
affirmative and subversive effects of socio-politically modelled body
concepts and sport practices.

Der Sport und die Körperkultur in der Sowjetunion prägten und
verwirklichten ein sozialistisches Menschenbild. Im Bereich des Sports
kreuzten sich Diskurse über technologischen Wandel, die modernen
wissenschaftlichen Leitdisziplinen Physiologie, Biologie, Medizin und
Hygiene sowie über die "Mechanisierung" und Perfektionierung des
menschlichen Körpers und seiner Leistungsfähigkeit. Der Sport als
Instrument eines staatlich gesteuerten "social engineering" barg aber
auch sozialen Sprengstoff und konnte zum Indikator schleichender
gesellschaftlicher Erschöpfungszustände werden. Im Kern richtet sich das
Erkenntnisinteresse des Workshops somit auf das Spannungsverhältnis
zwischen der affirmativen und der subversiven Wirkung
gesellschaftspolitisch modellierter Körperkonzepte und Sportpraktiken.

PROGRAM:

Friday, September 5th

9:30 - 10:00 Nikolaus Katzer, Helmut Schmidt University, Hamburg
Introduction

10:00 - 13:00 1st Section: Sites, Media, and Modernity

Discussant: Louise Mc Reynolds, University of North Carolina,
Chapel Hill
Chair: Nikolaus Katzer, Helmut Schmidt University, Hamburg

10:00 - 10:30 Ekaterina Emeliantseva, University of Zurich
Sports Visions and Sports Places: The Topography of Sports in Late
Imperial St Petersburg and its Photographic Representation
(1890-1914)

10:30 - 11:00 Burcu Dogramaci, University of Hamburg
Heading into Modernity: Sports, Architecture, and Photography in the
Young Turkish Republic

11:00 - 11:30 Coffee break

11:30 - 12:00 Sandra Budy, Helmut Schmidt University, Hamburg
Changing Images of Sport in the Early Soviet Press

12:00 - 13:00 Discussion

13:00 - 14:30 Lunch

14:30 - 18:30 2nd Section: Bodies, Strength, and Space

Discussant: Mike O'Mahony, University of Bristol
Chair: Sandra Dahlke, Helmut Schmidt University, Hamburg

14:30 - 15:00 Alexandra Köhring, Helmut Schmidt University, Hamburg
Exploring the Power of the Curve: The Project of an "International Red
Stadium" in Soviet Moscow of the 1920s

15:00 - 15:30 Bettina Jungen, University of Zurich
Frozen Action: The Sport Motive in Soviet Sculpture

15:30 - 16:00 Coffee break

16:00 - 16:30 Christina Kiaer, Northwestern University, Chicago
Deineka and the Vtorova Sisters: The Representation and Experience of
Sport
in the 1930s

16:30 - 17:00 Pat Simpson, University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield
Liberation and Containment: Re-visualizing the Eugenic and
Evolutionary Ideal of the Fizkul'turnitsa in 1944

17:00 - 18:00 Discussion

Saturday, September 6th

9:30 - 13:00 3rd Section: Actors, Milieus, and Memory

Discussant: Robert Edelman, University of California, San Diego
Chair: Hans-Joachim Braun, Helmut-Schmidt-University, Hamburg

9:30 - 10:00 Eva Maurer, University of Fribourg
An Academic Escape to the Periphery? The Socio-Cultural Milieu of Soviet
Mountaineering from the 1920s to the 1950s

10:00 - 10:30 Robert Edelman, University of California, San Diego
The Sal'nikov Affair of 1950: Soviet Football's Most Scandalous Transfer

10:30 - 11:00 Coffee break

11:00 - 11:30 Manfred Zeller, Helmut Schmidt University, Hamburg
When Lev Jaschin was Sent off the Field. Soviet Soccer in Retrospect -
An Oral History

11:30 - 12:00 Olga Chepurnaya, European University, St. Petersburg
Moscow Olympics - Individual Biographies

12:00 - 13:00 Discussion

13:00 - 14:30 Lunch

14:30 - 17:30 4th Section: Gender, Stereotypes, and Ideology

Discussant: Irina Bykhovskaya, Russian State University of Physical
Education and Russian Institute for Cultural Research, Moscow
Chair: Esther Meier, Helmut Schmidt University, Hamburg

14:30 - 15:00 Kateryna Kobchenko, National Taras Shevchenko University,
Kiev
Emancipation within the Ruling Ideology: Soviet Women in Physical
Culture and Sport in the 1920-1930s

15:00 - 15:30 Anke Hilbrenner, University of Bonn
Soviet Women in Sports: The Female Body between Gender Stereotypes and
Equal Opportunity Utopia

15:30 - 16:00 Stefan Wiederkehr, German Historical Institute Warsaw
"... if Jarmila Kratochvilova is the Future of Women´s Sports, I´m not
Sure I´m Ready for it." Media, Gender, and Cold War

16:00 - 16:30 Coffee break

16:30 - 17:30 Discussion

17:30 - 18:30 Final Discussion

Chair: Nikolaus Katzer, Helmut Schmidt University, Hamburg

Location:

Helmut-Schmidt-Universität/ Universität der Bundeswehr
Senatssaal (Gebäude M1)
Holstenhofweg 85
22043 Hamburg
www.hsu-hh.de

To attend the workshop, please reply to:
Manfred Zeller, mzellerhsu-hh.de