Jour fixe: Reconstituting Publics through Remembering Transitions....
This week's Jour Fixe the CAT group presented the following talk with the catching topic "Reconstituting Publics through Remembering Transitions Facilitating Critical Engagement with the 1980-90s on Local and Transnational Scales".
The Constructive Advanced Thinking (CAT) group - from the 2020 call - of Ksenia Robbe (PI - University of Groningen), Agnieszka Mrozik (Polish Academy of Sciences), Andrei Zavadski (HU Berlin) & Alexander Formozov (Dekabristen e.V) presented their project "Reconstituting Publics through Remembering Transitions: Facilitating Critical Engagement with the 1980-90s on Local and Transnational Scales (2021-2024)".
Abstract
The presentation will reflect the preparatory and initial stage of the project, which we are beginning to work on this summer. We will begin by introducing the project and its aims, the main of which is to facilitate ways of critical and inclusive public discussion of the ‘transitional periods’ and their memories in Central and Eastern Europe. We will then focus on three major theoretical areas that the project draws upon: the distinctions and intersections between vernacular and mediated memories; studies of nostalgia and their relevance for remembering 1980-90s transitions; the role of materiality in remembering this period. Furthermore, by reflecting on the experiences of the "Transition Dialogue" project in organizing discussions and engagements with this historical past, we will consider which approaches are most applicable for our aims and contexts, and which theoretical tools they require.