[Discussion] CFP: 2006 Soyuz Symposium: Walls and Bridges: Refiguring �Socialist� and �Postsocialist� Spaces in a Deterritorializing World

[gonul@pultar.org]

From: "Serguei Alex. Oushakine" <sao15@columbia.edu>

Walls and Bridges: Refiguring &#65533;Socialist&#65533; and
&#65533;Postsocialist&#65533; Spaces in a
Deterritorializing World

SOYUZ, the Post-Communist Cultural Studies Interest Group, invites paper
proposals and, for the first time, poster proposals, for its 2006 meeting, to be
held March 3-5, 2006, at Bryant University in Smithfield, Rhode Island. Bryant
University is conveniently located near both Providence, RI, and Boston. The
Soyuz symposium is an intimate forum where scholars (including graduate
students, junior faculty, and senior faculty) from across the world can exchange
ideas and engage in dialogue.

The 2006 Soyuz Symposium will focus on the deterritorialization of postsocialism
and invites papers and posters that propose new ethnographic, theoretical, and
methodological models for configuring the spaces and places of postsocialist
life. Although categories such as "socialism," "late socialism," and
"postsocialism" continue to be central to studies of state socialist societies,
particularly in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, critics have argued
that over-reliance on these categories has produced a sense of geographic,
ethnographic, and methodological isolationism. As a result, boundaries created
by uncritical application of the concepts of socialism and postsocialism may
have prevented analysts from hearing the perspectives of scholars and informants
who are positioned differently within these conceptual geographies.

Taking cues from recent globalization studies of deterritorialization and
reterritorialization, this Symposium challenges participants to map out new
conceptual frameworks that contest, query, or reject the traditional binary
categories of socialism and postsocialism. In particular, we are interested in
ethnographic work that attends carefully to local discourses of locality,
translocality, and globality as alternatives to, or critical engagements with,
traditional notions of socialism and postsocialism. Possible questions to
consider include: To what extent is it still legitimate to propose a geography
of socialism/postsocialism? How do the critical lessons from globalization
studies help socialist/postsocialist scholars rethink the categories and
boundaries that define and constitute our field sites and our scholarly
conversations? Where are the borders, centers, and peripheries of
socialism/postsocialism in a global, deterritorialized world, and who are our
interlocutors? How do global technologies create, transform, or eliminate
socialist/postsocialist communities? What do methodologies from globalization
research (multi-sited fieldwork, global commodity chains, virtual ethnography,
etc.) contribute to studies of socialism/postsocialism and to new research
alliances?

Proposed papers and posters should be based on ethnographic research in a
socialist or postsocialist society (please specify if you are proposing a paper,
a poster, or you have no preference). Presentations and posters may come from
any discipline (anthropology, sociology, folklore, political science, history,
literary studies, etc.), but must combine solid ethnographic evidence with
theoretical analysis. Suggested length for proposals is 200-400 words. Please
send proposals and a brief c.v. to Professor William Graves (wgraves@bryant.edu)
and Professor Melissa Caldwell (lissa@ucsc.edu) by December 1, 2005. Decisions
will be made and notification sent out in early January 2006.

Melissa L. Caldwell
Assistant Professor
Department of Anthropology
321 Social Sciences I
University of California, Santa Cruz
Santa Cruz, CA 95064
Phone: 831-459-3856
E-mail: lissa@ucsc.edu