B5112 - Experiences and Memories fo Eastern Europe (1) (LM)

Learning outcomes

At the end of the course students will possess a critical and in-depth knowledge of a) the historiographical debate about the national and transnational configuration of European experiences and memories; b) the different methodological approaches to study them and, c) the processes related to the redefinition of the coordinates of public and institutional memory in contemporary Europe. They will have acquired a critical knowledge of the key concepts and tools apt to identifying factors of change and of continuity in the debate on memory policies and how these can be reshaped with regard to political-institutional, social and gender factors. Also, they can recognize the relevance of and the interest in historical memory on the part of communities in contemporary Eastern European cultures - including the artistic production and public communication - and the specific role of historiography in fostering a critical and scientific approach. They will be able to outline a research question by critically selecting and evaluating the sources necessary to address it so as to be able to elaborate scientifically grounded interpretations; they will have achieved capabilities to produce contents of scientific quality that can be disseminated through the various channels of historical knowledge communication, teaching included, with an awareness of the implications for dissemination and for teaching.

Course contents

This module of the course starts from the current politics of memory of World War II, and the high conflict or divergence between them, and returns to how states and societies dealt with these traumatic experiences. While the western part of Europe, despite very different wartime experiences, worked toward a common set of memory principles and practices in the postwar decades, thanks largely to European integration, the eastern part of the continent "split" on this issue after the disintegration of the Soviet Union.

The module on Eastern Europe reflects on the peculiarities of the military and political violence it underwent in the years 1930-53, through the study of specific case studies in national and transnational perspectives (Ukraine, Russian Federation, Poland, Baltic states), and the analysis of primary sources. We will examine the construction of narratives about World War II in communist Poland and the Soviet Union, studying the hesitations of state policies and the emergence of alternative discourses within parts of society.

The module will be divided into the following 5 clusters:

1- Looking backward: from today’s controversies to yesterday’s divergent war experiences

2- Impossible “sorties de guerre”? Eastern Europe and persisting mass violence after 1945

3- From Stalinism to the Thaw: the winding paths of war memories

4- Late socialism, war memory and dissident history

5- Divergent memories: after the collapse of the Soviet bloc

Attending students, previously divided into groups, will be required to read, discuss and present an essay/chapter in the classroom. Presentations will be organized in specific classes starting from the 2nd week of the course. The list of texts to study – List B – and the detailed calendar of classes and assigned readings is available on the page "Virtuale" of the course.

Readings/Bibliography

It is strongly recommended for students with no previous experience in Russian and Soviet history to read at least one overview of 20th and 21st century Russian history before the course begins, or at least the second week of the course. For example, Fitzpatrick, Sheila. A Brief History of the Soviet Union. NY: Columvia UP, 2022 or Graziosi, Andrea. L’Unione sovietica, 1914-1991. Bologna: Il Mulino, 2011 (exists in ebook format obtainable through AlmaRe; it is the most comprehensive work on the Soviet period, and contains reflections on historiography up to 2010). The students may also find useful insights and overviews in Edele, Mark. Stalinism at War: The Soviet Union in World War II. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2021; idem. Debates on Stalinism. Issues in Historiography. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2020; e idem Russia’s War Against Ukraine: The Whole Story. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 2023.

Students who would wish to read complementary (and not mandatory for the exam) monographs or volumes on the object of the course can write to the professor at any time.

However, the list of texts - List B - to study for the classes and the final exam is detailed below, while the precise calendar and the links to the texts are to be found on the page Virtuale of the course.

1. Rudling, Per Anders. “The Khatyn Massacre in Belorussia: A Historical Controversy Revisited.” Holocaust and Genocide Studies26, no. 1 (2012): 29–58.

2. Hirsch, Francine. “The Soviet Union at the Palace of Justice: Law, Intrigue, and International Rivalry in the Nuremberg Trials.” In Stalin’s Soviet Justice “Show” Trials, War Crimes Trials, and Nuremberg, edited by David Crowe, 171–98. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2019.

3. Chrobaczyński, Jacek, and Piotr Trojański. “Auschwitz and Katyn in Political Bondage. The Process of Shaping Memory in Communist Poland.” In Memory and Change in Europe: Eastern Perspectives, edited by Małgorzata Pakier and Joanna Wawrzyniak, 246–63. New York, Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2015.

4. McBride, Jared. “Contesting the Malyn Massacre: The Legacy of Inter-Ethnic Violence and the Second World War in Eastern Europe.” Carl Beck Papers in Russian and East European Studies, no. 2405 (2016): 3–78.

5. Moine, Nathalie. «‘Chères petites, laissez-moi sortir’ . La mise à mort des patients de l’hôpital psychiatrique de Vinnitsa : sources judiciaires, mémoire locale et histoire psychiatrique». Revue d’histoire de la Shoah, no. 214 (2021): 21–54. An English translation is now available (search on AlmaRe). 

6. Koustova, Emilia. “(Un)Returned from the Gulag: Life Trajectories and Integration of Postwar Special Settlers.” Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History 16, no. 3 (2015): 589–620. 10.1353/kri.2015.0038

7. Irina Tcherneva and Juliette Denis, “Je me souviens de tout, Richard (Rolands Kalniņš, Studio de Riga, 1967): une manifestation précoce d’une mémoire concurrente de la Grande Guerre patriotique,” The Journal of Power Institutions in Post-Soviet Societies, no. 12 (2011), http://pipss.revues.org/3875 . [Ricordo tutto, Richard (Rolands Kalniņš, Riga Studio, 1967): una prima manifestazione di una memoria concorrente della Grande Guerra Patriottica]

8. capitolo 4 della monografia: Zeltser, Arkadi. Unwelcome Memory. Holocaust Monuments in The Soviet Union. Jerusalem: Yad Vashem: The International Institute for Holocaust Research, 2018.

9. capitolo 5 della monografia: Zeltser, Arkadi. Unwelcome Memory. Holocaust Monuments in The Soviet Union. Jerusalem: Yad Vashem: The International Institute for Holocaust Research, 2018

10. capitolo 3 della monografia: Martin, Barbara. Dissident Histories in the Soviet Union : From De-Stalinization to Perestroika. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2019.

11. capitolo 3 “La statalizzazione della memoria”della monografia: Borelli, Andrea. Nella Russia di Putin. La costruzione di un’identità post-sovietica. Studi storici. Roma: Carrocci, 2023.

12. Tatiana Zhurzhenko, "Legislating Historical Memory in Post-Soviet Ukraine", Elezar Barkan e Ariella Lang (eds.), Memory Laws and Historical Justice: The Politics of Criminalizing the Past (Palgrave Macmillan, 2023), https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-94914-3_5

13. Pakier, Małgorzata, and Joanna Wawrzyniak, eds. “Memory and Change in Eastern Europe: How Special?” In Memory and Change in Europe: Eastern Perspectives, 1–20. New York, Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2015.

Teaching methods

The course alternates lectures and debates in which the students are required to engage actively. The readings to be discussed in class will be assigned in the first week of lessons. Attending students shall enroll, by week 2 of the course, in groups that will present the dedicated lectures. Link for group enrollment https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1KiPexbIhf_pWU-nQPTUiCLUTp0XPhAQTHjHVzoI1GgY/edit?usp=sharing

For the preparation of class discussions, the texts will be uploaded on the "didactic materials" related to course.

Assessment methods

To be considered attending, students must take part to at least 75% of the lessons and engage actively in the discussions.

They can choose between two forms of final exam:

1. Either a 6000 to 7500 words paper (12 credits) on a topic of one of the following areas, related to the two modules of the integrated course:

• Politics of memory in Western Europe post 1989 (Rovatti)
• Traces or imprint of the war in Eastern Europe, 1945-2022 (Voisin)

Students are required to choose a specific subject within one of this two areas after consulting one of the two professors, or a subject transversal to the two modules, in this case the topic must be agreed upon with the two teachers (Rovatti and Voisin).

Deadline for the submission of the final paper is either 15^th April or 12^nd June

The evaluation of the essay will depend on its originality, source base and its critical depth. The grade assigned to the paper will be based on:

- selection of the topic of the paper and its relatedness with the course content

- ability to identify relevant and diverse bibliography

- critical analysis

- clarity in structure and aims

- language proficiency

The final grade will result from the evaluation of all aspects concerning the course: active participation in class; accuracy and punctuality in delivering the paper; accuracy in oral presentation and academic writing; capability to deepen and master topics addressed during the course; ability to identify relevant bibliography; critical analysis; clear and logical structure of the final paper.

2. Or a written exam (12 credits), related to both modules. This exam of max 120 minutes includes 5 open-ended questions (on choice) related to the texts (about 20 essays/chapters) analyzed in the classroom during lectures of both the Western European Experience and Memories module (List A) and the Eastern European Experience and Memories module (List B).

The Lists A and B will be published before the start of class.

 

Non-attending students are required to pass 2 written exams, valid for both modules (12 credits). The two written exams will be held separately on the same day or on two consecutive days:

°The first written exam (120 minutes, same for attending students) includes 5 open-ended, choice questions related to the texts (about 20 essays/chapters) analyzed in the classroom during lectures of both the Western European Experience and Memories module (List A) and the Eastern European Experience and Memories module (List B).

The Lists A and B will be provided before the start of class.

°The second written exam (180 minutes) involves short critical essay (max. 4 pages) from one of the two proposed tracks/question related to the topics covered in the modules of the integrated course.

In addition to an accurate study of the texts analyzed in the two courses (List A + B), in order to pass the second written exam non-attending students should study the following 2 books:

• Filippo Focardi, Bruno Groppo (a cura di), L'Europa e le sue memorie. Culture e politiche del ricordo dopo il 1989, Viella, Roma 2013
• Salomoni, Antonella. Salomoni, Antonella. Le ceneri di Babij Jar. L’eccidio degli ebrei di Kiev. Bologna: il Mulino, 2019.

The grade assigned to the short essay will be based on the precision in answering the question, the capacity to develop a critical analysis using an adequate scientific language.

 

For all exam forms (final paper, first written exam, second written exam):

- appropriate language and the ability to critically analyze relevant topics will lead to a good/excellent final grade;

- acceptable language and the ability to resume relevant topics will lead to a sufficient/ fair grade;

-inadequate language proficiency and fragmentary knowledge of relevant topics will result in failing the exam.

This 6 CFU course is part of the 12 CFU Integrated Course "SOCIETIES IN TRANSITION AND CULTURES OF CONFLICT IN CONTEMPORARY EUROPE."

If the student has included the integrated course (12 Cfu) in his/her study plan

-the final grade for attending students will be assigned by the professor with whom the topic for the final paper has been agreed upon (Rovatti or Voisin); or by both professors (Rovatti and Voisin), if they choose the written exam.

- the final grade for non- attending students will result from the arithmetic mean of the grades obtained in the two written exams, assigned together by the professors (Rovatti and Voisin).

 

Teaching tools

During frontal lessons the teacher will use power point presentations containing text and visual sources.

Audiovisual materials, documentary sources will be proposed to integrate some lessons. Teaching materials such as articles or short essays will be made available to students on the course page of "Virtuale".

Students who require specific services and adaptations to teaching activities due to a disability or specific learning disorders (SLD), must first contact the appropriate office: https://site.unibo.it/studenti-con-disabilita-e-dsa/en/for-students.

Office hours

See the website of Vanessa Voisin