Conferences

Die Jahrestagung stellt zur Diskussion, inwiefern postkoloniale Ansätze gegenüber der Imperiumsforschung neue Erkenntnisse zur Erklärung von Politik und Gesellschaft im Osten Europas liefern. Es geht um das Verhältnis von Imperium und Gewalt, Integration und Desintegration sowie um Wohlstandsversprechen und Identität. Zum Auftakt sprechen der ukrainische Schriftsteller Juri Andruchowytsch und die Historikerin Botakoz Kassymbekova über biographische und historische Dimensionen von imperialer…

The second international conference of our project "Towards Illiberal Constitutionalism" takes place on 12 & 13 October in the Vila Lanna, Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague. The conference is organised by the Prague project team, in cooperation with the Centre for Ibero-American Studies FF UK.

Latin America and Central Europe are regions that share the experience of dictatorships, authoritarianism, strong modernizing states, rebellious civil societies and transitions to and from…

Ausrichter: Imre Kertész Kolleg Jena (Joachim von Puttkamer, Irina Scherbakowa, Volkhard Knigge)
Die Konferenz wird gefördert aus Mitteln des Beauftragten der Bundesregierung für Ostdeutschland.

MITTWOCH // 05. JULI 2023
14:00 // Ankunft & Registrierung

15:00 // ERÖFFNUNG, GRUßWORTE
Staatsminister Carsten Schneider
Einführung in die Tagung (J. v. Puttkamer)

16:00 // PODIUM: IN WELCHEM EUROPA WOLLEN WIR LEBEN?
Das Podium diskutiert die normativen Voraussetzungen zukunftsgerichteter…

Until recently, the model of “constitutional tolerance” that allowed for a plurality of constitutional traditions within EU was understood as a strength. Not anymore. The constitutional transformation of Hungary and Poland towards authoritarian regimes in recent years has undermined the belief that despite the plurality there is a constitutional core shared by all member states allowing for mediation of conflicts and preserving the basic shared principles and values of EU as liberal democratic…

The workshop asks how intellectual history can speak to key social issues today, meaning it has to address the public, and how it can articulate its claims beyond academia.

How does intellectual history contribute to emerging discussions about social welfare in Europe, and women’s role in it? How does it add to an understanding of the state socialist and postsocialist past of the region to reframe the discussion about memory politics and transitional justice? Why does intellectual history…

The Imre Kertész Kolleg will hold annual conference 2022 to mark the end of its government-funded fellowship programme. Over the years, the Kolleg has hosted more than 170 scholars, researching a vast range of topics in the field of Central and East European studies. We take the occasion to discuss not only what has been achieved so far but also and foremost to outline current perspectives, challenges and research trends in the relevant disciplines.

We asked leading scholars in their field to…

Postcolonial perspectives have become increasingly relevant in the discussion of Central and Eastern European history, offering both challenges and opportunities alike on various themes. The workshop “Eastern Europe Postcolonial: New Approaches to an Ongoing Debate”, organized by the Imre Kertész Kolleg in cooperation with the Max Weber Foundation, explores in three roundtables the impact that postcolonial theory might have on discussing issues such as cultural hegemonies, economic imbalances…

Belarussian below

Der lange Schatten von Krieg und Genozid in Belarus: Das Nachwirken deutscher Gewaltherrschaft in der westlichen Sowjetunion

Im Fokus des Symposiums stehen Studien zur Erfahrung deutscher Besatzungsgewalt und des Zweiten Weltkrieges in der besetzten Sowjetunion, insbesondere in der Belarusischen Sozialistischen Sowjetrepublik. In mehreren Panels diskutieren die Teilnehmer:innen die unterschiedliche Gewalt- und Genoziderfahrung auf dem heutigen Gebiet der Republik Belarus…

To register, please write an e-mail to Immo.Rebitschek@uni-jena.de.

This workshop builds on, and challenges, the scholarship on the response to social disorder under Stalin by examining social control more broadly. Police purges were a massive response to social disorder, yet the question of social control was not limited to the police. In the same decade of the purges, courts and prosecutors were processing millions of cases. From a law criminalizing abortion to passport regulations, criminal…

The Holocaust and the Cold War: Culture and Justice  

May 26 – 28, 2021
Organizers:  Fritz Bauer Institut,  Frankfurt am Main and  Imre Kertész Kolleg, Jena

The conference will examine to what extent the Cold War affected representations of the Shoah in historiography, legal investigations and trials as well as the arts and will ask how this has determined political discourse until today. We will take stock of the confrontational nature of the Cold War and discuss how the Holocaust became a…

The workshop will be held online via Zoom, if you would like to participate, please register here. After your registration, you will receive a confirmation email (within 24 hours) containing information on how to join the meeting.

Cross-disciplinary research fields have been flourishing in the humanities, transgressing disciplinary boundaries in their scholarly interests and practice. This development impacted the scope of interdisciplinarity, transforming it from a marginal into an everyday…

'Space in Holocaust Research' is the first conference in Germany to examine space as a central category of Holocaust research from a theoretical and methodological perspective. The organizers seek to combine inter- and transdisciplinary discussions of a spatial turn in the humanities with recent research on the Holocaust and its legacy. The paradigm of space will allow for cross-disciplinary discussions on central issues of Holocaust research and for a prolific integration of new approaches. The…

organized by Dr Sabina Ferhadbegović (Imre Kertész Kolleg Jena); in cooperation with Professor Kerstin von Lingen, University of Vienna & Dr Julia Eichenberg, Humboldt University Berlin

“Crimes against peace” and “crimes against humanity” are undoubtedly two elements of crime, which have acquired enormous resonance in the legal and moral discussions in the aftermath of the WWII. They are often associated with the International Military Tribunal and the person of the American chief prosecutor at…

Research in biopolitics has become a multifaceted academic field in social sciences and the humanities. It is utilized in a variety of disciplines to describe and analyze the evolution and transformation of modern power rationalities. A Foucauldian approach initiated by its creator in order to theorize liberalism as a practice of government, its main focus is biopolitical technologies of governance, in other words technologies and techniques which govern human, social, and biological processes.

Organizers: Faculty of Political Science, University of Bucharest, Institut Universitaire de France, Imre Kertész Kolleg

The scholarship on reckoning with the past after the “third wave of democratisation” has generally provided analysis of national case studies or comparative accounts of countries seen as discrete units, disconnected from transnational or international developments. This approach has overlooked the impact of globalization of memory cultures on national settings as well as the…

The Association for Slavic, East European & Eurasian Studies’ 2018 Convention will be held in Boston, MA from 06 – 09 December under the topic “Performance”. The Imre Kertész Kolleg is very proud to be a part of this.

We are present with our directors Professor Joachim von Puttkamer and Dr Michal Kopecek, as well as our research associates Dr Juliane Tomann and Dr Jochen Böhler in various panels and discussion. A vast number of current and former fellows will also be at the ASEEES convention,…

From 25 - 28 September the 52nd Biennial Meeting of German Historians takes place in Münster. The overall theme of the 2018 meeting is "Divided Societies" and the Imre Kertész Kolleg is proud to be a part of this.

Our director Joachim von Puttkamer and our colleague Juliane Tomann represent that Kolleg at the Historikertag. Their session both take place on Friday, 28 September from 14:00 - 16:00.

Joachim von Puttkamer chairs the joint session on "Who Protects the Truth? Nationalism and the…

In a globalizing world, references to the past as a way of identity formation have become more and more important. Even though the “production” of history is the major field of academic historiography, the past is addressed in many popular contexts that are consumed and appropriated by immense numbers of people. Though the forms in which history is brought to life differ widely, most of them have one feature in common: they promise the distribution of knowledge via entertainment and this is what…

"The expression of truth is losing its ethical impact and becoming no more than a historical fact that arouses interest but not enthusiasm. And the experts are better informed and are able to quote facts more accurately than the dissidents" wrote Jiřina Šiklová, a Czech dissident sociologist, in January 1990. Already a few months earlier she had predicted that it would be the professionals and experts from the „grey zone“ between official Party structures and dissident circles, who would…

Europa und die USA sehen sich seit einiger Zeit mit Nationalismus und Rechtspopulismus konfrontiert. Diese Wiederkehr autoritärer Sehnsüchte lenkt den Blick fast zwangsläufig zurück in die Zwischenkriegszeit, in der die repräsentative Demokratie ihre bis dato größte Krise erlebte - und nicht nur in Deutschland scheiterte.
Ausgehend von der nationalsozialistischen "Machtergreifung" soll die Geschichte autoritärer Bewegungen und Regime in der Zeit nach dem Ersten Weltkrieg neu beleuchtet werden.…

The Ukrainian experiment between 1917 and 1922 is a paramount example of state-building in practices under the conditions of war and civil war. It produced a variety of ephemeral state structures: an « All-Ukrainian » Central Council ( Rada), a People’s Republic, a People’s Republi cof Soviets, a Ukrainian Puppet State (Hetmanate) at the mercy of the Central Powers, and a Ukrainian government-in-exile in Paris. In the end, Warsaw and Moscow bluntly divided Ukraine between them, incorporating the…

Conceived and implemented by Germans, the Shoah took place in occupied Central and Eastern Europe. During and after the war, the daunting task for all German occupied countries was to engage with what the Germans had set in motion and were implementing. In recent years, public debate on these complex issues has been increasingly polarized: histories of participation have been juxtaposed with histories of saving Jews and both have been regarded as statements on national character. Engagement with…

Action, experience and emotion are the focus when it comes to performativity. In cultural studies, the performative turn has shifted the focus away from texts and structures to inquiries into actions performed and the bodily experiences involved in creating collective meaning. In the field of history terms such as “living history,” “doing history” and "reenactment” have been established to characterize the experiential component of various practices of reviving, restaging and appropriating…

Herder Institute for Historical Research on East Central Europe – Institute of the Leibniz Association, Marburg
International Graduate Centre for the Study of Culture (GCSC), Justus Liebig University Giessen
Imre Kertész Kolleg, Friedrich Schiller University Jena
Supported by Leibniz Research Alliance “Historical Authenticity”

In the last decade, heritage studies have emerged as a field of cross-disciplinary research covering the topics including the built environment, museums and collections,…

venue: “Internationales Centrum ‚Haus auf der Mauer‘“, lecture room, Johannisplatz 26, Jena

The term ‘totalitarianism’ has experienced a remarkable comeback in political, historical, and social science discourses of the last half century. Having served as a key concept in the dissident critique of state socialist regimes in Central and Eastern Europe during the 1970s and 1980s, the term took on new life after 1989, losing its associations with the opposition and becoming widespread in the media…

Das Imre Kertész Kolleg Jena, die Stiftung Ettersberg, die Staatliche Schlösser, Burgen und Gärten Sachsen gGmbH und die Stiftung Thüringer Schlösser und Gärten führen vom 29. Juni bis zum 30. Juni 2016 eine gemeinsame Tagung durch, die erstmals Grundlagen der Geschichte des Denkmalschutzes und des Umgangs mit historischen Baudenkmälern im Staatssozialismus nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg in europäischer Perspektive beleuchten wird. Die Rolle und Funktion von historischen Baudenkmälern im Sozialismus…

At the end of the 20th century, societies in Central and Eastern Europe tend to conceive of themselves as ethnically homogeneous and ethnic diversity to be addressed as a question of national minorities. Whereas historical research has addressed the issues of forced migration, overseas emigration and political exile, the experiences of immigration and of coping with large numbers of refugees and its potential challenge to notions of national homogeneity have received little attention. The…

The use of media and visitor participation challenges the educational aspect that museums once offered. Conveying historical knowledge and stimulating a cognitive process of perception are being replaced by a more emotional museum experience: instead of dealing with historical facts, museums have become 'historical theme parks'. The central aim of the workshop is to discuss these developments on its historical backgrounds and develop further perspectives on roles and functions/ways of…

gefördert durch die Gerda Henkel Stiftung

Mehrere internationale Konferenzen in den letzten zwei Jahren machen deutlich, dass die Desiderate in der Geschichte der Waffen-SS – insbesondere in Bezug auf den Krieg im Osten – mitnichten alle erforscht sind. Im Gegenteil: 70 Jahre nach Ende des Zweiten Weltkrieges steht angesichts immer neuer Konflikte in Ost- und Südosteuropa eine Dringlichkeit im Raum, die Erforschung der Waffen- SS gerade in diesen Regionen voranzutreiben. Bei der Konferenz in…

Die Geschichte der Perestrojka ist neu und wird - wohl aus dem Grund - gerne am Stück und vom Ende her erzählt. ´Perestrojka´ und ´Untergang der Sowjetunion´ erscheinen oft in nur einem Satz. Dagegen gibt es einen großen Bedarf an Forschungen, die die Umgestaltung in der UdSSR zwischen 1985 und 1991 als Geschichte vielfältiger einzelner Prozesse und verflochtener Dynamiken mit unvorhergesehenem, ungeplantem oder auch anders gedachtem Ausgang analysieren.
Mit Schwerpunkt auf den inneren…

Violence during and in the immediate aftermath of the First World War is a frequent research topic pursued in various contexts and within the framework of different methodological approaches. However, culturally inspired analyses as well as expansions of the horizon beyond the boundaries of a particular nation-state have been rare. Moreover, almost all the existing scholarship focuses on those states in East-Central Europe that emerged from the wartime collapse as defeated. The other side of the…

The conference aims to explore the manifold aspects and reactions to a world in rapid transition. Case studies from the fields of politics, economics, intellectual currents and everyday life will discuss the attempts to cope with unexpected challenges and to shape events. Rather than continuing the ongoing debate on why communism failed and rather than taking the ensuing attempts at democracy for granted, the conference aims to develop an historical approach to the foundations of our…

Eine der wichtigsten Aufgaben der Historiografie der Ukraine heute, ist die Verortung ihrer Geschichte in transnationalen Bezügen. Dazu leistet die international hochkarätig besetzte Konferenz „Revolution und Krieg. Die Ukraine in den großen Transformationen des neuzeitlichen Europa“ einen Beitrag. In vier Sektionen setzen sich Historikerinnen und Historiker mit der ukrainischen Geschichte im Rahmen europäischer Transformationsprozesse vom 17. Jahrhundert bis in das 20. Jahrhundert auseinander.…

Wie der Kommunismus zählt auch der Antikommunismus zu den politisch-ideologischen Großphänomenen, die das 20. Jahrhundert prägten. Die Forschung hat bislang vor allem antikommunistische Organisationen in den Blick genommen, zumeist mit Fokus auf der Zwischenkriegszeit oder auf dem Kalten Krieg. Im Zentrum unseres Interesses steht nicht so sehr die Vielfalt antikommunistischer Zusammenschlüsse, sondern vielmehr die Frage, warum antikommunistische Ideologien und Ideologen über Jahrzehnte hinweg…

The fourth conference from the "Genealogies of Memory in Central and Eastern Europe" series organized by the European Network Remembrance and Solidarity is dedicated to the memory of 1989-91 in post-socialist countries. During three days, dozens of historians, sociologists and anthropologists from more than twenty countries will exchange views on what unites and what divides the memories of transformation in Central and Eastern Europe. The participants of the conference will discuss the dominant…

In collaboration, the Imre Kertész Kolleg (University of Jena), the Centre for Area Studies (University of Leipzig), and the Centre of Imperial and Global History (University of Exeter) will hold a conference on 'alternative encounters' in the post-war period. As decolonization accelerated, new linkages opened up and existing ties were remade between the so-called ‘Second World’ (from the Soviet Union to the German Democratic Republic) and the ‘Global South’ (from Latin America to Africa to…

The conference assembles international experts and discusses forms of political repression, oppression and surveillance in the countries of the former Warsaw Pact. The focus is on comparing local and systemic features of state repression, its dimensions and intensity across Central and Eastern Europe and on state repression as social practice. In cooperation with the Historical Institute of Warsaw University and the History Meeting House (DSH), the Kolleg is delighted to present Borys Lankosz,…

The existing literature on non-German volunteers in the Waffen-SS and police formations in occupied Europe is highly uneven, both in terms of quality and geographical coverage. While non-German soldiers fighting alongside the Wehrmacht have received some scholarly attention, even the more academically sound publications on the Waffen-SS of recent years have tended to prioritize a national or German-centric perspective over transnational, cultural history approaches. Our international conference…

During the twentieth century, large parts of Europe have been affected by war, violence and oppression. The First World War marked the beginning of a new form of representing war and violence in museums, including the sufferings of civilians. Experiences of total destruction and widespread death brought on debates about how to exhibit these existential experiences.
The central aim of the workshop is to discuss the origins of presenting violence and war in museums both in Western and East Central…

The unravelling of European empires was foundational to the making of the modern world. An old imperial order was swept away, and a new age of nation states rapidly replaced it. Whilst decolonisation played a fundamental role in the shaping of post-war world, its repercussions for Europe itself, and its legacies in a host of political, social and cultural spheres, are still relatively little examined. This conference will examine how the global dynamics of decolonisation had an impact not only…

The conference Catastrophe and Utopia will study the historical experiences, intellectual agendas, sustained reflections and utopian visions of Central and Eastern European intellectuals in the years between 1933 and 1958. Central and Eastern Europe was the central stage of the most catastrophic events during this quarter of a century, experiencing the rise and spread of Nazism, the Second World War and the Holocaust as well as the establishment of Stalinist regimes, political terror and extreme…

Globalität scheint heute alle Kulturen und gesellschaftlichen Sphären zu durchdringen und wird weitgehend unabhängig von theoretischen Präferenzen in zahlreichen Disziplinen, bei politischen Akteuren und in allen Regionen der Welt als Faktum akzeptiert und auf je eigene Weise adaptiert. Für viele Wissenschaften stellt sie eine Quelle neuer Forschungs- und Deutungsperspektiven dar, aber zugleich eine enorme Herausforderung, die es zu bewältigen gilt, und zwar begrifflich, theoretisch und…

The history of the Cold War has been, as the name suggests, predominantly narrated as a history of conflicts, confrontation, and competition. At the same time, the economic relations between Eastern and Western Europe since the 1970s tell a different story: The contacts and cooperation between companies and individuals in East and West developed dynamically throughout the late Cold War period.
While the trade relations with the “Eastern Bloc” were of secondary importance for the West European…

Diese Tagung thematisiert die Beziehung zwischen Kirchen und Staatsgewalt in Mittel- und Osteuropa. Damit ist ein Doppeltes gemeint: Zum einen die staatliche Gewalt, die gegen Kirchen ausgeübt wurde, seit sozialistische Regime an die Macht kamen; in der Regel zunächst blutige Verfolgung und Unterdrückung, dann die Entwicklung eines modus vivendi, der in den verschiedenen Staaten ganz unterschiedlich war. Zum anderen ist die staatliche Macht gemeint; hier ist wiederum zu unterscheiden zwischen…

In cooperation with the Museum Fabryka Schindlera in Cracow (Hosting Museum)

The central aim of the first workshop in Cracow is to reconstruct and to discuss fundamental developments in historical museums and the presentation of history in exhibitions both in Western and East Central Europe. Our underlying assumption is that there are more things in common than would be visible at first glance. The challenge to rescue exhibitions and museums from their existence as temples of the fine arts or…

Lange Zeit beschränkte sich das Interessen der Historiker am Thema Menschenrechte auf ideengeschichtliche Aspekte. Seit kurzem aber mehren sich empirische Studien über die Rolle internationaler Organisationen, die Herausbildung globaler Menschenrechtsdiskurse und die Interventionen zivilgesellschaftlicher Akteure. Und inzwischen ist die Frage nach einem historisch tragfähigen Begriff von den Menschenrechten ebenso umstritten wie die nach ihrer Genese und Periodisierung: war mit dem Aufkommen des…

The aim of the conference is to analyze the relationship between modernization, communication and integration. We want to discuss different aspects of these phenomena in four chronologically structured sections (before 1914, 1918-1939, 1945-1989 and after 1989). The subject of our analysis is Central and Eastern Europe including the western part of Russia. The conference will focus on important changes and key developments in everyday life of four generations. These changes will be discussed in…

In cooperation with Pasts, Inc. Center for Historical Studies at the Central European University

East Central Europe in the 20th Century. Roundtable on the State of the Art of Historical Studies is meant to serve two interrelated purposes. First, it is called to foster reflection and dialogue on the state of the art and potential future direction of historical research dealing with East Central Europe in the 20th century. Therefore, a number of scholars with substantial contributions to the…

The workshop is dedicated to Eastern and Central Eastern Europe as a region and the First World War as central event, including its immediate preludes and aftermaths. Within that framework, it focuses on the tradition of violent rule, behavior and thought.

Section One (A World in Transition) discusses the impact of the reign and the downfall of Empires on the one hand, the rise of national movements on the other hand on the formation of regional and trans-regional conflicts. Section Two…

Gemeinsam mit der ungarischen Philosophin Ágnes Heller und dem polnischen Soziologen Zygmunt Bauman begibt sich der von Lutz Niethammer initiierte und konzipierte Workshop an drei Tagen auf die Suche nach einer Generation, deren genuin osteuropäische Erfahrungen zu einem eigenen Weg postmodernen Denkens geführt haben.
Die Grundfrage nach dem Verhältnis von erfahrungsgeschichtlichen Voraussetzungen und philosophischem und sozialtheoretischem Denken will der Workshop anhand biographischer…

The Imre Kertész Kolleg Jena held its first official conference on 08 & 09 July, 2011.Adam Michnik was the keynote speaker, introducing the public to the topic with his speech on the heritage of dictatorships. On the second day Jiří Menzel opened the conference with a presentation on East Central European filmmaking with special emphasis on ironic approaches towards the 20th century.

Mehr als zwei Jahrzehnte sind seit dem politischen Umbruch im Jahre 1989 vergangen, der das Ende der kommunistischen Herrschaft im östlichen Europa bedeutete. Anlässlich des Jubiläums im Jahr 2009 wurden die jeweiligen nationalen wie auch die internationale Öffentlichkeit auf unterschiedliche Art und Weise mit den Ereignissen von 1989 durch eine wahre Flut an Bildern aus der Umbruchzeit konfrontiert, wie z.B. zum Fall der Berliner Mauer. Diese Reaktivierungen der geschichtlichen Ereignisse über…