Early Eastern European Queer: Sources, Interpretation, Visibility

Session Submission Type: Panel

Brief Description

What do we know about the Eastern European queer history in the epoch before the most or at least substantial part of the population of this territory became more or less literate, and before bureaucratic paperwork allowed queer voices to be heard? Existing research, in regional and global languages, suggests a near absence of coherent narratives until the mid-19th century. This is not just a historical matter; recent criminalization of LGBTQ+ identities and the anti-transgender legislation in Russia and anti-LGBTQ+ policies throughout the region threaten visibility and, consequently, the health and lives of these communities. To some extent this threat is due to the lack of the historical visibility of the group. Change is necessary, and historians can contribute by questioning the sources, ways of looking for them more effectively and interpreting them - the last task being especially complicated for the epoch, in which queer subjects tend to be rendered in ambiguities. The panel, through three papers, deliberately probes the search for the Medieval and Early Modern queer sources, bridging the gap between academic history and activism to foster greater visibility.

Sub Unit

• Early Slavic Studies

Chair

• I R

Papers

• A Book, a Flower, a Grave, and Others: Signs of Same-Sex Unions in the Late 18th-Century Russia - Andrei Kostin, U of Grenoble-Alpes (France)

• 'Male Same-Sex Relations and the Court of Peter I. Turning Muscovite': Research, Book, Actualization - Hanna Filipova, U of Gothenburg (Sweden)

• Queer Orthodox History in Russian LGBTQ+ Activism - Nick Mayhew, U of Glasgow (UK)

Discussant

• Jacob Bell, Texas Tech U

Session Manager

• Katherina Boicheva Kokinova, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences (Bulgaria)