Revolutionary Life beyond the State

Session Submission Type: Lightning Round

Brief Description

This lightning round presents new research on imaginary and actual alternatives to the State in the early 20th century. Short presentations in this round create a conversation between Kupala, Platonov, Witkacy, Malevich, and Makhno; consider anarchic architecture, alternative history, and innate literacy; and explore how revolution was imagined in the body and the automaton. In ASEEES 2023, our lightning round “Right-Left Encounters and Russian Political Culture” explored the convergence of radical and reactionary ideas and practices. In 2024, we look at responses to the Russian Revolution in Poland, Ukraine, Russia, and Belarus. While some writers, artists, and activists engaged in––we find, rather unorthodox––state-building, others were looking past the state and the revolution, toward new forms of community and humanity. In seeking “Revolutionary Life Beyond the State.” our protagonists sought liberation. What did they find in its place?

Sub Unit

• Literature: 20th Century

Chair

• Ania Aizman, U of Chicago

Papers

• Anarchi-tecture: Self-Building Practices in Revolutionary Russia - Liana Battsaligova, Oberlin College

• What Was Kronstadt Shot For? What For? For Demanding People’s Power: The Commune against the State - Victoria Buyanovskaya, U of Wisconsin-Madison

• Automated Apparatchiks - Semyon Leonenko, UC Berkeley

• Deeds without Doers - Alexander Lindskog, U of Chicago

• 'The Locals': Alternatives to Nationalism in Ianka Kupala’s 'Tutejshiia' - Oliver Okun, U of Chicago

• Roman Sans-Gêne: Revolutions in the Early Soviet Alternate Histories - Alexandra Sasha Portice, Middlebury College