At the Vanguard of Modernization: The Intertwined Histories of Animals and Empire in Ukraine

Session Submission Type: Panel

Brief Description

Through the exploitation of animal bodies, imperial powers carried out expansions, colonizing new lands and peoples while altering, often destroying, ecosystems. Animals served as sources of food, labor, and valuable commodities, while also symbolizing imperial power and status.Their bodies were re-engineered and commodified to produce consumer goods; animals regarded as key sources of economic prosperity. In other words, animals played diverse roles in imperial and colonial projects worldwide, and were similarly integral to Russia’s imperial expansion, colonialism, and the prosperity of its empire. Focusing on three case studies, which explore the intertwined histories of animals and empire during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, this panel features Ukraine under the Romanovs. The part of Ukraine under the Romanovs comprised of nine provinces: Chernihiv, Katerynoslav, Kharkiv, Kherson, Kyiv, Podolia, Poltava, Taurida and Vohlynia. The contributions of the panel are based on a diverse range of primary sources, both archival and printed, from the late imperial period, many of which have been both problematized and introduced into scholarly use for the first time.

Sub Unit

• History: 1800-1900

Chair

• Serhiy Bilenky, U of Alberta (Canada)

Papers

• The Forced Change in Agricultural Practices of the Greeks during the Rise of Maritime Trade in the Azov Sea Region - Svitlana Arabadzhy, Mariupol State U (Ukraine)

• Trapped by Modernity: Animal Bodies, Cattle Husbandry, and Imperial Pathologies in Romanov-ruled Ukraine - Julia Malitska, Södertörn U (Sweden)

• The Unhealthy Wetlands: Pests and Modernization of the Ukrainian Steppe - Anna Olenenko, U of Alberta (Canada)

Discussant

• Catherine Wanner, Pennsylvania State U