Between the Professional and the Political: the Stories of Gender Studies in Eastern Europe Told by Those Directly Involved

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Abstract

by Benjamin Cope, Alena Minchenia and Olga Sasunkevich

The development of gender studies in Eastern Europe is intimately intertwined
with the academic and life choices of a particular and, in the first instance, small group
of researchers, through whose efforts the new, gendered knowledge entered academia
in the form of new university courses and academic programmes, differently posed
research questions and interpretive frames, and a distinct fresh language of publications. The appearance of centres of gender studies and new generations of gender researchers did not, however, bring about a linear and unproblematic institutionalisation
of the new discipline. Reflecting on the fate of the Centre of Gender Studies at EHU, we
considered it important to talk with those who were at the source of the development
of gender studies in Russia, Ukraine, Lithuania, Poland and the Czech Republic. Our
interviewees tell of their hopes, achievements and disappointments. Although these
stories have much in common, including an ambivalent view of the results of the development
of gender studies in the region, the retrospective perspective they open up
also enables a reconsideration of what has been achieved and of what might be done
differently in the future. These interviews bear witness to the fact that, no matter how
unfavourable the external conditions, gender studies remains a dynamic field of the
humanities and social sciences, capable of asking searching and meaningful questions
at a critical time. We are grateful to those who talked with thus, and to Evgenia Ivanova
and Natallia Pavlovich for their help in bringing this project to fruition.