From 26-28 June, Cambridge's University Lecturer in Pre-Modern East Slavic Culture, Dr Olenka Pevny, and three PhD students in the Department of Slavonic Studies -- Rosie Finlinson, Nick Mayhew, and Katie Sykes -- will travel to L’viv, Ukraine to participate in the 2016 ASEEES-MAG Summer Convention at the University Centre of the Ukrainian Catholic University. Together they will host a panel exploring the theme of 'Images of the Other in Medieval and Early Modern Rus' Sources’. Professor Yury P. Avvakumov of the University of Notre Dame will serve as the panel's discussant.
The panel will consider how different narratives and identities mediate what we learn from the cultural past. Rather than searching for new heroes and heroines or contributing to the endless opposition of the One and the Other, the presenters will examine nuances in the enunciation of confessional identity, of female piety and of kinship bonds within and outside the framework of specific social and cultural norms. Their work will confront and challenge condoned and naturalized representations of 'Nemtsy' (foreigners or strangers) in north-western Rus' over the course of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries; representations of female piety in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Muscovy; and representations of canonical gendered kinships on Rus' territories up to the mid-seventeenth century.
The summer convention programme will be posted by 30 April. Below is more information on the panel as well as abstracts for the papers being presented by our PhD students:
Presenter: Katie Sykes
Title: Religious Identity and Difference in the Medieval Baltic: Constructing 'Nemtsy' in the First Novgorod Chronicle, c. 1200-1400 (Релігійна ідентичність і релігійна відмінність в середньовічній Прибалтиці: формування образу «німців» у Новгородському першому літописі в 1200-1400 роках / Религиозная идентичность и религиозное различие в средневековой Прибалтике: формирование образа «немцев» в Новгородской первой летописи в 13-15 вв.)
Abstract: The question of Rus' constructions of the western world is particularly topical. Existing scholarship characterises clashes between Rus' and 'Nemtsy' as conflicts between Orthodox Christians and Catholics. My work on the First Chronicle of Novgorod reveals that for c. 1200-1400, the text provides no grounds for the belief that 'Nemtsy' were constructed as a religious 'Other' to Rus' Christians. This calls into question conceptions of long-standing religious hostility between north-western Rus' and its western neighbours.
Presenter: Rosemary Finlinson
Title: Women on the Edge: Representations of Female Piety Outside the Nunnery in Muscovite Hagiography (Жінки на межі: Зображення жіночого благочестя за межами монастиря в Московські агіографії / Женщины на грани: Изображения женского благочестия за пределами монастыря в житийной литературе Московской Руси)
Abstract: Sixteenth and seventeenth-century Muscovite hagiography is notable for the increasing visibility of women. The Murom Cycle depicts laywomen engaging in pious behaviour outside ecclesiastical institutions and urban centres; on the social and geographical periphery, in the space between places. My paper explores the representations of women in the Cycle and studies their engagement in remapping the contours of holy place by providing models of sanctity from within the bounds of their own environment and experience.
Presenter: Nicholas Mayhew
Title: From 'Brothers' to 'Others': The Banning of 'Bratotvorenie' in Muscovy in the Seventeenth Century (Від «Братів» до «Інших»: зникнення oбряду «братотворенія» в Московських служебниках XVII-го століття)
Abstract: 'Bratotvorenie', a liturgical rite uniting two men as 'spiritual brothers', existed in the East Slavonic tradition until the mid-seventeenth century. It was banned in Moscow in 1655 and removed from liturgical books. On the basis of liturgical and hagiographical sources, this paper explores what constituted acceptable verses unacceptable forms of artificial kinship ties in Rus', Ruthenian and Muscovite lands. It considers how different manifestations of love between two individuals were appraised as well as when, where and why.
Dr Pevny will also chair another panel entitled 'Imagining the Greek Catholic Church in Lviv: Soviet and Post-Soviet Narratives'. This panel will include the following papers: Kathryn David (New York University) on ‘The Greek Catholic Church in the Soviet Imagination: The Yaroslav Galan Club and Church Education’; Diana Vonnak (Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology) on ‘Changing Functions and the Politics of Representation in the Lviv Museum of the History of Religion and Culture’; and Kateryna Budz (National University of "Kyiv-Mohyla Academy") on ‘Redefining Identity: Clandestine Ukrainian Greek Catholics' Attitude to Orthodoxy (1946–1989)’.
