ukraine summer school
Sponsored by
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The Wolodymyr George Danyliw Foundation (Canada)
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And the Embassy of France in Ukraine
In partnership with
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The Yuriy Fedkovych Chernivtsi State University
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The Chair of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Ottawa (Canada)
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The Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales [EHESS] (France)
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The Centre d’Etudes Franco-Russe de Moscou
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The University of Paris Ouest Nanterre-La Défense (France)
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The Centre for Slavic History (CRHS) of University of Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne
Workshop and Fieldwork
The Summer School is interdisciplinary and follows a workshop format. Each participant will present a pre-circulated paper and receive comments from a group of international faculty, as well as from other participants. Participants are expected to contribute actively to discussions and to participate in the extracurricular program. Throughout the week we will include roundtables, field visits, local interviews and excursions within the region. These off-site activities will contribute to our seminar discussions.
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The International Social Science Summer School in Ukraine takes place in a different city of Ukraine every year. Previous schools have been held in Uman (2009), Dnipropetrovsk (2010), Ostroh (2011), Zhytomyr (2012), Mykolaiv (2013) and Lviv (2014).
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Chernivtsi is a quintessential border city. Nestled in the foothills of the Carpathian mountains on the Prut River, Chernivtsi is the gateway to the Bukovina region, an area contested, conquered, and lost by multiple empires and nations. Today the region is split between Ukraine, Moldova and Romania. The Romanian and Moldovan borders are only kilometers away from Chernivtsi. Chernivtsi, Cernauti, Czernowitz, Tschernovits, Chernovtsy -- the city’s name echoes its multilingual and multiethnic heritage. The city was known as a cosmopolitan center, where the local population spoke at least six languages and enjoyed a rich and diverse cultural life. Austrians, Romanians, Ukrainians, Hungarians, Germans and Jews lived in this city, dubbed “Little Vienna.” It was also, however, known as “Jerusalem upon the Prut,” and at a conference in 1908 Jewish writers declared themselves for Yiddish as a literary language. Czernowitz native Paul Antschel, better known as Paul Celan, was a Jewish poet who chose to write in German, and the city now hosts a yearly international poetry festival in his name. Control of the city shifted constantly. During the First and Second World Wars its German, Jewish, Romanian, Polish, Russian, and Ukrainian inhabitants saw the city change hands several times, often at dramatic human cost. Claimed by the USSR in 1940, Chernivtsi fell to Nazi forces in 1940 and experienced Romanian occupation until 1944, when it became part of Soviet Ukraine until the USSR’s collapse in 1991. Today, it is in independent Ukraine, but traces of its multi-ethnic past as a city on the border of national and imperial projects remain. Its beautiful architecture preserves much of the heritage of previous generations, and it features one of the region’s largest Jewish cemeteries. Our summer school will take place in the Chernivtsi National University, whose main building is an architectural gem recognized by the UNESCO World Heritage List.
Eligibility
The Summer School is open to PhD students (or students enrolled in a kandidat nauk program) and young researchers (up to six years removed from their PhD or kandidat nauk degree). Proposals strong on theory and empirical research are particularly welcomed. The working language of the Summer School is English. Participants must be comfortable working in English.
Program Costs
There is no program fee. The organizers will cover accommodation, meals, workshops and all excursions. The participants (or their institutions) must pay travel expenses from their home country to Kyiv; the transfer from Kyiv to Chernivtsi will be covered by the summer school budget.
How to apply?
To be considered for the Summer School, candidates must complete an application form (that includes a 500 word project proposal) and add a CV. They can also send an additional written sample, such as a conference paper, a dissertation chapter, or a publication (optional). The application must be sent by e-mail to ukrainesummerschool@gmail.com, by 1 April 2017.
See Archives
“Borders in the Post-Socialist Space: Past, Present, Future”
Chernivtsi (Ukraine), 3-9 July 2015
“Embracing the City”
Lviv (Ukraine), 1-8 July 2014
“Soviet Legacies and post-Soviet Practices: Economics, Politics, and Everyday life”
Ostroh (Ukraine), 4-10 July 2011