Deadline: January 18, 2026
Dates and Location: June 29-July 8, 2026, Gyumri, Armenia
“Constructing Soviet Difference: Culture and Society” continues the summer school series
“Societies and Cultures Torn Apart”, started in 2024. The 2026 summer school will focus on the
ways in which, across the Soviet century, categories of difference were conceptualized, in
different realms and through different practices, and how the legacies of those ideas and
modalities continue to resonate today. It will explore Sovietness as a capacious category,
experienced in different ways in different places. With contributions from across disciplines and
areas, we will consider issues such as the following.
How the conception of being Soviet depended on ideas of distinction from other social,
political, national, and moral modalities? How it was manifested in searches for alternative
ways of living across diverse fields in order to correspond to the Soviet ideal? How it navigated,
affirmed and/or denied ethnic and national difference in relations across the Soviet Union’s
republics, and across global borders in networks of international socialism? How groups and/or
individuals carve(d) out their own modes of distinction—against or within the Soviet
project—using a range of mechanisms and definitions? The role of culture(s) in modelling
Soviet distinctiveness and in maintaining or challenging categories of difference.
Applications are now open! To learn more about the summer school’s program, thematic
sections, list of instructors, and scholarship opportunities, visit the summer school website:
https://summerschool.yerevancenter.org/