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Heidelberg, 22. - 23. Januar 2026

Programm

(Re)labelling Queerness after Socialism 

International workshop, Heidelberg University (Germany) 

November 25-27, 2026

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Auch im Wintersemester 2025/26 findet wieder unser Forschungskolloquium zur Osteuropäischen Geschichte statt, zu dem wir alle Interessierten ganz herzlich einladen möchten! 

Das breit gefächerte Programm umfasst Vorträge zu Gesellschaft, Genozid, Herrschaft, Migration, Wissenschaft und weiteren Themen in verschiedenen Regionen Osteuropas.

Weitere Details zu Terminen, Vortragenden und Vortragstiteln finden Sie auf dem Plakat. Über kurzfristige Änderungen informieren wir auf Facebook und Instagram.

Das Kolloquium findet wie gewohnt dienstags um 18:00 Uhr c.t. im Übungsraum II des Historischen Seminars statt. Wir freuen uns auf zahlreiche Zuhörer:innen und Diskussionsteilnehmer:innen!

Twin workshops in Lüneburg (17-18 September 2026) and Helsinki (29-30 April 2027)

Workshop 1: IKGN, Lüneburg, Germany, 17-18 September 2026

Religion in Motion:  Multi-level entanglements between USSR and Germany

Workshop 2: MWF Helsinki, Finland, 29-30 April 2027

Religious actors amid radical transformations in the Soviet Republics

Submission deadline: 31 January 2026

Perestroika reconfigured the religious field across the USSR and beyond. Policy shifts under Gorbachev – on vivid display during the 1988 Millennium of the Baptism of Rus’ and later legally fixed in the 1990 Law on freedom of faith – opened space for religion while exposing deep divisions about its place in Soviet society and history. Equally important, but hitherto little explored is the fact that borders became more permeable, both toward the West and within the socialist bloc. This produced a multi-faceted space for exchange, transfer, transcultural impact, self-representation and competition. Transformations affected the religious field at every level: from the top of the socialist state to the grass-roots levels of society, but also horizontally, in the centers, regions and peripheries of the USSR and across the hitherto restrictive borders. Representatives of émigré churches re-entered the scene with distinct agendas; the official, but hitherto subdued, church (ROC) tested new forms of publicity and self-promotion at home and abroad; local authorities experimented with notions of “national” religion; Western missionaries pursued “mission on red territory;” new forms of religious tourism emerged, and churches acted on the moving diplomatic floor, assuming relevant roles in states and societies across the ‘Socialist Bloc’. Memory politics changed rapidly, with public narratives about victims of the Soviet regime and the creation of a new pantheon of martyrs. A swift expansion of publishing, seminaries, translations, student exchanges, missions and branch offices, humanitarian relief, and even the antiquities trade reshaped infrastructures. Besides, changing emigration rules – affecting Jews, ‘Russian Germans,’ and other groups – radically altered local communities within the disintegrating Soviet Union and created new trends and communities of former Soviet citizens worldwide.

All these phenomena occurred simultaneously and impacted each other in a transnational dimension. They require further investigation while existing research findings await a comprehensive discussion in a focused scientific setting. We want to offer such a setting in two interdisciplinary workshops, the first taking place at Nordost-Institut (IKGN e.V.) in Lüneburg in September 2026, the second at Max Weber Forum (Max Weber Network Eastern Europe), Helsinki, in April 2027.

The first workshop is designed to specifically address entanglements of religious relations, including religious PR, mobility, and networks of religious actors during perestroika and early transformation. This workshop concentrates on relations between the USSR and Germany, both in their bilateral dimensions and their embeddedness in broader, global structures, due to the participation of involved actors from other countries and continents. We look for evidence on brokers and gatekeepers, linking religious and other actors in different republics of the USSR with Germany, for example in the form of support projects and aid campaigns. We presume that there were actors from all segments of state and society – political and religious hierarchies, religious and administrative practitioners, but also ‘ordinary’ people, who became interested and engaged under the new political circumstances.

The second workshop shifts its focus more on developments within the republics of the USSR, especially regarding the transformations of law, religious relations across different Soviet republics, and cases of state–religion governance. One aim is to explore how the legal announcement of religious freedom was perceived and processed by the actors; how it was understood both in the sense of a new pressure to act, even a threat, but also as the hitherto unknown opportunity for self-realization and the emergence of “traditional religions” and “national churches”.

We welcome proposals that explore the entangled history of religion during perestroika from the perspectives of history, religious studies, and anthropology. We are especially interested in source-based case studies that uncover how people, texts, funds, artifacts, and norms moved across the “Iron Curtain” and circulated within the diverse and multifaceted Soviet Union. While work on Orthodox and Catholic contexts is welcome, we especially seek contributions on initiatives from EKD milieus, free evangelical communities, and the often-overlooked Islamic, Jewish, Buddhist, and neo-pagan settings.

We are particularly interested in research that addresses:

• grassroots and regional (provincial) initiatives, especially in the republics of Central Asia and the Baltic states, as well as in the Far East, the Caucasus, and other regions;
• sensitivity to gender aspects, with special attention to hidden or overlooked women’s roles;
• religious or spiritually based humanitarian, educational, artistic, and ecological initiatives.

Please indicate which of the two workshops you would like to participate in and submit a paper proposal (400 words) along with a short CV (including current affiliation and contact details) by 31 January 2026 to Nadezhda.Beliakova@uni-bielefeld.de and Franziska.Schedewie@zegk.uni-heidelberg.de

Applicants will be informed of the acceptance of their proposal by 28 February 2026.

The working language of the workshops will be English. A publication of contributions is planned.

The workshops are organized by Nadezhda Beliakova (University of Bielefeld) and Franziska Schedewie (University of Heidelberg) in cooperation with Nordost-Institut – IKGN e.V. (Lüneburg) and Max Weber Forum Helsinki and funded by Nordost-Institut – IKGN e.V. (Workshop 1), Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft – DFG, and Max Weber Network Eastern Europe (Workshop 2).

The organizers will provide accommodation in Lüneburg (for Workshop 1) and Helsinki (for Workshop 2) for the duration of each workshop. Travel costs will be reimbursed after the workshop depending on budget availability with early career researchers, participants from post-Soviet states (excluding Russia and Belarus) and scholars in exile taking precedence.

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