Kommission Kulturelle Kontexte des östlichen Europa in der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Empirische Kulturwissenschaft e. V. (KKKöE) -
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Mobilisation and Community Formation in Minority and Diaspora Contexts: The “We” in Central and Eastern Europe
30.09.–02.10.2026 ǀ Freiburg (Breisgau)

Interdisciplinary conference organised by the Institute for Cultural Analysis of the Germans of Eastern Europe (IKDE), Freiburg, in collaboration with the Institute for Cultural Analysis and European Ethnology at the University of Freiburg.

Why “We”?

The word ‘we’ marks a clear distinction, creating an ‘inside’ and an ‘outside’. Belonging to a certain group is a marker of assurance and identification, perhaps even a necessity for navigating everyday life. Nevertheless, it is challenging to define precisely the conditions under which a sense of community emerges and those under which it becomes fragile, in particular, when ‘we’ are faced with crisis situations.

The concept of ‘we’ can unite, but it can also divide, creating oppositions and frontiers; it possesses a compelling power that has historically made it attractive to totalitarian regimes, yet it also serves a valuable purpose when it comes to shared cultural heritage and memory culture projects.

With regard to minority and diaspora contexts, multiethnic regions and migration societies, questions therefore arise concerning the mobilisation and formation of groups, the negotiation of belonging, and the emergence of (unexpected) alliances. The focus here is on various aspects of ‘we’ in and from Eastern Europe, subjected to analytical scrutiny through interdisciplinary discussion.

Throughout the conference, we will thus examine these processes, their narratives and representations in terms of their entangled trajectories and dynamics.

Programme

IKDE Programme Annual Conference 2026

The annual conference is open to the public.

Venue
Conference Room
Freiburg University Library
Platz der Universität 2
79098 Freiburg

Contact
Institute for Cultural Analysis of the Germans
of Eastern Europe (IKDE)
Goethestraße 63
79100 Freiburg
+49 (0)761 70443-0
Poststelle@ikde.bwl.de

_____________________

See also: Call for Papers (pdf, en)

PROTEST!
Expression, Organization and Impact in a Central and Eastern European Perspective

Organizers
Paulina Gulińska-Jurgiel
Jörg Hackmann
Piotr Kocyba
Grzegorz Piotrowski
Ira Spieker (ISGV)

Johann Gottfried Herder-Research Council and European Solidarity Centre, Gdańsk

Venue
Europejskie Centrum Solidarność, Gdańsk / European Solidarity Centre, Gdańsk
NOMUS - New Art Museum, Gdańsk

Date
22 to 24 June 2026

Contact
protest2026@isgv.de

Individuals and groups respond to perceived injustices and grievances with protest. The forms of expression are diverse and interact with the conditions defined by social and political opportunity structures. Protest is a central instrument of social negotiation processes related to participation and co-determination. It thrives on publicity and attention, yet it is – especially in authoritarian contexts – often accompanied by less visible practices of resistance that take place in everyday life or in subversive, hidden forms.

Protest manifests itself not only in rallies and marches but also in artistic forms of expression: in the visual arts, in literature, and in performance. Numerous narratives refer to the evaluation and appropriation of rebellious behaviour.

The conference aims to focus on various forms of protest and resistance, their structural conditions and consequences, as well as their (current and retrospective) legitimization vs. condemnation. While protest is a global phenomenon, we are focusing on contributions that explore its manifestations in Central and Eastern Europe across different historical periods (from the early modern era to the present).

The event is interdisciplinary in nature, as is the topic itself, and encompasses the disciplines of history, political science, cultural anthropology, sociology, literary studies, musicology, or art history.

Programme

Download programme
Registration: https://conf.isgv.de/conftool/

Trauma im östlichen Europa – Begriff, Erfahrung, Gedächtnis in Ethnografie und historischer Anthropologie / Trauma in Eastern Europe – Concept, Experience, Memory in Ethnography and Historical Anthropology
12.–13. Juni 2026 ǀ Graz, Österreich

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Veranstaltet von:

• Institut für Kulturanthropologie und Europäische Ethnologie der Universität Graz
• Arbeitsbereich Südosteuropäische Geschichte und Anthropologie am Institut für Geschichte der Universität Graz
• Kommission für Kulturelle Kontexte des östlichen Europas in der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Empirische Kulturwissenschaft
• Johann Gottfried Herder-Forschungsrat

Trauma in Eastern Europe – Concept, Experience, Memory in Ethnography and Historical Anthropology
Conference on 12 and 13 June 2026 at the University of Graz, Austria

Organised by:

• Department of Cultural Anthropology and European Ethnology at the University of Graz
• Section Southeast European History and Anthropology at the Department of History of the University of Graz
• Commission Cultural Contexts of Eastern Europe in the German Society for Empirical Cultural Studies
• Expert Commission for Empirical Cultural Studies in the Johann Gottfried Herder Research Council

Both historically and today, the societies of Eastern Europe have been shaped in many ways by political and social violence, by war and genocide, expulsion, and persecution. Especially from a Western perspective, these experiences have increasingly been framed in terms of collective or individual trauma.

The interdisciplinary conference seeks to shift perspectives in three interrelated areas of ethnographic, historical-anthropological, and ethno-psychoanalytic research. The contributions

• reflect on concepts of the traumatic in both historical and contemporary Eastern European contexts,
• they broaden and problematize the methodological repertoire of ethnography by incorporating subject-oriented research with and about people who have experienced violence in Eastern European settings,
• and they investigate the places, resonances, and practices of traumatic collective memories.

Conference lectures and discussions are held in English language.

Time:

The conference begins in June 12, 2026 at 2 p.n. and finishes on June 13, 2026, at 6 p.m.

Location:
University of Graz – Jesuitenrefektorium am Rosenhain
Aigner-Rollett-Allee 39, 8010 Graz, Austria

Contact, information, registration:
Institut für Kulturanthropologie und Europäische Ethnologie der Universität Graz
Attemsgasse 25/I, 8010 Graz, Austria
E-Mail: projekt.kulturanthropologie@uni-graz.at
Internet: https://kulturanthropologie.uni-graz.at/de/neuigkeiten/conference-trauma-in-eastern-europe/

Programme

Friday, 12 June 2026
Location: Aigner-Rollett-Allee 39, 8010 Graz (SR 120.12)

14.00 – 14.30 Welcome and introduction

14.30 – 15.15 Keynote

Linda Mëniku & Eglantina Zyka (Tirana, Albania):

Trauma and Migration: Narratives of Shock, Loss, and Adaptation Among Albanian Diasporas

15.15 – 16.20 Borders

Alexandru D. Aioanei (Iasi, Romania):
The Memory of Trauma on the Former Romanian–Soviet Border

Manca Švara, Martina Tonet & Daniel Wutti
(Koper, Slovenia/Klagenfurt, Austria):
Trauma, Remembrance, Resilience and Reconciliation

16.20 – 16.40 Coffee Break

16.40 – 18.30 Places

Sandra Kreisslová & Jana Nosková (Brno/Prague, Czech Republic):
Trauma-heritage in the post-Sudeten space: reconstruction of a German cemetery as a field of memory negotiations

Dušan Medin (Podgorica, Montenegro):
Between Silence and Memorialisation: Dissonant Heritage of the Yugoslav Wars in Montenegro Domestic Archives of Memory: Everyday Mnemonic Practices and Intergenerational Negotiations of Home in Post-war Bosnia

Sanda Üllen (Vienna, Austria):
Domestic Archives of Memory: Everyday Mnemonic Practices and Intergenerational Negotiations of Home in Post-war Bosnia

20.00 Communal Dinner

Saturday, 13 June 2026
Location: Aigner-Rollett-Allee 39, 8010 Graz (SR 120.12)

08.30 – 09.00 Arriving

09.00 – 09.45 Keynote

Hariz Halilovich (Melbourne, Australia):

Afterlives of the missing: Trauma, translocal memory and the politics of absence in post-genocide societies

09.45 – 11.35 Emotion and Ethnographic Resonances I

Katharina Eisch-Angus (Graz, Austria):
Borderlands silently speaking. Traumatic landscapes, past entanglements and the timeless recurrence of European war memory – and the ethnographic experience thereof

Olivia Anna Rachwol Hansson (Tübingen, Germany):
Postmemory as Method: Collective Trauma, “Halfieness”, and Ethnography Among the Polish (Far) Right

Alla Koval (Berlin, Germany):
Researching Trauma and Forced Migration: Emotional Resonance and Researcher Self-Care

11.35 – 12.00 Coffee Break

12.00 – 13.15 Embodied Trauma

Miruna Butnaru-Troncotă & Teofana Cepoi (Bucharest, Romania):
Silenced Wounds: Gendered Violence and the Politics of Memory in Postwar Bosnia-Herzegovina

Ioana Elena Urda (Timisoara, Rumania):
Renegotiating trauma representation on stage

13.15 – 14.30 Lunch (on site)

14.30 – 16.20 Emotion and Ethnographic Resonances II

Jaroslav Klepal (Prague, Czech Republic):
Between Affect and Solidarity: On the Ethnography of PTSD and Veteranhood in Bosnia and Herzegovina

Johanna Muckenhuber & Jolana Wagner-Skacel (Graz, Austria):
Understanding Transgenerational Trauma: Combining Autoethnographic and Ethnopsychoanalytic Approaches to the Study of the Long-Term Impact of Trauma

Christina Sterniša (Graz, Austria):
Naming the Dead: Gender, Necropolitics and Mourning Practices in Postwar Greece

16.20 – 16.30 Coffee Break

16.30 – 17.45 Multimodal Memories

Felicitas Auersperg & Anna Schor-Tschudnowskaja (Vienna, Austria):
How traumatic experiences are interpreted in the light of political culture

Bogdan Trifunović (Čačak, Serbia):
Digitizing Trauma in the Western Balkans: Memory Institutions and Genocide Narratives

17.45 – 18.00 Conclusion

Programme as PDF

See also: Call for Papers (en)