KFG conference | Diasporas, Exile Scholars and Knowledge Production in Area Studies (20–21 April 2026)

Date: April 20–21, 2026

Location: German Historical Institute, Warsaw

Organized by: Alexander Libman, Magdalena Sariusz-Wolska, Martin Schulze Wessel, Kai Willms (in cooperation with the German Historical Institute Warsaw)

Area studies emerged as a project to research distant societies from an outside perspective – Europeans attempted to describe the peoples and cultures of the East and South using a language they had developed themselves. This perspective was essential for the ideological construction of the West – at the same time, it was rightly criticized for imposing Western concepts, prejudices, and ideas on the non-Western world. Essentially, it is claimed that at least part of area studies says more about the West than about the societies they are supposed to be studying. The dialogue between Western area studies scholars and intellectuals and scientists from the countries of their research has never been an easy one.

The goal of the proposed conference is to draw attention to an actor, which in many cases played a crucial role in this dialogue, but requires more careful scholarly investigation – academic diasporas. The role of scholars ‘from the region’ – in their different roles and positions from those of exile scientists forced to leave their countries to emigrants interested in embracing access to Western academia – in the development of different area studies communities in different countries of Europe and the US has been strikingly different as well. In some cases, diasporas played the key role for development of area studies, shaping concepts, methods and even mental maps of the regions. In other cases, diaspora has taken the position of a fierce critique of the Western area studies – both of their own country and of other countries (e.g., the criticism of many Central European intellectuals of the Russia studies). Individual scholars of what one can refer to as ‘diaspora’ take very different positions and pursue different strategies in this context.

 

Programme:

Monday – 20 April 2026

09:00 – 09:30

Welcome and Opening Remarks: Martin Schulze Wessel (Munich), Kai Willms (Basel)

 

09:30 – 11:35

Panel 1: Russian Perspectives

Chair: Anton Liavitski (Munich)

Alexander Dmitriev (Prague)

Dmytro Chizhevsky and Roman Jakobson in European and Global Slavic Studies (1926–1945–1968)

Andrej Yakovlev (Berlin)

The Role of the Russian Academic Diaspora: Before and After 2022

Ivan Boldyrev (Nijmegen)

Mapping The Diaspora of Russian Economists: Preliminary Thoughts

Julia Sineokaya (Paris)

Russian Studies: The Impact of the Invasion of Ukraine

Commentary: Jan Musekamp (Warsaw)

Discussion

 

11:55 – 13:45

Panel 2: Caucasus Perspectives

Chair: Michal Kopeček (Vienna)

Giorgi Meladze (Berlin)

Exile Academics and the Circulation of Knowledge: Between Participation and Exclusion

Arpine Maniero (Munich)

Armenian Studies Between Diaspora and Armenia: Knowledge Production, Politics, and National Narratives

Zaur Gasimov (Bonn)

Co-Shaping an Area Studies: Polish Turkology in the Twentieth Century

Commentary: Guram Kvaratskhelia (Berlin)

Discussion

 

15:15 – 17:05

Panel 3: Ukrainian Perspectives

Chair: Dorothee Bohle (Vienna)

Ostap Sereda (Lviv/Berlin)

Between American Academia and Ukrainian Émigré Community: Ukrainian Studies at Harvard and the Changing Framework of East European Historical Studies

Maria Kovalchuk (Munich)

A Man Who Foresaw the Collapse of the Soviet Union: Roman Szporluk and His Contributions to Area Studies and the Theory of Nationalism

Oleksandr Avramchuk (Warsaw)

The Ukrainian Contribution to Cold War Area Studies on the Soviet Union: The Munich Institute as a Case Study

Commentary: Tomasz Hen-Konarski (Warsaw)

Discussion

 

Tuesday – 21 April 2026

09:00 – 11:05

Panel 4: Polish Perspectives

Chair: Magdalena Saryusz-Wolska (Warsaw)

Kai Willms (Basel)

Opportunities and Challenges of East–West Knowledge Transfers: The Case of Cold War Polish Émigré Scholars in the United States

Sławomir Łukasiewicz (Lublin)

Sovietologists From Poland and Their Cold War Networks

Beata Halicka (Poznań)

Exile, Gender and Knowledge Production: Polish Scholars in Postwar American Academia

Commentary: Claudia Kraft (Vienna)

Discussion

 

11:10 – 13:00

Final Discussion

Introducing Remarks: Alexander Libman (Berlin)