Russian Language & Area Studies at St. Olaf

Tag: RUSSN 330

  • Queer Russian Literature Undergraduate Conference

    On Saturday, December 6th, the Russian Language and Area Studies department hosted the first Queer Russian Literature Undergraduate Conference at St. Olaf.

    The event consisted of two student panels followed by a keynote from Katharina Wiedlack (University of Vienna).

    Six amazing students from Prof. Dossi’s Queer Russian Literature (RUSSN 330) delivered presentations on a variety of queer Russophone authors, some of whom you might not know, but many more that you will want to discover! After the panels, Katharina Wiedlack delivered her keynote address, titled “New Cold War Cultures and Russian Vulnerable Subjects.” The presentations and keynote were followed by a small reception catered by Tasteful Delights.

    Panel 1

    Maggie Walker “Mikhail Kuzmin’s Wings: A Platonic Fable”
    Parker Chelikowsky “Pederasty and Mikhail Kuzmin’s Wings“
    Maria Leyva “Having an Idol Doesn’t Always End Well: Sergei Esenin and His Followers”
    Panel discussion

    Panel 2

    Emily Kleiber “From Fantasy to Reality: The Collapse of Queer Desire in Marina Tsvetaeva’s Letter to the Amazon“
    Cayla Chun “Queerness is Russian: Aesthetic Revolt from Modernism to the 1990s”
    Panel discussion

    Yaz T. delivered a talk entitled “Цветы и Шпаги: Dichotomy of Gender in Marina Tsvetaeva’s work.” We won’t post a picture of Yaz to protect their anonymity.

    Keynote