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The next seminar from the INIMKOND series will take place on Tuesday at 18.00 and it will feature Prof. Mihhail Lotman who will talk on "Towards the semiotics of space: the case of Russia".

Join us in Room S-240 and for dinner afterwards.

ABSTRACT:

The paper will treat the problems of construction of Russian identity from the 19th century until the beginning of the 21st century. The ideological, historical-philosophical (historiosophical) and discursive practices will be observed.

1. In the first quarter of the 19th century an understanding about the singularity of Russia and its unique way evolved. The details and assessments could be rather different, even opposite: a) Russia is a blessed country, Russian nation is a godbearing nation (narod bogonosec), Russia’s mission is to bring light to other countries and nations; b) Russia is a damned place, Russian nation has fallen out of history, the only thing that is left is to learn from others (in this construction usually Europe is meant by the „others“).
2. At any rate an understanding that Russian identity is not something empirically given, known thing, but unknown, something which either existed in the past and is lost now or something which is yet to be found. Especially interesting here was the position of the so-called archaists which can be formulated in this way: Russian identity is in the past but this past is yet to be created. This paradoxical construction turned out to be quite enduring and occurs also in contemporary nationalists. 
3. The projection of future to the past and past to the future is one of the main methods of construction Russian identity through times, but it is not the only mechanism. Not less important is another: construction of „itself“ in opposition with „others“. But “the other“ is also not empirically given, but it is yet to be constructed. In developing “the other“ the main construction is not temporal, but spacial: “the other“ is either West or East. Here as well the main logic of constructing ideologemes is reflective: “West“/“East“ is anti „our“, while „we“ are anti „West“/“ East“. In essence, „East“ and „West“ are constructed with completely different models. 
4. While it is hard to find any development in conceptual schemes (the details are specified, additional particulars are added, but the logic remains the same), then clear development can be spotted in the discursive sphere. In the 19th century the main emphasis was on ideological constructions which had pretensions to the empirical correspondence. In the end of the 19th century – the beginning of the 20th century ideology was replaced by historiosophy. Here the opposite poles are marked by Vladimir Solovyov’s panmongolism (East is the absolute enemy, the evil of which has transcendent sources) and Eurasiatism, where the position of the absolute enemy belongs to West, while the ideal of Russia is the empire of Genghis-khan. In Post Soviet times a new tendency evolved: the objects of construction are not ideologemes or philosophemes, but the discourses themselves.