International Conference

B I O G R A P H I E S A N D T H E D I V I S I O N O F E U R O P E

BERLIN, 17 - 20 FEBRUARY, 1999

The Institute of Social Sciences at the Technical University of Berlin is pleased to announce the International conference 'Biographiesand the Division of Europe', which is organised in co-operation with the 'Sektion Biographieforschung der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Soziologie' (Section of Biographical Research in the German Sociological Association).

The conference will be held in English.

I S S U E S

As a result of World War II a historical new division between the 'East' and the 'West' of Europe was created. In this process a polarising re-structuration of societies on both sides of the "Iron Curtain" took place. In consequence lifeworlds, biographies and public discourse developed differently on the two sides of the system border. After 1989 a new period of transition started, affecting biographical orientations, familiy life, milieus, generational and gender relations. At present this process is taking place more dramatically in the societies of the former East-European countries than in the Western part. The conference will largely concentrate on topics from these countries.

The purpose is to deal with the following questions:

• What impact did and still does the violent division of Europe have on biographies and in families over more generations?
• In what way was the constitution of state communist societies interwoven with the emergence of specific biographical patterns?
• How did relations to "others" develop?
• How was migration and living between the systems experienced?
• What changes and biographical re-orientations are connected with the transition of postcommunist societies after 1989?

P R O G R A M M E

W E D N E S D A Y, February 17, 1999

19.00 Welcome and Registration

'Ernst-Reuter-Haus', Straße des 17. Juni 112, 10587 Berlin

T H U R S D A Y, February 18, 1999

9.00 OPENING of the Conference

Wolfram Fischer-Rosenthal, Institut fuer Sozialwissenschaften TU

Roswitha Breckner, Organising Committee

Introduction: Ursula Apitzsch, Sektion Biographieforschung

9.40 - 12.00 PLENARY

Wolfram Fischer-Rosenthal (Berlin):
Biographies in European Modernity

Erhard Stoelting (Potsdam):
The "East" of Europe - A Historical Construction

12.15 - 13.00 2 parallel Sessions

SESSION 1:

TO LIVE IN STATE COMMUNIST SOCIETIES AND WITH THEIR BORDERS. BIOGRAPHIES IN TENSION BETWEEN PERSON-MILIEU-STATE

Zdzislaw Krasnodebski (Bremen):

Political Biographies in Poland and Germany - a Comparison

SESSION 2:

TO LIVE WITH 'OTHERS': DRAWING UP, CROSSING, CHANGING AND DISSOLVING FRONTIERS IN AND BETWEEN ETHNICAL AND CULTURAL MILIEUS

Yvonne Schuetze (Berlin):

"We are similar in the sense that we are different". Social Relations between Russian Jewish Migrants and the Host Society. A Comparison between Germany and Israel

13.00 - 15.00 Lunch

15.00-18.00 Continuing 2 parallel Sessions

SESSION 1:

Helena Flam (Leipzig):
Regime-related Anxieties of the East German and Polish Bystanders

Zdenek Konopasek (Prague):
What Made State Socialism Durable? The Constitution of Political Power Based on the Pursuit of Biographical Projects in Every Day Life

Petar Vodenicharov (Blageovgrad, Bulgaria):
Communist Modernisation and the Constitution of New Publicity. Gender and Age Identities

Dorothee Wierling (Berlin):
Parents and Politics. Childhood in the German Democratic Republic in the 1950s

Ina Dietzsch (Potsdam):
The Construction of the Border Between East and West Germany in "Bowing Letters"

Vera Sparschuh (Berlin):
The Biography of the Biographers. Some Remarks Concerning the History of the Social Sciences in East Germany

SESSION 2:

Ingrid Oswald & Viktor Voronkow (Magdeburg, St. Petersburg):
Tricky Hermeneutics. About Understanding the Other in German-Russian Research

Laszlo Kurti (Miskolc, Hungary):
From Darkest Transylvania to Window Socialism: Romania and Hungary in the Western Imagination

Eva Kovacs (Budapest):
State Border and Identity in Eastern Europe. A Case Analysis

Susana Kus=E1 (Bratislava):

"We and Others". Divisions in Family History Narratives from an Ethnically Mixed Village

Julia Vajda (Budapest):
Dividing Experiences in a Catholic-Jewish Family

F R I D A Y, February 19, 1999

9.00 PLENARY

Gabriele Rosenthal (Kassel):
WW II: Transgenerational Transmission of Violence and Trauma

10.00 Coffee Break

10.30 - 13.00 3 parallel Sessions

SESSION 3:

HISTORICAL AND PRESENT TIME HORIZON OF DIVISION. CONSEQUENCES OF WAR, PERSECUTION, AND EXTERMINATION IN EASTERN EUROPE

Shimon Redlich (Beer Sheva, Israel):
Memories of War and Holocaust: Jews, Poles and Ukrainians from a Town in Eastern Galicia

Eva Bruecker (Oranienburg):
Living with Concentration Camp Memories. Biographies of Ukrainian Survivors of Sachsenhausen

Bettina Voelter (Berlin):
Biographical Work in Families of Jewish Emigrants who returned to the German Democratic Republic

Kaja Kazmierska (Lodz):
Polish - German Relationships Based on Eastern Border Polish Narratives on the Experiences of World War II

SESSION 4:

TO LIVE BETWEEN THE SYSTEMS: REFUGE, EXILE, MIGRATION

Mirjana Morokvasic (Paris):
Escaping Nationalism and Violence in the Post-Yugoslav Space

Lena Inowlocki (Frankfurt):
Representations of the Old World in New World Traditionality: Families of Jewish Displaced Persons

Mihai D. Gheorghiu (Paris/Iasi):
The Biographical and Generational Constitution of the Romanian Exile after 1945 and its Influence on the National Elite after 1989

Roswitha Breckner (Halle/Berlin):
The Meaning of the "Iron Curtain" in East - West Migration Biographies

SESSION 1 Continuing

Kristina Popova (Blageovgrad, Bulgaria):
Ideology and Faith in Generational Relations According to Autobiographical Memories in Bulgaria

Heinz-Gerd Hofschen (Bremen):
Persistence and Transformation of Working Class Milieus in the 1950s. A Comparison between the GDR and FRG

Ingrid Miethe (Berlin):
Political Activities of Women in the German Democratic Republic Opposition and their Family Context

Wolfgang Heuer (Berlin):
The Emergence of Civil Courage

13.00 - 15.00: Lunch

15.00-18.00: 2 parallel Sessions

SESSION 5:

PROCESSES OF BIOGRAPHICAL RE-ORIENTATION IN THE WAKE OF DISSOLVING STATE SOCIALIST SOCIETIES

Viktoria Semjonova (Moscow):
The Message from the Past. Experiences of Suffering Passed Through Generations

Mihaela Miroiu (Bucharest):
Between Autobiography and CV

Ulrike Nagel (Jena):
Manager Biographies. Economic Rationality and Biographical Transformation

Victor Susak (Lviv):
Prefiguration, Configuration, and Refiguration of Leaders in Post-Soviet Ukraine

Simone Kreher (Berlin):
Do We Live with the Myth of Biographical Re-Orientation?

SESSION 6:

TRANSFORMING GENDER RELATIONS

Elena Meshcherkina (Moscow):
The Virtualisation of Female and Male Biographies as Strategy of Adoption. The Situation in Post-Soviet Russia

Elena Zdravomyslova (St. Petersburg):
A Script of Today's Russian Feminist Biography

Eva Schaefer (Berlin):
Broken Continuities? The Changing Meaning of Gender in East German Women's Lives

Pavla Frydlova and Jana Hradilkova (Prague):
Women's Memories: Searching for Identity within Socialism

Marina Beyer (Berlin):
Women's Lives in the German Democratic Republic: The First Generation (Aufbaugeneration)

S A T U R D A Y, February 20, 1999

9.00 - 12.30 PLENARY

Ilja Srubar (Erlangen):
The Structure of Lifeworld and Transformation of Everyday Fields of Action

Coffee Break

Conference Observations

Devorah Kalekin Fishman (Haifa, Israel):
Looking on Europe from an Outside - Perspective

12.30 FAREWELL AND END OF THE CONFERENCE

ORGANISING COMMITTEE:

Prof. Dr. Wolfram Fischer-Rosenthal, Technische Universitaet Berlin
Roswitha Breckner, Martin-Luther Universitaet Halle-Wittenberg
Bettina Völter, Technische Universitaet Berlin
Ingrid Miethe, Freie Universitaet Berlin

CONTACT:

Roswitha Breckner
Universitaet Halle-Wittenberg
Institut für Paedagogik
Franckeplatz 1
06110 Halle (Saale), Germany
phone +49 (0)345 5523825, and +49 (0)30 7844349
fax +49 (3)345 5527574, and +49 (0)30 78704516
e-mail: r_breckner@csi.com

REGISTRATION FEES:
until January 15, 1999: 90,- DM / 40,- DM reduced
after January 15, 1999: 120,- DM / 50,- DM reduced

The conference is sponsored by:

'Bundeszentrale fuer Politische Bildung' 'Friedrich-Ebert Stiftung'

R E G I S T R A T I O N F O R M

please address to:

Prof. Dr. Wolfram Fischer-Rosenthal
Technische Universitaet Berlin
Institut für Sozialwissenschaften
Franklinstr. 28/29, FR 2-5
10823 Berlin, Germany

registration by e-mail and fax accepted:
fax: +49 (0)30 314-79494
e-mail: firo0733@mailszrz.zrz.tu-berlin.de

To book your place on the conference "Biographies and the Division of Europe", TU Berlin (17 - 20 February 1999), please return this form, together with the registration fee of

__ 90,- DM / __ 40,- DM* (until January 15, 1999)

__ 110,- DM / __ 50,- DM* (after January 15, 1999)

It is payable either by cheque or by transferring to the account:
Breckner (Conference), Berliner Sparkasse, BLZ: 100 500 00 Account #: 1130153580

Name: _______________________________

Address: _______________________________

_______________________________

Signature: _______________________________

* reduced fees are available for students, unemployed and participants from central-eastern european countries

Quelle = Email <H-Soz-u-Kult>

From: Roswitha Breckner <r_breckner@csi.com>
Subject: Conference: Biographies and the Division of Europe
Date: 01.12.1998

Copyright ©1996-2002, H-Soz-u-Kult · Humanities · Sozial- und Kulturgeschichte

Termine 99