BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//Sabre//Sabre VObject 4.6.1//EN CALSCALE:GREGORIAN BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:Europe/Zurich X-LIC-LOCATION:Europe/Zurich TZURL:http://tzurl.org/zoneinfo/Europe/Zurich BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:+0100 TZOFFSETTO:+0200 TZNAME:CEST DTSTART:19810329T020000 RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;BYMONTH=3;BYDAY=-1SU END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:+0200 TZOFFSETTO:+0100 TZNAME:CET DTSTART:19961027T030000 RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;BYMONTH=10;BYDAY=-1SU END:STANDARD END:VTIMEZONE BEGIN:VEVENT UID:news797@osteuropa.philhist.unibas.ch DTSTAMP;TZID=Europe/Zurich:20260907T140437 DTSTART;TZID=Europe/Zurich:20260924T140000 SUMMARY:Conference "Living the Soviet Utopia: Cultural History of Technolog oies in Ukraine\, 1922-1991" DESCRIPTION:Rather than treating technology as a purely infrastructural or economic domain\, the conference approaches it as a cultural force that sh aped forms of knowledge\, social hierarchies\, and everyday life\, while s imultaneously being redefined through these very practices. Central to thi s framework are questions about how scientific knowledge and expert author ity were produced within specific institutional environments\, including c losed academic cities\, secrecy regimes\, and highly structured research i nfrastructures\, and how these conditions contributed to the formation of a distinct scientific intelligentsia. Equally important is the exploration of technology in everyday life: how industrial goods\, housing technologi es\, agricultural modernization\, and consumer technologies mediated daily routines\, aspirations\, and material cultures of Soviet citizens. The co nference further interrogates how infrastructures of modernization were ex perienced unevenly across space and social groups\, producing both visions of progress and persistent frictions of scarcity\, adaptation\, and infor mal practice. At the same time\, attention is given to the cultural imagin ation of technology in Soviet Ukraine\, including cybernetics and early no tions of artificial intelligence\, as well as to the ways in which technol ogical optimism and its limits were represented\, contested\, and reworked in cinema\, visual culture\, and artistic responses to industrialization and catastrophe. In this regard\, the Chernobyl disaster serves as a criti cal point of reflection on the fragility of technological utopianism and i ts environmental and social consequences.\\r\\nFor more information\, see the flyer [t3://file?uid=1197] below. X-ALT-DESC:

Rather than treating technology as a purely infrastructural o r economic domain\, the conference approaches it as a cultural force that shaped forms of knowledge\, social hierarchies\, and everyday life\, while simultaneously being redefined through these very practices. Central to t his framework are questions about how scientific knowledge and expert auth ority were produced within specific institutional environments\, including closed academic cities\, secrecy regimes\, and highly structured research infrastructures\, and how these conditions contributed to the formation o f a distinct scientific intelligentsia. Equally important is the explorati on of technology in everyday life: how industrial goods\, housing technolo gies\, agricultural modernization\, and consumer technologies mediated dai ly routines\, aspirations\, and material cultures of Soviet citizens. The conference further interrogates how infrastructures of modernization were experienced unevenly across space and social groups\, producing both visio ns of progress and persistent frictions of scarcity\, adaptation\, and inf ormal practice. At the same time\, attention is given to the cultural imag ination of technology in Soviet Ukraine\, including cybernetics and early notions of artificial intelligence\, as well as to the ways in which techn ological optimism and its limits were represented\, contested\, and rework ed in cinema\, visual culture\, and artistic responses to industrializatio n and catastrophe. In this regard\, the Chernobyl disaster serves as a cri tical point of reflection on the fragility of technological utopianism and its environmental and social consequences.

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For more information\, see the flyer below.

DTEND;TZID=Europe/Zurich:20260925T150000 END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR