Spatial Turns in Ukrainian Studies

International Ukrainian studies are currently evolving amid simultaneous challenges. In different countries outside of Ukraine, establishment of new institutions and networking initiatives has significantly boosted research on Ukraine across various academic disciplines. 

The result is the growing visibility of Ukrainian studies in the media, which remains particularly important during the Russian war against Ukraine. This development has also shaped the expertise influencing state policies and rapid changes in international politics and has had an impact on societal reflection on attitudes towards the war. At the same time, Ukrainian studies are developing in close contact with scholars in and from Ukraine while ongoing discussions about area studies are affecting the issue. 

The conference will highlight case studies on knowledge production about Ukraine during wartime in connection with the field’s own processes of self-reflection. 

At the Annual Conference of “Denkraum Ukraine”, marking two years since its establishment, over 30 participants from Ukraine, Germany, Canada, Hungary, Italy, Norway, Poland, Romania, Sweden, Switzerland, and the Czech Republic will address these challenges across the following thematic panels and roundtable discussions:

• the Construction of the Field: Intellectual Biographies in Ukrainian Studies
• Conflict and Regional Entanglement in Black Sea Studies
• Regions in Conflict and Entanglement: Carpathian Ukraine, Hungary and Ukraine
• War and Knowledge Production on Ukraine
• the Future of Minority Studies
• Knowledge Transfer about Ukraine: Successes and Failures
• Ukrainian Studies in International Dialogue

Organized by “Denkraum Ukraine” / “Think Space Ukraine” at the University of Regensburg, financed by the DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service) through the funds from the Federal Foreign Office (AA), Leibniz Institute for East and Southeast European Studies (IOS).