Midwest Slavic Conference

Midwest Slavic Conference

General Information on the Conference

Each year the Midwest Slavic Association and CSEEES partner together to host the Midwest Slavic Conference. The conference has been held on the OSU campus since 2003 and is normally held in the spring. Participation is open to undergraduate and graduate students, faculty, and independent scholars from across the United States and abroad. Approximately 30 panels are held each year with over 250 attendees from institutions throughout the country and internationally. Conference events include a keynote address, reception, and panels covering film, political science, culture, history, linguistics, and many other disciplines that focus on all countries and regions of Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union.

Midwestern states map with superimposed photo of the Red Square.

Upcoming Conferences

2026 Midwest Slavic Conference

March 27-29, 2026 - Columbus, OH

Register for the Conference

2026 Conference Panel Schedule

The Midwest Slavic Association and The Ohio State University’s (OSU) Center for Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies (CSEEES) are pleased to announce the 2026 Midwest Slavic Conference to be held in-person in Columbus, OH, on March 27-29, 2026. The conference committee invites proposals for papers on all topics related to the Slavic, East European and Eurasian world, particularly those related to the theme of crisis and trauma. This year’s theme will delve into the lasting impact of trauma and the multifaceted and complex responses across Eastern Europe and Eurasia; examining how war, displacement, authoritarianism and cultural erasure have shaped collective memory, rebuilding and resilience. By highlighting voices from the post-Soviet space, the Balkans, the Caucasus and Central Asia, the conference invites scholars, artists and practitioners to explore how crisis and trauma are processed and transformed through community and social practices, literature and the arts, oral and material history, policy and more. Through interdisciplinary dialogue, this theme aims to foster critical reflection and creative inquiry into the politics, poetics, and lived experience of personal and communal damage that may forge a path toward recovery and fortitude or, alternatively, may resist such tidy narrative resolutions.

The conference will commence at 5:30PM on Friday with a keynote address by Dr. Jehanne Gheith (Duke U.). Building on the keynote address, a plenary panel will follow on Saturday morning. Panels by conference participants will then be held on Saturday from 10:30AM-4:45PM and Sunday from 8:30AM-11:45AM.

Abstract and Panel Submissions

Please note that under Ohio law SB1, papers and/or panels devoted specifically to issues of diversity, equity and inclusion are not permitted. For more information, please click here.

Please submit a one-paragraph abstract and C.V. in a combined, single PDF file using our submission portal by 11:59 PM EST on Friday, January 23rd. Undergraduate and graduate students are strongly encouraged to participate. Interdisciplinary work and pre-formed panels are encouraged. Proposals for individual papers are also welcome.

Registration is required to attend all conference events and activities. 

Deadlines

  • Abstract and C.V. Deadline: January 23, 2026
  • Notification of Acceptance: February 16, 2026
  • Scheduling Conflicts Due: February 19, 2026
  • Panels Announced: February 20, 2026
  • Registration Opens: February 24, 2026
  • Final Papers to Chair: March 20, 2026
  • Presenter Registration Deadline: March 24, 2026

Registration and Fees

Registration is REQUIRED to attend all conference events and activities. Registration will include entry to all conference panels as well as all special events listed in the Special Events section below. 

Attendance at the keynote is NOT included with registration and must be purchased separately.

Presenters

  • Students: $50*
  • Faculty/Independent Scholars: $75

General Attendees

  • Student Attendees: $25*
  • Non-Student Attendees: $35

Keynote Reception Fee

  • $30 per person

*Donated Registrations for Young Scholars of Slavic Studies

Want to support up and coming scholars in our field? This year we have created an option for faculty and independent scholars to donate conference registration(s) for undergraduate and graduate students who are participating as presenters or general attendees. This will allow students to enjoy the conference to the fullest extent.

Students who are interested in receiving a waiver code for donated registrations should email CSEEES at cseees@osu.edu after panels are announced on February 20. All students presenting or attending are welcome to request a waiver, no documentation is required to request one. Donated registrations will be available on a first come, first served basis.

Special Events: Friday, March 27

Opening Reception and Keynote Address with Dr. Jehanne Gheith (Duke U.)

Friday, March 27, OSU Faculty Club, Grand Lounge on the 1st Floor (181 S Oval Mall, Columbus, OH 43210) 

  • Opening Reception, 5:30PM-6:30PM
  • Keynote Address, 6:30PM-8:00PM

Attendance to the keynote is not included in the cost of conference registration and must be purchased separately. Attendance is $30 per person.

“It Could Happen Again”: Memory, Trauma, and Repair in and after the Gulag

In the 1990s, a time of relative openness and hope in Russia, Dmitrii Ivanovich, a Gulag survivor, would not speak off-script about his experiences, but instead read me a prepared statement. He would not answer questions, because, he said, “It [the camps] could happen again.” He was, of course, reading the situation with great accuracy. 

In my keynote, I will explore the narratives of three Gulag survivors in some depth: two who lived through the Gulag themselves, and one daughter of Gulag survivors. Traumatic experience demands some depth of exploration, but as I delve into these individual accounts, I will also suggest wider intergenerational effects of this traumatic experience.

It is critical that we understand that "trauma" is culturally informed and is not everywhere the same. For example, the public silence that surrounded the Gulag had both personal and societal effects for the experience and expression of trauma and affected/s the paths to repair. The repression of information around Gulag experience, also, as Nanci Adler and others have argued were essential to the formation and maintenance of state power in Russia. In a course that I taught last year with Anthropologist Michele Rivkin-Fish, on Memory, Trauma, and Healing, in which we explored the effects of traumatic experience in Ukraine/Russia and Palestine/Israel. Some of the materials we used and questions students raised, show the peculiar difficulties of understanding the long reach of trauma and I will bring some of those into this talk.

Finally, I will explore both the resilience of those who lived through the Gulag and the particular workings of this experience, that resist “closure”-which I see as its own kind of repair. I bring my experience both as a scholar of Russian culture and as a trauma-informed clinician to the talk. I also see this talk as interactive in the sense of sharing knowledge. The topic of the effects of trauma is timely and complex and it is vital for us to deepen our understandings of it through rich conversation.

Special Events: Saturday, March 28

Plenary Panel

8:30-10:15AM, Pfahl Hall, Blackwell Inn and Conference Center (2110 Tuttle Park Pl., Columbus, OH 43210)

Chair

Panelists

"Emotional Ecologies of Violent Infrastructure in Georgia’s Abandoned Soviet Spas" by Dr. Ariel Otruba (Arcadia U.) 

This plenary presentation examines the slow violence of protracted urban displacement and war's capacity to harm over an elongated time horizon through Violent Infrastructure: Protracted Displacement and Housing Injustice in Tskaltubo, Georgia (Virginia Tech Publishing, 2025) and its companion Photovoice exhibition. Violent Infrastructure features photographs taken by ten internally displaced persons (IDPs) who fled the 1992–1993 Georgian-Abkhaz war. The images were produced as part of a feminist visual ethnography exploring the emotional impact of three decades of displacement under abject housing conditions in the former Soviet spa resort of Tskaltubo, Republic of Georgia. The project demonstrates how crumbling walls and pervasive mold are not merely imperial afterlives, but emotional ecologies of violent infrastructure—more-than-human forces—that transform IDPs’ sense of identity, agency, personhood, and futurity. The project also illustrates how creative and participatory methodologies can function as sites of ethical witnessing, inviting a critical reimagining of more caring and just spatial futures for displaced populations in Georgia and beyond.

"Witnessing in Transit: Poetic Testimony and the Formation of Collective Trauma in the Russian Oppositional Arts Review" by Dr. Natalia Vygovskaia (Miami U.)

The paper discusses Linor Goralik’s project The Russian Oppositional Arts Review, which Goralik (born in Dnipropetrovsk, southeastern Ukraine) launched in March 2022, shortly after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The project aims to create an inclusive space for new forms of identity and solidarity among those who oppose the war, have fled their country, live under oppression, or endure the state’s escalating crackdown on dissent.

In contrast to the belatedness and communicative disconnection characteristic of cultural trauma after the Second World War, often described as a “wall of silence,” the present moment is marked by permeable membranes. Through these membranes, authors and readers across the world exchange thoughts and seek ways to grapple with loss, grief, and guilt. Goralik repeatedly emphasizes that the project’s central purpose is to refuse silence in the face of current events and to resist violence through narration: by opposing war rhetoric and, ultimately, by making the unpresentable speakable. And here my inquiry begins. What can poetry do that other genres of literature cannot? What connects readers and authors, and what separates them? Does reading these poems become an act of resistance, or does it simply pass the experience along to those who never lived it? Can it help trauma subside for those who are still moving through it? Does poetry offer us hope for healing?  Is poetry a collective ritual of voicing and hearing suffering that resists the very limits of language where participants share experience, stripped of agents, names, and actors? 

Lunchtime Theatrical Performance: Excerpt of The Body of a Woman as a Battlefield in the Bosnian War (1997) by Matei Vişniec

12:15-1:15 PM, Pfahl Hall, Room 302

Theater scholars and performers Kelly Gallagher and Dr. Alisa Ballard Lin (Ohio State U.) will do a staged reading of excerpts from Romanian-French playwright Matei Vişniec’s harrowing play The Body of a Woman as a Battlefield in the Bosnian War (1997). The play depicts a victim of the mass rapes during the Bosnian War struggling to process her trauma at a German clinic in dialogue with an American psychologist. Dr. Lin will also provide commentary on trauma in East European theater.

Due to the room capacity of Pfahl Hall 302, this event is limited to 55 audience members. Sign-up for this event will be available during the keynote and Saturday morning at the Blackwell, and a light lunch will be served to attendees. 

1:30-3:00PM - Session 2, Pfahl Hall, Room 230

Panel Chair: Dr. Theodora (Kelly) McGee (EUSA)
Participants:

  • Michael Furman (Oxford U. Press, Ohio State U.)
  • Laura Linderman (foreign policy., Indiana U.)
  • Nancy Pelligrino (Hilton Parker LLC, Ohio State U.)

Join us for our career roundtable for soon-to-be and recent graduates. If you would like to learn about careers beyond the professoriate in our field, drop on in! The speakers on this roundtable represent a range of professions including academic publishing, law, and foreign policy.

3:15-4:45 PM - Session 3, Pfahl Hall, Room 330

Judges: Dr. Ariel Otruba (Arcadia U.) and Dr. Natalia Vygovskaia (Miami U.)
Presenters: 

  • Nora Archer (Kenyon College)
  • Aliyah Moad Northwestern U.)
  • Nicole Wang (Kenyon College)

CSEEES is excited to host the 2026 Midwest REEE Lightning Talks, held in conjunction with the 2026 Midwest Slavic Conference. Lightning talks are short, fast-paced presentations (3–5 minutes) that allow undergraduate students to showcase their research, creative work, or projects in a concise format designed to spark conversation and collaboration. This event offers a dynamic platform for students conducting guided research in any discipline related to Eastern Europe and Eurasia to practice communicating their work to a diverse audience.

5:00-5:30 PM, Pfahl Hall, 2nd Floor Foyer

All registered conference attendees receive membership through their registration fee!

Join the Midwest Slavic Association (MWSA) for our annual meeting! MWSA supports Slavic, East European, and Central Asian studies in the Midwest region of the U.S. and beyond. We'll discuss ideas for future conferences, provide updates, and more. This year will also be welcoming our incumbent President, Vice-President, and Graduate Student Representative. We hope to see you there!

To learn more about MWSA, please visit our webpage.   

6:30-8:00 PM, Location TBA

This event is for undergraduate and graduate students ONLY.

We inviting participating and attending undergraduate and graduate students for our annual student mixer starting at 6:30PM. This will be a wonderful opportunity for our emerging scholars to meet and network with their peers in an informal setting. This year's mixer will be hosted by CSEEES Graduate Student Representative, Margot Hare and MWSA Graduate Student Representative Siobhán Seigne. Shareables and non-alcoholic beverages will be covered by CSEEES.

6:30-8:00 PM, Budd Dairy Food Hall

This event is for faculty and independent scholars ONLY.

Join the CSEEES and MWSA staff for our faculty and independent scholar mixer starting at 6:30PM. This will be a wonderful opportunity to meet and network with colleagues in an informal setting. 

General Conference Information

We do not provide funding for lodging for any participants at the conference. We encourage undergraduate and graduate students to apply for travel grants from their home universities to cover all travel costs. If any documentation is needed to apply for funds, please email cseees@osu.edu.

Other lodging options include:

For those driving to campus, self-pay parking is available at parking garages close to the conference site in the Lane Avenue Garage and the Tuttle Garage.

A variety of taxi cab services also operate in the Columbus metro area, as well as Lyft and Uber.

Presenting at a conference for the first time is an exciting opportunity to share your work, connect with peers, and gain confidence as a scholar. This short guide offers helpful tips to support you as you prepare your talk, navigate the presentation format, and make the most of your time on a panel. Whether you're new to public speaking or just new to conferences, these suggestions will help you step into your session feeling ready and empowered.

Before the Conference

  • Make sure to send your presentation materials to the panel chair promptly and do not send them longer versions of your paper, what you send them should represent what you will present at the conference. Completed presentation materials are defined as: 
    • Papers (see below for suggested length)
    • A completed slide deck
    • Any audio, visuals, or notes that you intend to use
    • Any combination of the previously listed items
    • Abstracts are NOT considered to be a type of presentation material
  • The conference rooms will each have a projector and internet access. However, presenters should bring their own laptops and any special cords needed for connecting to audio/visual equipment. Please prepare a backup in case you encounter any issues accessing your presentation. The conference site will have staff and volunteers on hand to help. 

During the Conference

  • If you are on a panel with 3-4 presenters you should prepare a presentation of 15-20 minutes in length, generally material that can be covered in a 8-10 page paper. 
  • If you are on a panel with 4-5 presenters you should prepare a presentation of 10-15 minutes in length, generally material that can be covered in a 6-8 page paper. 
  • If you choose to present by reading from a paper, be aware that reading directly from a paper is less engaging. Try to make eye-contact with the audience and not read word-for-word from the paper. 
  • Each panelist will present, then questions and discussion led by the chair will be at the end of the panel. 
  • Be respectful of other panelists' time to allow equal discussion and time for all members. 

If you have any other questions about conference, available tech, or other potential needs, please email cseees@osu.edu in advance!

There are many dining options located in easy walking distance from the conference location, the Blackwell Inn and Conference Center. Below are a few close options but by no means is it an inclusive list.

Knowledge Bank is a digital repository maintained by OSU's University Libraries. Conference participants can elect to have their abstracts, papers, and PowerPoints included in Knowledge Bank. Within Knowledge Bank, CSEEES has created a community for the Midwest Slavic Conference that contains programs and participants' materials. Knowledge Bank is accessible through the University Libraries' website and is open to everyone, including those not affiliated with OSU. Papers are searchable and downloadable, helping to increase the impact of the conference and providing a way to spread participants' work. Learn more about the Knowledge Bank.

Check out CSEEES' community today!

Prior Conferences

Friday, April 4 - Sunday, April 6, 2025 

2025 Co-Sponsors

Gold Sponsors

  •  Academic Studies Press; the Department of Slavic and East European Languages and Cultures at Ohio State U.; the Hilandar Research Library at Ohio State U.; and the Mershon Center for International Security 
    Studies at Ohio State U.

Silver Sponsors

  • Bard College; the Center for Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies at U. of Texas at Austin; and the Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies at Harvard U.

Bronze Sponsors

  • The Center for Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies at U. of Michigan; the Department of History at Ohio State U. and the Department of Linguistics at Ohio State U.

Keynote address: "New Russian Apocalypticism" 

  • Presented by Dr. Mikhail Epstein (Emory U.)

Plenary panel: “Shaping East European and Eurasian Culture and History: Forging Authentic Narratives Through AI, Media, and Storytelling Methods”

  • "Faking It: What Fictions of AI Reveal About the Future of Human Language" by Dr. Molly T. Blasing (U. of Kentucky)
  • "Media, Mind, and Authenticity" by Dr. Ludmila Isurin (Ohio State U.)
  • "Unsettling Contested Narratives: Storytelling and the Quest for an Authentic History" by Dr. Malkhaz Toria (Ilia State U., Fulbright Visiting Scholar at the Davis Center at Harvard U.)

Friday, April 5 - Sunday, April 7, 2024 

2024 Co-Sponsors

Gold Sponsors

  • The Department of Slavic and East European Languages and Cultures at Ohio State U. and the Mershon Center for International Security Studies at Ohio State U.

Silver Sponsors

  • Academic Studies Press, the Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies; the Center for Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies at U. of Texas at Austin; the Department of Linguistics at Ohio State U.; the Hilandar Research Library at Ohio State U.; Kenyon College, and the Robert F. Byrnes Russian and East European Institute at Indiana U., Bloomington

Bronze Sponsors

  • The Center for Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies at U. of Michigan; the Department of Political Science at Ohio State U.; and the Summer Language Institute at U. of Pittsburgh

Keynote address: "Cold War: Then and Now" 

Plenary panel: “Echoes of the Cold War: Past and Present Perspectives Across the Regions”

  • "Futurity, Nostalgia, and the (New) Cold War in Contemporary Television" by Dr. Julia Keblinska (Ohio State U.)
  • "Reimagining Yugoslavia: Lessons for Today's World" by Brano Mandić (Editor in Chief and Founder of Normalizuj.me)
  • "Glasnost and the End of the USSR" by Jeffrey Trimble (Board of Directors Chair at Eurasianet) 

Friday, March 24 - Sunday, March 26, 2023 

Co-sponsored by The American Councils for International Education, The Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies, The Department of Slavic and East European Languages and Cultures at The Ohio State U., The Havighurst Center at Miami U., The Society for Slovene Studies, U. of Pittsburgh’s Summer Language Institute, and U. of Washington's Roma Boniecka Endowed Program for Slovene Studies.

Keynote address: "Gothic Displacements and the Russian Imperial Conquest: Literary Cases of Finland and Ukraine" with Dr. Valeria Sobol (U. of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign)

Plenary panel: "Fostering Community and Solidarity in a Time of Plague: Uniting Readers Across the Globe Through Russian Literature" by Dr. Anna Barker (U. of Iowa), "The Quotidian and the Crisis: Documenting the Immigrant Experience through Food Writing" by Dr. Philip Gleissner (Ohio State U.), and "Demopolitics, A Key to Understanding Modern Central-Eastern Europe and Beyond: Evidence from Poland" by Dr. Jarosław Szczepański (U. of Warsaw)

Friday, April 1 - Sunday, April 3, 2022

Co-sponsored by Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies.

Keynote address: "Looking Across Species in the Anthropocene: Carnivores and Compassion" by Dr. Ian Helfant (Colgate U.)

Plenary panel: "Who Owns Icebergs? Seeking Multidisciplinary Solutions in a Legal Vacuum" by Dr. Matthew Birkhold (Ohio State U.), "What Can a Cosmic Collision Teach Us about Climate Change? The 1908 Tunguska Explosion and Environmental Perils of the Future" by Dr. Andy Bruno (Indiana U., Bloomington), and "Fighting "Future Famines" after the First World War" by Dr. Maria Fedorova (Macalester College).

Thursday, April 15 - Saturday, April 18, 2021

The 2021 conference was held in a virtual, online format. Information is available on the 2021 Midwest Slavic Conference Website.

Keynote address: “The Geography of Joy: Alex Dubas, Voices of Russian Happiness, and the Art of Translation”, by Dr. Yvonne Howell, University of Richmond

Plenary panel: “Manufacturing Consent: The Politics of Showmanship in Putin’s Russia” by Dr. Hannah S. Chapman, Miami University, “Temporalities of Concrete: Housing Imaginaries at the Margins of Europe” by Dr. Smoki Musaraj, Ohio University, and “War Memory as Entertainment in 21st Century Russia” by Dr. Karen Petrone, University of Kentucky

Sunday, September 13, 1:00 - 4:00PM EDT

Co-sponsored by The Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies, Department of History OSU, Department of Linguistics OSU, Department of Slavic and East European Languages and Cultures OSU, Department of Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies OSU, the Undergraduate International Studies Program OSU, and University Libraries.

The 2020 Conference was originally scheduled for April 2020 but cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The originally scheduled conference keynote and plenary panel were held on September 13 online. No panels were held.

Keynote address: "Ordinary Apocalypse and Everyday Science Fiction" by Dr. Anindita Banerjee, Cornell University

Friday, April 5th - Sunday, April 7th, 2019

Co-sponsored by Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies, Department of History, OSU, Department of Slavic and East European Languages and Cultures OSU, The John Glenn College of Public Affairs OSU, and the Undergraduate International Studies Program OSU.

The 2019 conference had over 60 panelists and over 100 attendees. Papers, abstracts, and the conference program can be found in the conference's Knowledge Bank collection.

Keynote address: “A Farewell to an Empire Revisited” by Dr. Vitaly Chernetsky, University of Kansas

Friday, April 7th - Sunday, April 9th, 2017

Co-sponsored by The Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies, The Center for Slavic and East European Studies OSU, The Department of Comparative Studies OSU, The Department of History OSU, The Department of Slavic and East European Languages and Cultures OSU, The Department of Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies OSU, The Hilandar Research Library OSU, The Mershon Center for International Security Studies OSU, The Midwest Slavic Association, The Office of International Affairs OSU, The Resource Center for Medieval Slavic Studies OSU, and The Undergraduate International Studies Program, OSU.

Over 70 panelists presented at the conference with close to 150 attendees. Papers, abstracts, and program from the conference can be found in the conference's Knowledge Bank collection.

Keynote Address: "Putin Country: A Journey into the Real Russia, The Challenge of Covering Russia" by Anne Garrels

Prior Conference Programs

Programs from prior conferences can be found on CSEEES' Knowledge Bank community along with other materials from the conference.