SOCIAL HISTORIES OF THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION
A year-long
series of monthly discussion meetings, timed to take place during the
run-up to the centenary of Russia’s revolutions of 1917.
Venue: Birkbeck, University of London
Full programme and further information: https://socialhistories1917.wordpress.com/
Each
discussion will be opened by historians, scholars working in academia
who have spent many years studying the revolution in the Russian
archives. But these are not academic seminars - they are open to all who
share our interest in the history of the Russian revolution as a
landmark struggle for social liberation. At each discussion there will
be an opening talk of about 30 minutes, followed by open debate.
The
emphasis in the discussion meetings will be on the social histories of
the revolution - that is, how it was experienced by the mass of working
people who participated.
By taking this approach we aim
not to brush aside the role of political leaders, and their disputes and
decisions, but rather to move beyond these well-known debates and reach
a deeper understanding of the revolution as the active participation of
millions of people in changing history.
We hope that by
developing our theme over a year of meetings, we will be able
collectively to engage in serious thinking and re-thinking about the
revolution and its significance for our past and present.
William Dixon, Brendan McGeever, Simon Pirani (Organisers)
TIMETABLE OF EVENTS
2016
Oct 27 – Steve Smith (University of Oxford): The Social History of the Russian Revolution and Civil War, 1917-1921
Nov 24 – Brendan McGeever (Birkbeck, University of London): Antisemitism and Revolutionary Politics in the Russian Revolution, 1917-1919
Dec 15 – Andy Willimott (Reading University): Living the Revolution: Urban Communes in 1920s Russia and the Invention of a Socialist Lifestyle
2017
Jan 26 – Sarah Badcock (Nottingham University): The 1917 Revolutions at Local Level
Feb 23 – Katy Turton (Queens University, Belfast): Women in Revolt: the Female Experience of the 1917 Revolutions
March 16 – George Gilbert (Southampton University): The Radical Right and the Russian Revolution
March 30 –Dimitri Tolkatsch (University of Freiburg, Germany): The Ukrainian Peasant Insurgency in the Revolutionary Period
April 27 – Chris Read (Warwick University): The Social History of the Revolutionary Period
May 25 – Barbara Allen (La Salle University, USA): Alexander Shlyapnikov and the Russian Metalworkers in 1917
June 29 – Don Filtzer (University of East London): The Working Class and the First Five-year Plan, 1928-32
Sep 28 – Wendy Goldman (Carnegie Mellon University, USA): Taking Power: Remaking the Family, Levelling Wages, Planning the Economy
Oct 12 – Lara Cook (University of York): Local Soviets in 1917-18 and their Relations with the Central Executive Committee
Oct 26 – 1917 A Century On: A Debate (Speakers TBC, including
Simon Pirani (author of
The Russian Revolution in Retreat 1920-1924)
Nov 23 – Gleb Albert (University of Zurich): Early Soviet Society and World Revolution, 1917-27
