Abstract

The lecture will focus on the issues related to the gender studies in two ex-soviet countries: Russia and Belarus. Prior to 1991 both countries belonged to the Soviet Union where gender studies practically did not exist, although studies of women as a demographic group of the population were developed. The period of the 1990s was favorable for establishing gender studies thanks to the efforts of academic feminists and international community. Academic feminists expressed scholarly commitment, entrepreneurial skills and public involvement. These skills were necessary for the academic innovation that became a challenge to conservative patriarchal revival. Gender studies made Russian sociology more critical and reflective. In early 2000s conservative turn in Russian state ideology and deficit of international support provoked fundamentalist attack on gender studies. As a result academic feminist research is developing in the unfavorable ideological climate. Gender studies in contemporary Belarus are less developed than in Russia due to the dominance of traditional stereotypes. Gender issues often substituted by women issues; and the major fields of research on women are still the same as in the Soviet days: children, family, and work. However, feminism and gender studies exist, and several non-governmental organizations are involved in them.

Short bio: Larissa Titarenko is Professor of Sociology at Belarusian State University (Minsk, Republic of Belarus) and Associate Researcher at Sociological Institute (S.-Petersburg, Russia). Her research interests include social theory, modernization, value changes, gender studies, education and youth, public opinion and identity. For more than 20 years she is teaching sociology of gender at Belarusian State University. For this course she published the first textbook on gender in Belarus. She participated in some international conferences on gender, including The Fourth World Conference on Women. Later she presented a paper at the special UN session on women’s issues. Professor Titarenko published more than 15 books and textbooks and more than 300 articles on different topics (in Russian). As a result of her participation in the international projects she contributed to several books published in English: Sociology in Russia (co-author, Palgrave, 2017), After the Soviet Empire: Legacies and Pathways (co-editor, Brill, 2015), and Tradition and Renewal: the Shape of Sociology for the Twenty-First Century (Sage, 2012), etc.

Activity within the Doctoral Programme in International Politics and Conflict Resolution [see programme of lectures]