ARCHIVES Danyliw Seminar 2017
ARCHIVES Danyliw Seminar 2017
Program Committee
Program Committee
ARCHIVES Danyliw Seminar 2018
Iryna Shuvalova
University of Cambridge (UK)
Iryna Shuvalova is a PhD student in Slavonic Studies and a Gates Cambridge Scholar at the University of Cambridge, where her research centers on the songs of the War in Donbas and the communities that produce them. In addition to her academic work, she is active as a poet and translator. She authored three books of poetry and won a number of writing and translation awards, including the Joseph Brodsky / Stephen Spender Prize (2012).
PRESENTATION
Abstract
Songs of the Donbas War: dismantling, construction and reconstruction of identities through text, sound and image
Iryna Shuvalova
In her article, Shuvalova explores the visual representations of the War in Donbas in the music videos of the recent years (2014 – present). She presents a comparative analysis of the visual interpretations of the songs about the Donbas War created and performed in Ukraine; those produced in the DNR and LNR; and finally, those originating in Russia. She examines the use of visual means for the construction of diverging narratives of war; visual self-representation of the regional and national identities of various groups involved in the war; as well as the visual strategies of constructing an image of an enemy in the music videos. She tries to understand if there are any substantial and meaningful differences or similarities in how the different parties involved in the War in Donbas produce and consume the music videos based on the songs about this war. Shuvalova also looks at what, if anything, such differences and similarities might tell us about the processes within these communities, as well as the dynamics between them.