Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies

Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies
Name	Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies
Formation	1948
Type	Learned society
Headquarters	United States
Region served	North America, Europe, Eurasia
Leader title	President

Contents

History

Founded in the aftermath of World War II by scholars influenced by debates over Soviet Union policy, the association emerged alongside organizations such as the American Council of Learned Societies, National Academy of Sciences, Modern Language Association, American Historical Association and Social Science Research Council. Early leadership drew on figures associated with Harvard University, Columbia University, University of Chicago, Stanford University and Yale University, and engaged with archival openings like those following Perestroika under Mikhail Gorbachev. Over decades the association adapted to major developments including the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the enlargement of the European Union, the NATO expansion, the Orange Revolution, the Rose Revolution, Euromaidan and shifts in scholarship around Cold War history, Imperialism of Russia, and post-imperial transitions involving the Habsburg Monarchy and the Ottoman Empire.

Governance is modeled on nonprofit structures found at institutions such as the American Association of University Professors, American Council on Education, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and operates through an elected board, officers including a president linked to universities like Princeton University, University of California, Berkeley, University of Michigan, University of Oxford and committees that mirror those in groups such as the Royal Historical Society and the British Academy. Administrative headquarters coordinate with archives and libraries including the Library of Congress, British Library, Russian State Library, Polish National Library and the Hoover Institution. The bylaws reflect standards from the Internal Revenue Service for nonprofit classification and draw on professional ethics influenced by the American Historical Association.

Programs include research fellowships comparable to awards from the MacArthur Foundation, training initiatives modeled on the Fulbright Program, summer seminars akin to those of the National Endowment for the Humanities, and outreach partnerships with museums and centers such as the Smithsonian Institution, Museum of Modern Art, George Washington University Elliott School, Kennan Institute and the Wilson Center. The association organizes language pedagogy workshops referencing curricula for Russian language, Polish language, Ukrainian language and collaborates with archives like the Hoover Institution Archives, Bundesarchiv, Central State Archive of Supreme Bodies of Power and Government of Ukraine and the Russian State Archive of Socio-Political History.

The association publishes a flagship journal comparable in standing to titles such as the Slavic Review, which features scholarship on figures like Leo Tolstoy, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Adam Mickiewicz, Taras Shevchenko, Bohdan Khmelnytsky and analyses of events including the Pale of Settlement, Holodomor, Battle of Stalingrad, Siege of Leningrad and debates over interpretations advanced in works by Boris Pasternak, Alexander Solzhenitsyn and Isaac Deutscher. It issues newsletters and monograph series in the tradition of publishers like Cambridge University Press, Oxford University Press, Harvard University Press, Columbia University Press and Routledge.

Membership comprises professors from institutions such as University of Toronto, University of Warsaw, Charles University, European University Institute and researchers from think tanks like the RAND Corporation, Brookings Institution, Center for Strategic and International Studies as well as doctoral students and independent scholars. Regional chapters mirror networks in metropolitan areas including New York City, Washington, D.C., Chicago, San Francisco, Toronto, London, Berlin and Warsaw, and coordinate seminars with cultural centers such as the Polish Cultural Institute, Russian Cultural Center, Ukrainian Institute and the Baltic Studies Center.

The association confers prizes in the spirit of honors like the Nobel Prize, Pulitzer Prize, National Book Award, and specialized awards reminiscent of the George L. Mosse Prize and the Reginald Zelnik Book Prize in History, recognizing monographs on topics connected to scholars linked to Isaiah Berlin, Eric Hobsbawm, E. H. Carr and honoring contributions that illuminate episodes such as the January Uprising, Hungarian Revolution of 1956, Prague Spring and research on figures like Alexander II, Franz Joseph I and Mustafa Kemal Atatürk.

Annual conferences draw panels comparable to those at the American Historical Association and the Modern Language Association, featuring sessions on the Russian Revolution, Soviet dissidents, Polish Solidarity, Baltic independence movements, Caucasus conflicts, Central Asian republics and keynote lectures by scholars from Princeton University, Yale University, University of Cambridge, Lomonosov Moscow State University and the European University at St. Petersburg. The association partners with institutions such as the Kennan Institute, Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute, PIIRS, Wilson Center and regional archives for collaborative symposia and public programming.

Category:Learned societies Category:Area studies organizations Category:Academic organizations established in 1948