Performing Imagined Communities on Stage: On the Revival of Popular Music and Comedy in East-Central and Eastern Europe

The workshop examines how popular music and comedy have (re-)shaped imagined communities in East-Central and Eastern Europe since the late socialist period.

During and after the breakdown of state socialism, the political and economic liberalisation enabled the revival and commercial expansion of previously marginalised cultural genres. Particularly popular music and comedy formats fostered experimentation, cross-border exchange and the emergence of new genres such as Disco Polo, Turbo-Folk and stand-up comedy. Since the 2010s, however, a re-centralisation of state power occurred. Populist measures gained ground in cultural politics and ideological pressures transformed the cultural landscape once again.

At our workshop, we would like to discuss how this change in the political landscape affected the stage performances of popular comedians and musicians. What active role and function do they have in the production of meaning, belonging and affect? How do they create spaces of cultural reflexivity and empower communities to negotiate trauma, to articulate dissent or to reproduce conformity? By foregrounding the performative and affective dimensions of popular music and comedy, the workshop examines how they contribute to identity formation, political mobilisation, resistance, but also to the mainstreaming of illiberal imaginaries, especially in the context of authoritarian tendencies and Russia’s war against Ukraine.

Keynote speakers: Ana Hofman (Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts) and Amy Austin Garey (Virginia Commonwealth University)

The workshop will include a public event on June 25 featuring a Berlin-based stand-up comedy collective and a musical performance by DJ Inda aka NépiSokkoló. Seating is limited. If you want to attend, please register in advance at indira.hajnacs@leibniz-gwzo.de.

We will soon announce a detailed workshop program.