With the full-scale war, the roles within the public sphere change, and academia is no exception. We have talked with Oleksand Ivashyna about the decolonization and marketing of Ukrainian academia, researchers’ responsibility, and transformation of the role of intellectuals.
Kateryna Osypchuk
Crisis situations call for decisive and clear measures. However, by definition, a researcher should continually expand their knowledge and test its limits. How does this trickster/researcher survive at times of political change? How does this role change at the time of war?
Oleksandr Ivashyna
I cannot speak for everyone, but I am looking from the sidelines and following the work of other researchers in the humanities field. Some of them have changed their views, especially the ones who once had connections in the Russian academic circles. Naturally, there are changes inside Ukraine as well. Academic research is biased; it’s a fact. There is a whole plethora of published Russian researchers with fairly balanced views, but after 2014 following the annexation of Crimea, they began to support Putin’s propaganda machine. We even welcomed some of them as guest speakers during public events [organized by the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy]. Naturally, there is no knowledge outside of politics and most certainly outside of war. In an attempt to distance oneself from something like that, we also publically took a stance. I doubt that anyone is able to see the war from the eyes of God. At the same time, this bias does not turn us or other researchers into mindless promoters of pro-Ukrainian propaganda. We also have to define a pro-Ukrainian position in the field of academic research. What is behind it? Here, I believe, we are left to the rule of thumb. In my opinion, every case is unique and every researcher should make their own decisions.
As you may have noticed, many researchers try to avoid controversial subjects, and I totally get that. Such discussions hit on a raw nerve; they are best left alone for the time being. However the subject cannot be avoided entirely. Today, academic researchers should become champions of some of the most pressing topics. It’s quite rare when academic articles become popular with a wider audience. And it shouldn’t be this way. Perhaps, I am being too critical here. It’s good when a researcher is able to popularize academic knowledge and present their ideas to a wider audience in a plain language. When discussing controversial subjects in the intellectual field, it’s not enough to analyse the subject in its complexity; it’s also vital to find the right words and use the right rhetoric. Such an approach encourages more productive research without fostering toxicity.
Here’s a concrete example of how bias is born and how it should be avoided. Oxana Timofeeva is a remarkable Russian researcher, the author of the History of Animals and Introduction to the Erotic Philosophy of Georges Bataille. In the latest almanac In the Face of Disaster she published, in my opinion, there is a quality piece titled The Death Drive: from Empire to Fascism based on the concepts pioneered by Freud, Hegel, and Bataille. The article presents stimulating arguments on the Bucha massacre (by the way, some of my family were lucky enough to escape Bucha right after the Russians invaded). Timofeeva believes that, from the moral standpoint, which is much more prominent in the Russian liberal media, the war crimes perpetrated by Russians in Bucha are pure evil and cannot be explained rationally. Ultimately, in the mind of the one passing the judgement, the source of evil is always elsewhere; the actor never sees themselves in the evil deed. I would like to add my own reasoning and say that Ukrainians have the following logic: the others perpetrating evil (i.e., the Bucha murderers) are people just like us, but at the same time they are different from us – they are inhuman. The simplest way out of this problem of evil is to dehumanise the criminals, searching for the roots of evil in the national character and its extreme cruelty or in the Russian culture which celebrates violence, Timofeeva writes. I believe, that what she means is that instead of searching for the root of evil, namely facing the fact that Bucha is a crooked mirror which distorts all human qualities and makes human nature unrecognisable, an individual refuses to look at their own reflection which is linked in their mind to all of the frightening and inhumane qualities as the source of evil. And it’s not just about some abstract person on the planet Earth, it’s about specific Ukrainian men and women who need to face the inhumane ‘other’ in themselves. Timofeeva argues that the atrocities in Bucha abundantly reveal what Slavoj Žižek defined as the inhuman core of humanity. They have references to what the German idealists called the ‘concept of the negative’, and Freud termed the death drive. But the argumentation has a vital flaw. Timofeeva shifts the blame away from specific war criminals who should face international justice and instead focuses on such general issues like ‘what is human?’ I believe that at the time of war, such hybrid arguments should be left aside; they can weaponise the enemy. It’s a polite way of shifting the blame and attention by transferring the focus from specific Russian war crimes to abstract metaphysical topics which will have a never-ending debate. This is the crux of the matter – we all have a different way of interpreting ideas. Like, if you are lucky enough to come across an article written by a ‘good Russian’, as you read on you begin to realise that even academic researchers at some level engage in bias and politics.
Kateryna Osypchuk
I do agree that it’s a type of ruse designed to shift attention and a refusal to accept responsibility; these factors are at the root of this seeming need for general anthropological analysis. It also touches upon the irrationality of evil. Hannah Arendt believed that evil is beyond comprehension; it spreads like a fungus without penetrating deep into the surface. Often evil is part of the cult of unreason, and it has no explanation. But I believe, it’s also a precarious position because it’s absolutely vital to have an explanation why evil exists. Is it possible for us to comprehend the irrationality of evil? If we try to rationally explain actions of the invading army, does it in any way justify them?
Oleksandr Ivashyna
It’s all about being appropriate. Oxana Timofeeva’s line of reasoning would be appropriate at the time of peace but now we should most importantly focus on specific cases with a judicial tilt, more precisely solutions to the moral problems which at least for now seem too abstract.
Kateryna Osypchuk
Now, we are discussing the new modus operandi of academic researchers, which places extra obligations on what they write and requires more responsibilities on what they do. How do you define the responsibility of a researcher? What shape does it take today?
Oleksandr Ivashyna
In war time, one needs to uphold a pro-Ukrainian position. For example, professors need to adapt the syllabus if it was developed before the war, and if it has Russian references, naturally they need to be revised. And it’s not because your boss told you so; you must understand by yourself that now all of it has to change. Some Russian texts are of good quality, and perhaps they need to be translated into Ukrainian, but again, someone has to translate it. Text translation is another problem; the Ukrainian translation of Roland Barthes’ Camera Lucida was published only last year. Another example: instead of working on improving the cultural soft power of Ukraine during the war, like strengthening our translators’ community, we dissolve the Dovzhenko Centre. Perhaps we need to be looking to substitute Russian academic texts with Ukrainian equivalents. But here we encounter another problem which has been there since the 90’s –Ukrainian researchers are not promoted in broader academic discourse, save for a few exceptions. Ukrainian researchers publish their research in peer review journals and it is buried there; the articles do not get promoted or advertised anywhere else. A regular person does not have the time to be flipping through hundreds of articles and research papers, it’s too much trouble. Intercultural communication within academic circles is still not sufficient. Academic institutions should launch more communication forums, and organise talks to help showcase the achievements of Ukrainian researchers, but there is nothing like that. There is a great demand for Ukrainian academic research in culture, and it could yield great results, especially during the war.
Kateryna Osypchuk
It’s also about the transformation of a researcher with expert knowledge in their field into a public intellectual, who is fully engaged in the public-affairs discourse. But how do we distinguish between the two: a public intellectual and a researcher? Also, how do the roles change?
Oleksandr Ivashyna
Academic jargon is difficult to understand; a regular person finds it confusing. We need to translate academic knowledge for the wider public into plain language, in order to explain the researcher’s position and avoid any misunderstanding. We need to nurture our community of dragomans, the experts trained in analysis and commentary. For example, Slavoj Žižek is very active on the public scene, he holds public talks and has tons of energy, so he and other intellectuals like him remain relevant. But not everyone is able to rise to that kind of standard. There are some pseudo-intellectuals who just engage in attention seeking behaviour, but we really need to see a healthy public interest in those intellectuals with decades of experience in their academic field, who have written extensively on their subject. Naturally, they are busy people; nonetheless one needs to understand that now the popularisation of academic knowledge is as important, if not more, than publications in peer review magazines.
Kateryna Osypchuk
So, a researcher does not fulfill the same role as a public intellectual due to their lack of communication with the public. Does this issue have an intellectual tradition behind it? How did we arrive at this great divide between academic jargon and plain language, and how do we bridge this gap?
Oleksandr Ivashyna
Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht is a popular contemporary researcher. He lectured across the world and coined the term ‘deixis’. Sometimes we require complex language to highlight a topic’s significance, although it’s often applied as a filter to create a hermeneutic divide between academia and regular folk; in this sense, expert knowledge has a negative side effect. Complex terminology keeps non-experts at bay; it’s something to brag about. And perhaps some experts do brag. As a result, a researcher is able to carve out a place for themselves in the academic community, which provides some, albeit small, income. The question of popularisation is knowledge and making it accessible to everyone is ignored. Here, it is a matter of personal responsibility. ‘When the cannons are heard, the muses are silent’, as a popular saying goes. I believe that many intellectuals are afraid of approaching controversial and raw topics because they can be ostracised as a result.
Kateryna Osypchuk
Nonetheless, academic research could become part of the diplomatic discourse, such as establishing and maintaining international relations. How could researchers forge relations and mobilise others within the academic community and beyond? What type of solidarity can be achieved among the research communities during the war?
Oleksandr Ivashyna
Recently I spoke to a friend of mine, also a researcher. He shared with me that receiving grant support for academic research has become more difficult because the subject field of decolonisation is much more competitive now, especially in what’s related to Ukrainian culture. Many researchers who specialised in totally different subjects have changed their focus. Still, there are some connections among them but they are more sporadic now. There are some residences and conferences which serve as forums, but that’s it. There is no social discussion, and as a result, all of those wonderful academic talks and articles are lost to the obscurity of history. In some respects, they have no social relevance. And in this sense, this issue of the popularisation of relevant academic knowledge is extremely significant. A researcher should be out there amongst the public, but it’s not always the case.
Kateryna Osypchuk
For now, the Ukrainian Academy is a small campus where everyone is acquainted through several handshakes but not personally. The existing connections should be made more evident and clear. On the one hand, it should be done by the state which should be interested in creating a sustainable national academic community, and on the other hand, the process involves individual actors who forge those connections themselves. In your opinion, which agency is responsible for establishing and maintaining connections within the academic field so the researchers have their own go-to person, stay abreast of intellectual trends, and form partner relations?
Oleksandr Ivashyna
This is the crux of the problem. Now, the responsibility is solely with individual actors in the academic community. It’s a question of resources, but personal resources are never enough; they are always stretched beyond our ability to maintain them. There should be agencies which foster academic relations. Often such agencies are formal; they exist only on paper and slowly wither away. Here again, it’s very important to stay at the cusp of social change. Any discussion should be intellectual, even in the case of a heated argument – the argumentation should be based on logic. And it should be done with care, especially during the war.
A lot has been said and written about organised knowledge and its impact on the creation of a sustainable society with the ability to discuss, review, and identify some of the most pressing issues. And it should be done not exclusively through the intellectual bubbles inside which all seems to disappear. But who should control the process? The question remains. We haven’t identified a relevant agency yet.
Perhaps academic institutions should include departments responsible for the management of knowledge. Researchers themselves are somewhat passive; they need to be pulled out of their own bubble. Someone needs to promote those amazing research papers, articles, and events and make them relevant to our needs. If nothing happens soon, we will continue living inside our intellectual bubbles.
Kateryna Osypchuk
So, it’s about engaging the managers to help identify connections and forge partner relations between the researchers as well as defining a new role for the researcher. Critics say that it’s not high on the agenda because there are other more, effective ways of doing things. Such discussions undervalue the role of a researcher. However, I still believe that doing research and publishing texts, even though such texts have no direct bearing on current events, is very important for identifying Ukrainian voices and countering enemy propaganda. So how do we continue to fight, even though what we do is not high on the agenda? How do we transition from this passive existence and become active outside of our individual bubbles?
Oleksandr Ivashyna
Left to its own devices, the matter is not going to change and nothing will improve. Strategically speaking, it’s a cultural war or the application of so-called soft power, a way to market Ukrainian culture which in the long-term could become absolutely vital. Naturally the most important thing right now is to survive, and our survival solely depends on our military success, but we should not forget that we are also engaged in fighting a cultural war. We see that the Russian gangster regime or fascist regime is quite successful in the deployment of cultural soft power. Naturally, they have more resources, and it explains the abundance of Russian translations and publications. In Ukraine, Russian language publications were nothing out of the ordinary, and it only became evident after 2014 that it’s a fifth column of sorts. Russians believe that if Russian language publications are popular and appreciated by Ukrainians, it means that they can also lay claim to the territory. Inside the country and inside our personal intellectual bubbles, Russian books were just a form of intercultural communication which suddenly were made into a weapon and turned against our nation. So, we should not underestimate the significance of the academic community or academic research. Ukraine still does not have all of the translations of classical academic texts. And if we continue to ignore this problem, we will eventually lose the cultural war. In order to develop Ukrainian culture, we need to do some real work and have the resources. But how do we get access to the resources? We need to develop an understanding that such efforts must go beyond theoretical discussions and transition into the material realm. So, Ukrainians need to understand that other agencies and not just the armed forces need their financial support. But today the nation should rally behind its military, as our survival depends on it. Nonetheless, our long-term cultural survival depends on the support of cultural projects and academic research. We may not survive without it. Finally, our voice has been heard and we have to demonstrate some achievement as a result. In order to do that, we need to take stock of what we have; that is, we need to conduct an audit of our academic assets in a positive sense.
Kateryna Osypchuk
Regarding the Ukrainian presence on the international arena (including the global academic community) for the process to yield long-term results, we need to be discussing the decolonisation of our nation, knowledge, and research methodologies. We need to get our voice back and speak about what is important to us. Here’s what we need to know – how do we decolonise not just the institutions but also our research practices? And what should serve as a marker of our success?
Oleksandr Ivashyna
A while ago, I heard someone say that Ukrainian researchers and artists are specially invited to participate in events as a representative of ‘Ukrainian voices’. Ukrainian culture is treated as exotic: like, ‘and here have a subaltern group which speaks for Ukraine’. Our researchers should be taking part in discussions because of their exemplary achievements in the field and not because of their ethnicity. They should be judged based on their professional skill and not as part of some exotic creed. The hype around Ukraine will soon die down and there will be less interest, so we must focus on being professional, skilled, and provide the highest quality of academic research. This is the right way. It’s vital not to slide into being another exotic nation from Said’s Orientalism, but in the heart of Europe.
Kateryna Osypchuk
The Ukrainian nation has become a true symbol of invincibility and endurance. Quite often, Ukrainians are invited to participate in public events because of that. So, now we transition from one colonial existence to another. What is the right thing to do when the interest dies down, so the window of opportunity remains open for the Ukrainian researchers? How do we continue to make the Ukrainian voices heard without relying on the agenda promoted by international donors?
Oleksandr Ivashyna
There are Ukrainian researchers with long-standing connections to the international academic community. We just need to distinguish between market trends which are determined by the need to stay relevant within the academic community and other academic activities of larger social significance. In this respect the rise of Ukrainian soft power, it is absolutely vital for the marketing of Ukrainian culture and influence. We see how easy it was to label Ukraine ‘corrupt’ when the level of corruption in our country is probably the same as in other western nations. Thousands of Ukrainian casualties have changed that. We must remember that losing a reputation is easy, but earning a reputation is very hard work, especially within the academic community.
Kateryna Osypchuk
So, it’s all about safeguarding what we have and marketing our achievements in conjunction with establishing sustainable connections while being an integral part of the global academic community.
Oleksandr Ivashyna
In my opinion, such connections already exist. But it’s more important to make the activities visible — academic achievements must be endorsed and become part of public discussion. If academic achievements are not made public, they are worthless; so let them stay inside their academic bubbles. Naturally, there is a network of academic connections and it’s very well developed, but it’s not enough. If socially relevant research does not become public knowledge, what is it for?