Course co-directors: Ostap Sereda and Balázs Trencsényi
This course will be structured around the key contested issues in modern Ukrainian intellectual life. It will provide a historical overview of the main political, social, and cultural debates, starting from the Maksymovych-Pogodin controversy over the legacy of the ancient Kyivan state, focusing on the discussions around the main challenges of modernity that was initiated by Mykhailo Drahomanov, and then covering the literary plurality in Soviet Ukraine that survived until the main waves of Stalinist repressions, and the political polarization in interwar Western Ukraine. The course will also highlight the repercussions of these debates in the contemporary public sphere.