This symposium is a collaboration between the University of Michigan’s professor of Art & Design and Digital Studies Irina Aristarkhova and UCLA’s Slavist and curator Dr. Sasha Razor. It is focused on events that took place during the summer of 2020 in Belarus, bringing them into a broader discussion around digital citizenship, activism, and the new emerging scholarship. The symposium aims to introduce new concepts and approaches to imaginative activism, grounded in critical digital studies, feminist and new media theory, digital curation, contemporary art history, and information studies, in addition to the study of democracy and the Eastern European region.

Description: In the summer of 2020, many countries experienced protests against police violence and demanded democratic social change. A small country in Eastern Europe - Belarus - became one of the centers of global activism. Activists, IT professionals, artists, designers and neighbors teamed up to coordinate, connect, and amplify their work on digital platforms, such as Telegram, Instagram and Youtube, to overthrow the dictatorial regime. They created visual representation and identity of a social movement that now exists largely in digital formats and often made for digital platforms that themselves could be compromised and used against them. What is the role of scholars and librarians who study citizen activism, contemporary art and digital culture? What kind of new questions and solutions are posed by today’s digital citizens? Reimagining what these tools enable and how they can be used, and researching new forms of “imaginative activism,” are the primary goals of this interdisciplinary symposium and the digital exhibition curated by Sasha Razor at Michigan Libraries.

Symposium Program

PART 1 (10am-12pm)
"Digital Activism Roundtable of Artists,
Designers and Cyber-activists"
Yuliana Shemetovets
Andrew Maximov
Yanina Sazanovich
Maxim Tyminko
Anastasia Kostyugova
Moderated by Sasha Razor

PART 2 (1-2:45pm)
"Digital Citizenship and
Its Scholarly Discontents" Panel
Irina Aristarkhova
Fee Christoph
and Kendra Eaton
Elena Gapova
Georgy Mamedov
Moderated by Mikhail Krutikov

PART 3 (3-4pm)
Librarian Roundtable: "Saving the Future,
Archiving Digital Content"
Brendan Nieubuurt
Jamie Vander Broek
Anne Cong-Huyen
Anna Rakityanskaya
Moderated by Igor Pilshchikov

PART 4 (4:15-5:15pm)
Exhibition Launch: "The Code of Presence: Belarusian Protest Embroideries and Textile Patterns"
Rufina Bazlova
Lesia Pcholka
Daria Sazanovich
Yuliya Tsviatkova
Discussant: Alisa Lozhkina
Exhibition Curator and Moderator: Sasha Razor


Register for the Zoom Link here: https://umich.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJcpfuCspj0oEtzVzusHe2MCx64QCDmp7rCR