The full-scale Russian war shattered (and continues to have a tremendous impact) the everyday lives and professional practices of people in Ukraine. In the early spring of 2022, many social scientists and historians started to reassemble their skills and apply them to the documentation of the present moment. As the war unfolds, their rapid responses adjust to new durations. During her presentation, Natalia will discuss transitioning from an emergency to a longitudinal approach in war documentation. Based on the example of the “24/02/22, 5 am: Testimonies of the War” international initiative, she will describe how scholars can implement a shared authority principle at different interview-based research stages. She will address multiple inherent challenges for the projects dealing with open-ended situations of protracted uncertainty and outline the venues for further developments of war-related initiatives.
Natalia Otrishchenko is a sociologist and researcher at the Center for Urban History in Lviv. She has been involved in many international projects, including the “Region, Nation and Beyond” at the University of St Gallen, “Memories of Vanished Populations” at Lund University, “Historical Cultures in Transition” at Collegium Civitas, and “Legacies of Communism?” at ZZF. In 2022–23, she conducted research as a Fulbright scholar at the Department of Sociology, Columbia University, USA. In 2023, she was a visiting professor at the School of Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences in Paris. In 2024–25, Nataila is a UNET Fellow at ZOiS. Since March 2022, she has led the Ukrainian team in the international documentation initiative “24.02.22, 5 am: Testimonies from the War”. Her academic interests include qualitative research methods, oral history, urban sociology, sociology of expertise, and spatial and social transformations after state socialism.
Tuesday, 12 November 2024
14.00 - 14.30
DH Lab, 1st floor Maison des Sciences humaines, Belval Campus
Portrait © Iryna Sereda, 2023 / Center for Urban History