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THE SEMIOTICS OF AUGUST IN THE 20th CENTURY 





Dear colleague,



I am delighted to invite you to participate in a special edition of the New Literary Observer, currently featuring the working title “The semiotics of August in the 20th century”.



This special edition is a continuation of a large-scale NLO project that aims to apply an anthropological perspective in rethinking the processes of transformation of modern societies, to formulate new interdisciplinary approaches to studying human history, and to work up a new scientific paradigm capable of stimulating the development of up-and-coming practices in the humanities



The edition will investigate the extent to which the life of the private individual has fundamentally changed as a result of the global cataclysms of the 20th century: the world wars, intellectual, social and scientific-technological revolutions and the geopolitical reshaping of the world.



The “short” 20th century, according to Eric Hobsbawm, opened in August 1914 and ended in August 1991. Upon closer inspection, we see that in the last century August constituted a deeply symbolic time (especially for Russia) – many events of profound importance, which determined abrupt turning-points in history, took place in that very month. With reference to well-known dates, we can present a basic periodicisation of the 20th century as follows:



1. August 1914 (beginning of the First World War) – August 1939 (beginning of the Second World War) 2. August 1939 – August 1945 (end of the Second World War) 3. August 1945 – August 1968 (invasion of Soviet tanks into Czechoslovakia, student unrest in Europe) 4. August 1968 – August 1991 (disintegration of unified Communist space) 



While acknowledging the conditional character of such a periodicisation, we nevertheless believe it to be a useful tool to use in realising the basic aim of the investigation. Our task lies in testing the validity of the generally accepted opinion, that the beginning of the First World War marked the end of the belle epoque and a radical break with the existing value system, way of life and goal-setting of modern European society of the previous period.



Our particular interest in Augusts as the high points of social bifurcation in the 20th century was dictated by our belief that it is precisely at such moments of the collapse of civilisation that the hidden carcass of culture reveals itself, that is, the whole multiform system of customary lifestyle and values-based practices hit hardest by the change. In his attempt to re-establish the disintegrated sense of continuity, the private individual tries to reconstruct the traditional order of things, while at the same time inevitably reformulating and transforming tradition itself.



We propose to analyse how, in the midst of the elemental process of the normalisation of life at key moments in the world cataclysms of the 20th century, the private individual gave meaning to and recreated his existence in the totality of personal and social ties. For instance, we will examine modifications in:

-	relationships between friends, lovers, family members, professionals and partners;

-	everyday practices, lifestyle, habitat;

-	the selection of beliefs, ethical values and behavioural models;

-	the boundaries between the public and private sphere;

-	individual and collective memory;

-	forms of social stratification and mobility;

-	individual and collective identity:

-	intellectual and artistic reflection (scientific discoveries and the concept of the human being, the value of human life, the boundaries between nature and culture, etc.) . 



From the point of view of the anthropological approach, each of the above-mentioned historical periods and overall:

-	in which spheres of the private individual's life did the most radical changes take place?

-	where did the customary framework for existence remain unchanged despite global catastrophes and revolutionary discoveries?

-	what is the correlation between “loss” and “gains”?

-	what are the differences in the new life experience of people living in “open” and “closed” societies?

-	how traditionally do the documents from this period being used by the researchers reflect the depth and essence of the changes?



Articles should be submitted no later than 15 April 2012.





Respectfully yours,



 

Irina Prokhorova

Editor-in-chief

New Literary Observer