It seems that the Russian literary canon has survived and will survive. But the condition of the expertise on this canon hardly raises similar optimism. Interpretation of Russian classical literature is powerfully pressured from two sides: mass culture and messianism. On the hind, one could notice the aggressive agendas of neo-liberalism and of what might be called neo-nationalism (though both agendas could appeal to the values of a third one – of multiculturalism). It is a condition which is hardly new though its similes from the past might be difficult to identify; and its parameters in Russia and outside Russia are likely to differ. It is a condition which instigates the cultural instinct of preserving scholarship’s autonomy (in terms of subject as well as of social status) but it also forces us to face the question: what kind of thing is that core that we are trying to maintain? Besides, and probably as a part of the same situation, both literary canon and experts in it seem to loose influence against what seems a rival discourse and rival agents. That rival discourse – cinema – can easily be stigmatised as an instrument of ‘heteronomia’, as a tool of mass culture in particular. But it might occur that the sensitivity and the intelligence cinema is cultivating could not only differ from those cultivated by literature but exceed them or be more corresponding to the sensitivity of contemporary man.
We are inviting scholars from the field of Russian studies to discuss the mentioned and related issues. We are strongly encouraging contributions in Russian though such in English and in major Western languages are also invited. Yet the authors of the non-Russian language contributions shall be expected to deliver their papers and to respond in Russian, for the sake of a coherent discussion. The authors shall be expected to deliver close to final versions of their papers in Sofia, for they shall have no more than a week after the last day of the conference to elaborate them before submitting for publication. The papers shall be published in a thematic issue of an international journal in Slavic studies.

The contributors are welcome to consider the situation from different perspectives, such as:
– The Russian literary canon and the canon of Russian literary studies expertise: comparing their resistibility;
– Russian literature and criticism in Russia/on Russian literature under the pressure of messianism and mass-culture, today and once upon a time;
– The state, the market and the historical conscience of the academia as factors of pressure;
– Academic literary studies and literature in (the) time of post-art and post-aesthetics;
– The strip of autonomy within the field of scholarly production (in literary scholarship): who does (not) need it?
– The Russian Idea, Russian classical literature and multiculturalism;
– Russian classical literature and the cinema;
– Russian studies abroad: between their subject matter and their home context;
– Fashion and monumental isolation in Russian studies.

The submission must include an abstract in English or in Russian (100-200 words).

Organiser: Task Group on Russian Literature, Division of Comparative Literature, Institute for Literature, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences.
Organising committee: Yordan Lyutskanov (yljuckanov@gmail.com), Radostin Rusev (radrusev@abv.bg), Hristo Manolakev (h_manolakev@abv.bg).
Contact person: Yordan Lyutskanov.