Emerging Voices in REEES Colloquium | Milica Popović

Event time: 
Wednesday, December 1, 2021 - 2:00pm to 3:00pm
Location: 
Online See map
Speaker/Performer: 
Milica Popović, Postdoctoral Fellow, Central European University
Event description: 

The fifth colloquium in the series features Milica Popović, Postdoctoral Fellow, Central European University. She will present on “Deconstructing Yugonostalgia – the case of the (post)Yugoslav political actors: the last pioneers.”

Register to Attend on Zoom: https://bit.ly/REEES-MPFall2021
At the intersections of political science and cultural memory studies, my research analyzes Yugonostalgic memory narratives of the generation of the last pioneers (born between 1974 and 1982), in three (post)Yugoslav countries: Slovenia, Croatia and Serbia. Implementing Constructivist Grounded Theory (Charmaz, 2004), through political ethnography, in-depth interviews and participant observation, in the course of 2017 and 2018, I interviewed 62 political actors across the political spectrum. Conceptualizing nostalgia as a contentious expression, I argue that nostalgic memory narratives provide a safe space for cognitive dissonances of the last pioneers in their life (hi)stories, primarily dialoguing with their generational and political positionalities. Re-defining the multitude of contents of Yugonostalgia, interconnected yet separate from Yugoslavism, helps us understand the discursive memory battles in the (post)Yugoslav space and the transformation of memory narratives into collective and political phenomena.
Bio:
Milica Popović is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the OSUN Global Observatory on Academic Freedom, at the Central European University in Vienna. She obtained her PhD in Comparative Political Sociology at the Doctoral School of Sciences Po Paris, affiliated with CERI (Center for International Studies), and in Balkan Studies at the University of Ljubljana in 2021, under the title “(Post)Yugoslav memories as resistance strategies – Understanding the political significance of Yugonostalgia”. Her academic research interests are primarily focused in the field of Memory Studies, looking into transmission of memory within post-socialist contexts and the interplays between memory and nostalgia and the political identities.
Popović has obtained a MA degree in Political Science at the University Paris 2 Panthéon-Assas and BA in Law at the University of Belgrade. Popović is a member of the editorial committee of the journal “Balkanologie” and an active member of the Memory Studies Association, the French Association of Balkan Studies and as the member of the Administrative Board of the French Association for Russian and East European Studies (SFERES). Her most recent publications include “Yugo-nostalgia and the return of former state borders”, co-authored with prof. Jacques Rupnik (Enciclopedia Italiana, 3/2, 2019), “Yugonostalgia – the Meta-National Memory Narratives of the Last Pioneers” (Yugonostalgia on the Move, Museum of Yugoslavia, 2018) and “Exhibiting Yugoslavia” (Družboslovne Razprave, 81/32, 2016).
In parallel to her academic career and teaching experience at Sciences Po in Paris, Popović gained 20 years of professional experience within international organizations, on judiciary and rule of law reforms, and primarily in the field of Higher Education. Popović has been participating in the building of the European Higher Education Area since 2003, and she has worked as an independent researcher and consultant in the field for the last ten years on numerous projects of the Council of Europe, the European Commission and many others.

Admission: 
Free but register in advance