Elisa Lucente earned her Ph.D. in History with honors from Pavia University, presenting a thesis titled "My Ukraine is Here: Journeys of Belonging - A Political and Cultural History of the Ukrainian Diaspora in Canada (1945-1991)." Her scholarly focus encompasses urban cultural studies, with specific research interests in spatiality, memory, and identity formation within migratory settings.
Contemporanea. Rivista di storia dell'800 e '900, 2023
Through the analysis of memoirs, newspaper articles, and oral history interviews, this article ex... more Through the analysis of memoirs, newspaper articles, and oral history interviews, this article explores the organizational efforts of Ukrainian women who found themselves in displaced person camps in postwar Europe. While they praised elements of domesticity and reiterated essentialized gendered roles of raising children and keeping houses, women nevertheless claimed an active involvement in political struggles, challenging the public-private distinction that relegates them to the domestic sphere. This case study enables the understanding of how discourses and institutions, both patriarchal and feminist, circulate in transnational milieus of nation-building, critically addressing the gendered logic through which the language of nationhood, belonging, and migration is not only constructed but also contested.
This article examines the post-Soviet as a category of analysis in the study of historical memory... more This article examines the post-Soviet as a category of analysis in the study of historical memory and nation-building in the former Soviet Union. Post-soviet memory suggests a continuum in space and time that will be critically addressed through the lens of a local case study, the borderland city of Lviv. Two questions structure the analysis: how we shape our surroundings and how they shape us. Following postcolonial theories derived from urban and memory studies, Lviv is presented as a palimpsest made of temporal, spatial or even imaginary layers from which it could be possible to recount the multiple narrations at play in the historical memory of the city. Finally, the paper questions whether the category of cultural hybridity may be instrumental in conceptualizing the multilayered structure of identification processes in the post-Soviet space, moving beyond cultural and national essentialism.
29 International Conference - Council of European Studies: “Europe’s past, present and future. Utopias and dystopias”, 2023
Lviv is a borderland city with a variegate past, that nowadays finds itself at the gates of the E... more Lviv is a borderland city with a variegate past, that nowadays finds itself at the gates of the European Union. Throughout the years this city has been a medieval Rus’ village, a town belonging to the Polish crown, the capital of the Galicia and Lodomera province of the Habsburg Empire and a modern centre during the inter-war Second Polish Republic. After the Nazi occupation and the chaotic war times, it was a strategic city of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic and finally it is thought nowadays as the “bastion” of nationalism in independent Ukraine. Known as Leopolis, Lemberg, Lwow, L’vov and L’viv, the urban space of this city is emblematic because it encloses much of central and eastern European history: from a variegate imperial heritage of religious and linguistic kaleidoscope to a top-down forced national uniformity. This presentation aims at discussing this peculiar aspect of Lviv considering its urban landscape as a palimpsest made of different, sometimes clashing, temporal layers. In the analysis, the city is considered as a “text” in order to highlight not only the author’s intentions (local and national authorities), but also the total arbitrariness of the readers’ interpretations (tourists and dwellers of the city). Specifically, I will emphasize the role that these different perceptions have in constructing local and national narratives and how they have shaped images of heroes, victims and enemies through time. Even though the national discourse stresses the “foreignness of the past”, depicting Polish, Jewish and Soviet heritages as something alien from Ukrainian Lviv, it will be concluded that the present is nothing more than the selective remembrance, manipulation and elaboration of all those multifaceted traces of past times.
Despite how trivial they may appear, beauty contests are a cultural practice where struggles over... more Despite how trivial they may appear, beauty contests are a cultural practice where struggles over power and representation are on display. Some scholars have already located beauty pageants in dominant discourses of patriarchy and nationalism (Banet-Weiser 1999; Balogun 2012), but only a few have addressed their significance in diasporic communities, especially in countries where minorities constitute key components of the national mosaic (Ferrules 2019). In this context, the presentation discusses a peculiar practice of belonging enacted by the Ukrainian diaspora in Canada during the Cold War, that is the organization of the “Miss Kiev” pageant in Winnipeg,
the city where prime minister Pierre Trudeau, addressed the anti-soviet Ukrainian diaspora to announce the policy of “multiculturalism within a bilingual framework” in 1971. To apply as “Miss Kiev” participants had to write an essay on whether «the retention of the Ukrainian cultural heritage is important in today’s world», some of which are still preserved in the Sylvia Todaschuk fonds at the University of Manitoba. Through the analysis of these entry forms, complemented by oral history interviews and newspaper articles, this paper attempts at detangling the complex and multifaceted construction of collective identities within the Ukrainian diaspora in Canada on two levels. On the one hand, I question what it meant to be Ukrainian for a young woman in Canada and how diasporic identities reiterate and readapt the motherland traditions through performances and practices of belonging. On the other, I contextualize this event in the wider framework of the Canadian “politics of multiculturalism” analyzing how this collective identity both influenced and has been influenced by it.
Social Science History Association Annual Conference (Chicago 2022), 2022
The Second World War set in motion an unprecedented dislocation of population, with over sixty mi... more The Second World War set in motion an unprecedented dislocation of population, with over sixty million people displaced throughout Europe, North Africa, the Middle East, and the Far East . Within the larger post-Second World War refugee and displaced person population, Ukrainians comprised the greatest portion of Soviet citizens repatriated voluntarily or by force at the war’s end. However, more than 200,000 among them voted with their feet. They refused to return to their former homes and found themselves stranded in displaced person camps across western occupation zones in Germany, Austria, and Italy. As early as May 1945, Ukrainians who refused to be repatriated claimed their recognition as a separate nationality. Therefore, DPs camps swiftly became active political and social centers that provided an opportunity for them to develop a “Ukraine in exile”, where the institutional life flourished together with feelings of commitment to the cause of independent statehood. Undoubtedly, in this peculiar nation-building situation, a strong emphasis was placed on the education for the “children of the war”, since they made up for about a quarter of the total Ukrainian DP population. Several studies have examined the centrality of children in the organizational system of DP camps . However, research was mainly limited to the effort that the adults devoted to arranging schools, educational curricula, programs, and after-school activities. Drawing on these analyses, the purpose of this work is to show how children viewed and understood their day-by-day experiences and to investigate how they conceived of themselves in relation to the tumultuous world in which they lived. Challenging the idea that DP camps are associated only with trauma and hardship, this contribution studies this Ukraine en miniature from a children’s point of view. Furthermore, the paper engages with the voices of adults who endured displacement as children, analyzing how the camp culture left its mark on them after resettlement. The analysis concentrates on Ukrainian refugees and DPs who migrated to Canada from Germany and Austria in the aftermath of the Second World War and considers the impact that this specific receiving context had in shaping narratives and memories of displacement in the following decades. Methods and theories are derived from microhistory and anthropology and the study employs a variety of sources, such as oral history interviews , oral sources, correspondence, and memoirs of former DPs collected in several Canadian institutions . By addressing questions of childhood, spatiality and mobility, the paper aims to extend prior work in adult-centric migration research looking at this historically situated in-between space of displacement through the lens of children’s eyes.
Conflicting subjects. Between clash and recognition, 2022
By examining newspaper articles, celebratory pamphlets and monuments, the article discusses the c... more By examining newspaper articles, celebratory pamphlets and monuments, the article discusses the conflict that emerged around the symbol of Taras Ševčenko in the Ukrainian diaspora on the occasion of the Centenary of the poet's death in 1961 in Canada. The symbolic conflict is articulated as a dispute over identity and ideology which is inscribed in the overall framework of the "battle for the hearts and minds" that crossed the second half of the twentieth century in Canada.
Contemporanea. Rivista di storia dell'800 e '900, 2023
Through the analysis of memoirs, newspaper articles, and oral history interviews, this article ex... more Through the analysis of memoirs, newspaper articles, and oral history interviews, this article explores the organizational efforts of Ukrainian women who found themselves in displaced person camps in postwar Europe. While they praised elements of domesticity and reiterated essentialized gendered roles of raising children and keeping houses, women nevertheless claimed an active involvement in political struggles, challenging the public-private distinction that relegates them to the domestic sphere. This case study enables the understanding of how discourses and institutions, both patriarchal and feminist, circulate in transnational milieus of nation-building, critically addressing the gendered logic through which the language of nationhood, belonging, and migration is not only constructed but also contested.
This article examines the post-Soviet as a category of analysis in the study of historical memory... more This article examines the post-Soviet as a category of analysis in the study of historical memory and nation-building in the former Soviet Union. Post-soviet memory suggests a continuum in space and time that will be critically addressed through the lens of a local case study, the borderland city of Lviv. Two questions structure the analysis: how we shape our surroundings and how they shape us. Following postcolonial theories derived from urban and memory studies, Lviv is presented as a palimpsest made of temporal, spatial or even imaginary layers from which it could be possible to recount the multiple narrations at play in the historical memory of the city. Finally, the paper questions whether the category of cultural hybridity may be instrumental in conceptualizing the multilayered structure of identification processes in the post-Soviet space, moving beyond cultural and national essentialism.
29 International Conference - Council of European Studies: “Europe’s past, present and future. Utopias and dystopias”, 2023
Lviv is a borderland city with a variegate past, that nowadays finds itself at the gates of the E... more Lviv is a borderland city with a variegate past, that nowadays finds itself at the gates of the European Union. Throughout the years this city has been a medieval Rus’ village, a town belonging to the Polish crown, the capital of the Galicia and Lodomera province of the Habsburg Empire and a modern centre during the inter-war Second Polish Republic. After the Nazi occupation and the chaotic war times, it was a strategic city of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic and finally it is thought nowadays as the “bastion” of nationalism in independent Ukraine. Known as Leopolis, Lemberg, Lwow, L’vov and L’viv, the urban space of this city is emblematic because it encloses much of central and eastern European history: from a variegate imperial heritage of religious and linguistic kaleidoscope to a top-down forced national uniformity. This presentation aims at discussing this peculiar aspect of Lviv considering its urban landscape as a palimpsest made of different, sometimes clashing, temporal layers. In the analysis, the city is considered as a “text” in order to highlight not only the author’s intentions (local and national authorities), but also the total arbitrariness of the readers’ interpretations (tourists and dwellers of the city). Specifically, I will emphasize the role that these different perceptions have in constructing local and national narratives and how they have shaped images of heroes, victims and enemies through time. Even though the national discourse stresses the “foreignness of the past”, depicting Polish, Jewish and Soviet heritages as something alien from Ukrainian Lviv, it will be concluded that the present is nothing more than the selective remembrance, manipulation and elaboration of all those multifaceted traces of past times.
Despite how trivial they may appear, beauty contests are a cultural practice where struggles over... more Despite how trivial they may appear, beauty contests are a cultural practice where struggles over power and representation are on display. Some scholars have already located beauty pageants in dominant discourses of patriarchy and nationalism (Banet-Weiser 1999; Balogun 2012), but only a few have addressed their significance in diasporic communities, especially in countries where minorities constitute key components of the national mosaic (Ferrules 2019). In this context, the presentation discusses a peculiar practice of belonging enacted by the Ukrainian diaspora in Canada during the Cold War, that is the organization of the “Miss Kiev” pageant in Winnipeg,
the city where prime minister Pierre Trudeau, addressed the anti-soviet Ukrainian diaspora to announce the policy of “multiculturalism within a bilingual framework” in 1971. To apply as “Miss Kiev” participants had to write an essay on whether «the retention of the Ukrainian cultural heritage is important in today’s world», some of which are still preserved in the Sylvia Todaschuk fonds at the University of Manitoba. Through the analysis of these entry forms, complemented by oral history interviews and newspaper articles, this paper attempts at detangling the complex and multifaceted construction of collective identities within the Ukrainian diaspora in Canada on two levels. On the one hand, I question what it meant to be Ukrainian for a young woman in Canada and how diasporic identities reiterate and readapt the motherland traditions through performances and practices of belonging. On the other, I contextualize this event in the wider framework of the Canadian “politics of multiculturalism” analyzing how this collective identity both influenced and has been influenced by it.
Social Science History Association Annual Conference (Chicago 2022), 2022
The Second World War set in motion an unprecedented dislocation of population, with over sixty mi... more The Second World War set in motion an unprecedented dislocation of population, with over sixty million people displaced throughout Europe, North Africa, the Middle East, and the Far East . Within the larger post-Second World War refugee and displaced person population, Ukrainians comprised the greatest portion of Soviet citizens repatriated voluntarily or by force at the war’s end. However, more than 200,000 among them voted with their feet. They refused to return to their former homes and found themselves stranded in displaced person camps across western occupation zones in Germany, Austria, and Italy. As early as May 1945, Ukrainians who refused to be repatriated claimed their recognition as a separate nationality. Therefore, DPs camps swiftly became active political and social centers that provided an opportunity for them to develop a “Ukraine in exile”, where the institutional life flourished together with feelings of commitment to the cause of independent statehood. Undoubtedly, in this peculiar nation-building situation, a strong emphasis was placed on the education for the “children of the war”, since they made up for about a quarter of the total Ukrainian DP population. Several studies have examined the centrality of children in the organizational system of DP camps . However, research was mainly limited to the effort that the adults devoted to arranging schools, educational curricula, programs, and after-school activities. Drawing on these analyses, the purpose of this work is to show how children viewed and understood their day-by-day experiences and to investigate how they conceived of themselves in relation to the tumultuous world in which they lived. Challenging the idea that DP camps are associated only with trauma and hardship, this contribution studies this Ukraine en miniature from a children’s point of view. Furthermore, the paper engages with the voices of adults who endured displacement as children, analyzing how the camp culture left its mark on them after resettlement. The analysis concentrates on Ukrainian refugees and DPs who migrated to Canada from Germany and Austria in the aftermath of the Second World War and considers the impact that this specific receiving context had in shaping narratives and memories of displacement in the following decades. Methods and theories are derived from microhistory and anthropology and the study employs a variety of sources, such as oral history interviews , oral sources, correspondence, and memoirs of former DPs collected in several Canadian institutions . By addressing questions of childhood, spatiality and mobility, the paper aims to extend prior work in adult-centric migration research looking at this historically situated in-between space of displacement through the lens of children’s eyes.
Conflicting subjects. Between clash and recognition, 2022
By examining newspaper articles, celebratory pamphlets and monuments, the article discusses the c... more By examining newspaper articles, celebratory pamphlets and monuments, the article discusses the conflict that emerged around the symbol of Taras Ševčenko in the Ukrainian diaspora on the occasion of the Centenary of the poet's death in 1961 in Canada. The symbolic conflict is articulated as a dispute over identity and ideology which is inscribed in the overall framework of the "battle for the hearts and minds" that crossed the second half of the twentieth century in Canada.
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Papers by Elisa Lucente
Two questions structure the analysis: how we shape our surroundings and how they shape us. Following postcolonial theories derived from urban and memory studies, Lviv is presented as a palimpsest made of temporal, spatial or even imaginary layers from which it could be possible to recount the multiple narrations at play in the historical memory of the city. Finally, the paper questions whether the category of cultural hybridity may be instrumental in conceptualizing the multilayered structure of identification processes in the post-Soviet space, moving beyond cultural and national essentialism.
Conference Presentations by Elisa Lucente
the city where prime minister Pierre Trudeau, addressed the anti-soviet Ukrainian diaspora to announce the policy of “multiculturalism within a bilingual framework” in 1971. To apply as “Miss Kiev” participants had to write an essay on whether «the retention of the Ukrainian cultural heritage is important in today’s world», some of which are still preserved in the Sylvia Todaschuk fonds at the University of Manitoba. Through the analysis of these entry forms, complemented by oral history interviews and newspaper articles, this paper attempts at detangling the complex and multifaceted construction of collective identities within the Ukrainian diaspora in Canada on two levels. On the one hand, I question what it meant to be Ukrainian for a young woman in Canada and how diasporic identities reiterate and readapt the motherland traditions through performances and practices of belonging. On the other, I contextualize this event in the wider framework of the Canadian “politics of multiculturalism” analyzing how this collective identity both influenced and has been influenced by it.
Two questions structure the analysis: how we shape our surroundings and how they shape us. Following postcolonial theories derived from urban and memory studies, Lviv is presented as a palimpsest made of temporal, spatial or even imaginary layers from which it could be possible to recount the multiple narrations at play in the historical memory of the city. Finally, the paper questions whether the category of cultural hybridity may be instrumental in conceptualizing the multilayered structure of identification processes in the post-Soviet space, moving beyond cultural and national essentialism.
the city where prime minister Pierre Trudeau, addressed the anti-soviet Ukrainian diaspora to announce the policy of “multiculturalism within a bilingual framework” in 1971. To apply as “Miss Kiev” participants had to write an essay on whether «the retention of the Ukrainian cultural heritage is important in today’s world», some of which are still preserved in the Sylvia Todaschuk fonds at the University of Manitoba. Through the analysis of these entry forms, complemented by oral history interviews and newspaper articles, this paper attempts at detangling the complex and multifaceted construction of collective identities within the Ukrainian diaspora in Canada on two levels. On the one hand, I question what it meant to be Ukrainian for a young woman in Canada and how diasporic identities reiterate and readapt the motherland traditions through performances and practices of belonging. On the other, I contextualize this event in the wider framework of the Canadian “politics of multiculturalism” analyzing how this collective identity both influenced and has been influenced by it.