aaus-list @ ukrainianstudies.org -- Re: [aaus-list] Poltava 2009


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Wow, "tribal cyclic micronarratives" (including carefree Cossacks and  
every Amerindian culture from the Incas and Mayas to the Inuit) versus  
Washington, Shevchenko, Chavez, Ukrainian-Canadian pioneers and  
"linear, historical time" itself... Columbus certainly had a lot  
riding on his coattails. That seems exactly the kind of macronarrative  
(and apology for imperialism) that postcolonial critics have been  
trying to deconstruct all these years.

Respectfully,
Adrian Ivakhiv


Quoting "Rubchak, Bohdan" <kalush@uic.edu>:

>
> Natalko,
>
> it seems to me that Mykola Riabchuk's piece was conceived not so much to
> tell his readers that Catherine's monuments are out of place in Ukraine
> (which is surely obvious even to them), but that Christopher Columbus'
> monuments are out of place in the Americas, which they now would love to
> hear.
>
> The comparison between the two historical figures and situations strikes
> me as bizarre. Having oversimplified the recent criticisms by the
> postleninist left of the erection of new monuments to Christopher Columbus
> as a symbol (or even poetical signifier) of the oppression of the Indians,
> and hence the replacement of tribal micronarratives by national
> hypernarratives (let us remember that not only the United Stages but also
> Venezuela is involved), Mr. Riabchuk overlooks the fact that Columbus is a
> metaphor of the intervention of historical or linear time into tribal
> cyclical temporalities, with the happy result not only of Chavez and not
> so much of George Bush, but also of George Washington (of whom at least
> one Ukrainian spoke rather well), the American Constitution, the
> Ukrainian-Canadian pioneers, the awareness of the oppression of Native
> Americans in every American grammar school, and, finally, Fulbright
> fellowships. If Columbus did not exist, someone would have had to invent
> him.
>
> I really hope that a Russian wit does not take Mr. Riabchuk's unfortunate
> comparison a tiny step further and say that even as Columbus introduced
> historical time in the Americas, Catherine inroduced it in Ukraine, and by
> oppressing the carefree, tribal, singing and dancing Cossacks, made
> possible the birth of Taras Shevchenko, Ivan Franko, and last but by no
> means least, Mykola Riabchuk.
>
> Stay well,
>
> Bohdan
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On Wed, July 18, 2007 7:42 pm, Natalia Pylypiuk wrote:
>> The following article by Mykola Riabchuk implicitly addresses the
>> essence of such celebrations:
>>
>> *Shanuvaty kolumbiv i kayeryn krashche v barseloni ta Peterburzi*
>> http://www.gpu-ua.info/index.php?&id=171812
>> (10-VII-07)
>>
>>
>> |||||||||||||||||
>> Greetings!
>> Natalia Pylypiuk
>> University of Alberta
>>
>>
>> On Jul 11, 2007, at 2:51 PM, stephen velychenko wrote:
>>
>>> Putin and Poltava mayor  ready to celebrate glory of Russian arms.
>>> No statement from Kyiv yet.
>>>
> %3
>
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