Londongrad and Londongradians: Identities, Imaginaries, and Cultural Practices of Russians in the UK

Podcasts from the Londongrad workshop, organised within the AHRC-funded, Edinburgh University based project ‘Global Russians: Transnational Russophone Networks in the UK’. (PI: Lara Ryazanova-Clarke).

The Londongrad workshop was part of the four-year project ‘Global Russians: Transnational Russophone Networks in the UK’, which in itself is part of the ‘Cross-language Dynamics: Reshaping Communities’ OWRI Programme (led by Manchester University).

The workshop explored the imaginaries of ‘Londongrad’ – the British spaces populated and inflected by Russians.

  • What does it mean to be a ‘global Russian’ living in Britain?
  • How do the various art and media forms capture the life of Russians in the UK?
  • How do these forms mediate the language, experiences, behaviour and cultural practices, loyalties, and other attributes of ‘global Russians’?
  • And do these representations have a community building potential, contributing to the continuing disaporisation of Russians, to the development of Russophone networks and of the transnational interactions between Russians and the host culture?

The workshop addressed these and other relevant questions by bringing together academics, writers, journalists and actors whose work has reflected on the Russian community of ‘Londongrad’.

Link to the conference event description and full programme

Session 1

Robert Saunders (Farmingdale State College) - Imaginaries of Russian Expatria: Then and Now

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Roundtable

UK cultural institutions & creative professions in 'Londongrad' (Roman Borisovich, Alexander Kan, Anna Edovina, Pavel Iosad, and Karina Karmenian)

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Keynote

Alexander Kan (BBC Russian Service). ‘Russian Cultural Presence in London: a Snowballing Effect’

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Session 2

Anna Pechurina (Leeds Beckett University). ‘Here nobody knows my name’: Home and Belonging among Russian-speaking migrants in the UK

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Adrian Wanner (Pennsylvania State University). ‘Know Your Own:’ Michael Idov’s Londongrad and the Russian Culture Industry

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Lara Ryazanova-Clarke (Edinburgh University). Londongrad as a Linguistic Imaginary: Russian migrants in the UK in the work of Mikhail Idov and Andrei Ostalsky

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Session 3

Viktoria Merzliakova (Russian State University for Humanities, Moscow). Londongrad and Londongradians: a Russian media perspective

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Stephen Hutchings (Manchester University). Recent Televisual Representations of Russians in London: A Home from Home?

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Vlad Strukov (Leeds University). London(grad) as a Global Stage: Hypervisibility as a Soft Power Tool

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Session 4

Yulia Savikovskaia (Oxford University). Contemporary Russian migration to Great Britain as a theme for modern drama: Visions of home and abroad in a play ‘Tate Modern’ (Avtorsky Theatre, St Petersburg)

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Keynote

Roman Borisovich (‘Boris’ in the documentary ‘From Russia with Cash’). ‘Russian anticorruption campaign in the UK and its representations’: A Discussion.

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