Alena Minchenia

The primary goal of my research project is to explore circulation and manifestations of emotionality of political protests in contemporary Belarus and interrelations of these protests with political uprisings in Central and Eastern Europe and Middle East and Northern Africa.

The research analyses how and by what means emotional intensities of political protests are sustained. I am interested in how gender, class and geopolitical asymmetries are (re)produced by discourses about political changes and how and what subject positions in respect to gender, class, location and age are constructed by experiences and discourses of dissent. I take as a case for my research numerous attempts of political mobilization in Eastern Europe and in Belarus, in particular.

Theoretically, I draw on two corresponding shifts:
- the general reconceptualization of emotions as social and reflective of a power structure rather than the inner self (e.g., Ahmed 2004, Lutz 1988, Svasek 2005);
- the claim of centrality of emotions for analysis of protest and politics (e.g. Jasper 1998,Flam 2004, Svasek 2005).