The conference, entitled Queering Central and Eastern Europe: national features of sexual identities, will take place on April 11, at UCL’s School of Slavonic and East European Studies (SSEES).

Devoted to the study of non-normative – or ‘queer’ – sexualities in Central and Eastern Europe, the conference will provide a forum to reflect on the diversity of issues and approaches in this relatively new research area.

It will adopt an interdisciplinary approach, bringing together scholars in the social sciences, history, Slavic and other area studies, as well as activists from lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) communities.

Among the themes the conference will examine will be how did queer sexualities in this region evolve historically, and what influence does that historical legacy impart today.  And what is unique about Central and Eastern European sexual identities, when compared within the region and with Western and other non-Western formations.

Dr Healey, a senior lecturer, will be present a research paper to delegates, entitled Sodomy and Homosociability in Leningrad Province in the 1950s.
He said: “I am very happy that Swansea and UCL-SSEES have collaborated to organise this unique gathering of scholars and activists.

“My own research paper looks at the history of emotional and sexual relationships between men in the region around Leningrad in the aftermath of the Second World War, using archival evidence including court records and photographs.”

For more information visit the conference website at http://queering-cee.blogspot.com/, and for more information about Swansea University’s History Department, visit http://www.swan.ac.uk/history/.