Les échanges universitaires, la logique de bloc et l'esprit de guerre froide

Abstract

Résumé Katherine Verdery, anthropologue américaine spécialiste de la Roumanie socialiste, revient dans cet entretien sur plusieurs points importants de son parcours dans la guerre froide. Elle montre tout d’abord combien elle fut, intellectuellement et professionnellement, influencée par les effets structurants du conflit Est-Ouest. Elle souligne aussi combien la possibilité d’aller travailler sur le terrain, derrière le rideau de fer, changea sa perception du socialisme et lui permit de dissiper l’esprit de guerre froide. Elle revient enfin sur la question de la circulation des savoirs en anthropologie entre les États-Unis et la Roumanie, montrant que les obstacles rencontrés furent parfois créés par les contraintes de la guerre froide mais aussi souvent tout simplement liés à deux traditions intellectuelles différentes.

A Political Ethnography of Rural Communities under an Authoritarian Regime: The Case of Belarus

“…These arrival contexts influenced the definition of their research subjects. The Romanian sociologist Mihail Cerna, who had encouraged Katherine Verdery to study Romania, had explained to her before her departure that she “clearly must not submit a project that directly or indirectly concerns the functioning of the socialist system, but rather that [she should] choose a topic that interests the authorities, such as folklore” (Verdery and Faure, 2011: 202). Indeed,scientists in Central and Eastern Europe […] were in a quest to find the ‘people’, in their desire to build a nation and reveal its original nature.…”

“…Indeed,scientists in Central and Eastern Europe […] were in a quest to find the ‘people’, in their desire to build a nation and reveal its original nature. To this end, they did not require comparisons or theories but instead, they needed to accurately describe the local traditions (Verdery and Faure, 2011: 207).In 1967, Caroline Humphrey was supposed to be working on kinship in Buryatia, by outwardly adopting an approach that conformed to the Soviet principles of etnografiâ , which is similar to folklore studies (Gessat-Anstett, 2001: 66), but which was far removed from the perspectives of Western social anthropology. These activities could not therefore openly appear to be focused on the socialist system in force.…”

“…scientists in Central and Eastern Europe […] were in a quest to find the ‘people’, in their desire to build a nation and reveal its original nature. To this end, they did not require comparisons or theories but instead, they needed to accurately describe the local traditions (Verdery and Faure, 2011: 207).…”