Bethan Winter (University of Oxford):

“Détente from Below: People-to-People Networks Across the Cold War Divide”

This talk introduces my current book project on the cultural history of détente from below, which focuses on various people-to-people networks between the UK and USSR/CSSR between the 1960s and 1990s. The project traces how individuals in the UK forged durable connections with counterparts across the Iron Curtain across a variety of fields and for a number of reasons. In this talk I will discuss three such stories, spanning nuclear physics, philosophy, and rock music, in order to demonstrate the breadth of arenas in which collaboration took root. By foregrounding the agency of the actors involved, the project argues that détente was not simply the outcome of high diplomacy but was actively co-produced from below through everyday practices of exchange, cooperation, and cultural engagement.

(po angielsku)

Moderacja: Jan Musekamp