The Duck of Minerva

Elizaveta Gaufman is Assistant Professor of Russian Discourse and Politics at the University of Groningen, the Netherlands. She is the author of "Everyday Foreign Policy: Performing and Consuming the Russian Nation after Crimea" (2023) and "The Trump Carnival: Populism, Transgression and the Far Right" (2024).

Recent Posts

Motherland Calls

Motherland Calls

by | 30 June, 2017 | ,

Y’all are probably sick and tired of hearing about Russia: hacking, colluding, obstructing, peeing, meddling, trolling, spying... I'm waiting in terror to see what Stephen Colbert has filmed in the Motherland. So far, his mispronouncing of Sergey Kislyak’s name together with fur hat clad ‘Russian hackers’ with vodka and thick accents have not been particularly impressive. To quote Seth Meyers and Amy Poehler, ‘Really?’ Throw in a mail-order bride and we have a full house of Russian stereotypes. Has American TV not been able to come up with anything new since Boris and Natasha? Yes, Russia is...

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Trolling Me Softly

Trolling Me Softly

by | 30 May, 2017 | ,

While the Russia probe is expanding to include naïve 36-year old Harvard graduates, pundits all over the world have been worried about elections in other countries. The massive WikiLeaks dump (pun intended) on Emmanuel Macron’s campaign in France did not work, so the next troublesome case seems to be Germany (the UK is fine, they are already leaving the EU). As Quattrociocchi et al. note, the so-called ‘echo-chambers’ on social media reinforce selective exposure and group polarization, further radicalizing the political debate that is  already polarized in the US. With 62% of American adults...

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It’s Not Easy Being Green

It’s Not Easy Being Green

by | 28 April, 2017 | , ,

A dilute alcoholic solution of Brilliant Green (Viridis nitentis spirituosa) is a topical antiseptic, effective against gram-positive bacteria, also known under a Russian colloquial name zelyonka. If you grew up in the Soviet Union and ever had chicken pox, zelyonka turned you into a green-spotted leopard for at least a week: it’s hard to get it out of your skin. Brilliant green has, however, some serious safety issues: when ingested it can induce vomiting and contact with eyes can lead  to grave injuries, even blindness. This is what a prominent Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny...

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If You Post It, They Will Come

If You Post It, They Will Come

by | 29 March, 2017 |

I know most of you are busy watching the all-too-real reality horror show of the 45th administration, but there has been some interesting news coming  out of Russia (sorry, no meteorites or Putin's nipples). On Sunday, somehow almost 90  thousand people went out on the streets in 87 cities all over Russia to protest against corruption. The unsanctioned demonstrations were met with brutal police crackdown with around 1000 protesters arrested in Moscow alone. To make matters worse, none of the TV channels reported the disturbances (apart from Russia Today, to be fair). Channel One spent about...

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The Trump Syllabus: Duck Input Needed!

by | 24 March, 2017 | , ,

Even though ISA provided some much-needed group therapy, in the end we still need to grapple with and teach about #45. I was inspired by some ideas in syllabi 1, 2, and 3, but I also needed some background information and topics that are geared towards a non-American audience. On top of it, I left the theme of one session open for the students to decide on. So below is roughly what my students are  in for at the University of Bremen.  Any ideas how to improve it? Unit 1: Sources DEMAGOGUERY AND DEMOCRACY Finley, M. (1962). Athenian Demagogues. Past & Present, (21), 3-24. Further reading:...

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Girl Power

Girl Power

by | 8 March, 2017 | , ,

Women in academia do not enjoy an easy ride. Even though “manel” count at this year’s ISA was much lower, there is still work to be done. Not to mention the recent scandal about the epidemic levels of  sexual harassment at the UK universities. But let's rejoice at the thought that a mere hundred years ago things were much worse. My university campus in Bremen has a Lise-Meitner-Strasse and the International Women's Day is a good opportunity to share her story. In short,  Hidden Figures needs to have a German prequel. Lise Meitner was born in 1878 into an upper-class Jewish family in Vienna...

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Black History Month

Black History Month

by | 28 February, 2017 | , ,

Do you think this person is white? If you are from Europe or North America, you might have said yes. If you are from Russia, you might have described this person as black. Most IR peeps are familiar with the fluid perceptions of whiteness and blackness that exist in the word: Sandor Gilman wrote, for instance, how Irish immigrants in the US in the beginning of the century were often considered black. The irony of blackness could not be more poignant in Russia: the famous Russian Armenian actor Frunzik Mkrtchan whose picture I put above is literally Caucasian, because he comes from the South...

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What’s worse, looking jealous or crazy?

What’s worse, looking jealous or crazy?

by | 7 February, 2017 | ,

When President Trump and Press Secretary Spicer started to insist that the protest against Muslim ban [that is not a ban] was paid for, it rang a bell. This kind of rhetoric is a textbook reaction from an autocratic ruler who cannot believe that people would care enough about human rights to go out on the streets on their own. Unfortunately for all the autocrats in the world, people would. The success of the protest is hard to predict, especially in a democratic country, but if people are protesting against you, the first thing to do is to try and delegitimize it. Here is how. The wave of...

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Talk Intel To Me

Talk Intel To Me

by | 31 January, 2017 | , ,

I remember laughing about an article in The Medium about a TV Sitcom that triggered the downfall of Western Civilization. In case you were wondering, it’s Friends with its “tragic hero” Ross Geller. The author lamented the awful mistreatment of the most cerebral character on the show that signified the harsh embrace of anti-intellectualism in America in the early 2000s. For instance, most of Ross’s academic stories were cut off by his bored friends and audience laughter. Why? Maybe some people would like to know more about sediment flow rate?! In the age of an amazing accessibility of...

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#RussiansDidit

#RussiansDidit

by | 28 December, 2016 | ,

Putin’s annual press conference is a chance for regular citizens to spend 3 hours in a great and rich Russia, where everything is in order and Putin is capable of installing presidents in foreign countries (according to one journalist). In general, the press conference strived to paint a picture of a great power facing some economic problems and who is constantly challenged by other countries (they are probably jealous and/or Russophobic). For me it was also a chance to wonder at Putin’s stamina. He might not be Superman, as one of the posters brought by the journalists stipulated, but his...

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