Vivliofika and the World 2024

Against the backdrop of the war in Ukraine the field of Eighteenth-Century Russian Studies is in something akin to crisis mode, which has produced deep and thought-provoking reflections on how or whether the field needs to be reconceptualized (or “decolonized” as some have framed it). This essay examines the nature of ourown journal, Вивлиофика, and its modest renaming, against the backdrop of this current rethinking. Itdiscusses these issues, first, by looking to its historical inspiration, N. I. Novikov’s, Древниая Российская Вивлиофика, in an effort to clarify Novikov’s own agenda(s) in producing it. The essay returns to the present,identifying various approaches current within empire studies that could embrace this decentering within an umbrella notion of “imperial spaces.”