Prof. Buchanan is one of fifteen talented scholars from Eastern Europe and North America convening for a two-week residency hosted by the American University in Bulgaria

The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign is proud to announce that Donna A. Buchanan will participate in the 2024 Summer Institute for the Study of East Central and Southeastern Europe (SISECSE), convened by the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) and the Centre for Advanced Study Sofia (CAS).

Buchanan is one of fifteen talented scholars from Eastern Europe and North America convening for a two-week residency hosted by the American University in Bulgaria from June 13-29, 2024 in Blagoevgrad, Bulgaria. SISECSE will provide the scholars with dedicated time for their own research and writing in a collaborative and interdisciplinary setting. Additionally, participants will have the opportunity to participate in small group writing workshops and a series of discussions on the topic “The Humanities and Interpretive Social Sciences in a Time of Emergency, or Thinking Urgently,” exploring how humanistic scholars and scholarship can foster resilience, empathy, and collective action.

Buchanan’s project involves the completion of a book, The Girl in the Bell: Cosmologies Ensounded in Bulgaria. Her research explores how the gendered “voices” of pastoral (herding) and ritual (church and mumming) bells make audible current beliefs about nature, the universe, spirituality, and heritage. The project documents how these bells are made, conceptualized, and played; how they are heard and valued; and, their gendered associations and role in devotional and musical practice. Buchanan’s analysis elucidates key facets of Bulgaria’s ongoing spiritual revival, namely music’s capacity to effect national-sacred power in postsocialist states.

“ACLS is excited to continue our successful partnership with the Centre for Advanced Study Sofia and convene leading scholars of East Central and Southeastern Europe in Bulgaria,” said Deena Ragavan, ACLS Director of International Programs. “The Summer Institute provides a vital opportunity for scholars to advance their own projects, as well as benefit from the perspectives of their fellow participants representing a diversity of institutions, geographic areas, and fields of study in the humanities.”

Now in its second year, the Summer Institute for the Study of East Central and Southeastern Europe is made possible by a generous donation from Carl and Betty Pforzheimer. The program builds on a long history of ACLS support for humanistic scholars and scholarship in Eastern Europe including the ACLS Humanities Program in Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine (1999-2010).