Invitation to the conference Central European Masculinities. Norms and Transgressions

International conference Central European Masculinities. Norms and Transgressions will take place from September 29 to October 1, 2025, in the Lecture Hall of the University Library in Bratislava at Ventúrska 11. It will be held in English and is open to the public.
In recent decades, gender expectations and norms have undergone significant changes. Traditional notions of masculinity are increasingly being questioned, and new models of masculinity are emerging. However, although masculinity studies have been established as a field of research for more than three decades, they have not received sufficient attention in our environment.
The third event of the research project 𝐶𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑟𝑎𝑙 𝐸𝑢𝑟𝑜𝑝𝑒𝑎𝑛 𝑀𝑎𝑠𝑐𝑢𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑖𝑡𝑖𝑒𝑠 focuses on the period of cultural modernity, i.e. from the end of the 18th century to the 20th century (until the advent of postmodernism), but will also address contemporary forms of masculinity. The keynote speaker will be Anne Tomiche from the Sorbonne in Paris, who will give a presentation on dandyism in the avant-garde at the beginning of the 20th century. The individual panels will focus on themes such as the construction of the image of the nationalist man, Jewish masculinity in the modern era, the depiction of the male body at the turn of the century, the creation of modern masculinity in the 20th century, desire, difference and non-normativity, border spaces, and contemporary global challenges to masculinity.
Distinguished guests from academic institutions in Chicago, Rome, Haifa, Paris, Krakow, Berlin, Warsaw, Budapest, Belgrade, Rijeka, Prague, Katowice, Ostrava and Bratislava will present their contributions. The research project Central European Masculinities is a collaboration between the Institute of Literary Studies at the University of Silesia in Katowice, the Institute of Czech Literature and Comparative Literature at the Faculty of Arts of Charles University, the Institute for Czech Literature at the Czech Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Polish Culture at the University of Warsaw, the Center for Social Sciences in Budapest (HUN-REN-ELTE), the French Research Center for Humanities and Social Sciences in Prague (CEFRES, CNRS-MEAE), which is supported by the French Ministry of Higher Education and Research through the PARCECO program, and finally the Institute of Slovak Literature of the Slovak Academy of Sciences. It is held with the kind support of the University Library in Bratislava.