Aleksandar Ranković, MRes

Aleksandar Ranković, MRes

Aleksandar Ranković is a PhD student at the Institute of Contemporary History at the University of Vienna. He was awarded a bachelor degree in Political Science from Sciences Po Paris and a master’s degree (with distinction) in East European Studies from the School of Slavonic and East European Studies (SSEES) at University College London. Furthermore, he spent a semester each at Boğaziçi University Istanbul and at the Free University Berlin. He is alumnus of the German Academic Scholarship Foundation (Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes).

His research focus lies at the intersection of the histories of transformation and gender in Yugoslavia and the post-Yugoslav space. In his doctoral thesis he deals with conscientious objectors and deserters in transformational Yugoslavia during the 1990s. A particular focus is placed on antimilitarist activism of Yugoslav feminists and homosexuals. Moreover, by examining the Yugoslav case, he investigates the issue of how historians of transformation can work with improvised and fragmentary activist “community archives”.

Abstract: „Transformation on the Margins? Conscientious Objection and Sexuality in late Yugoslavia” (working title)

This project investigates the agency of marginalized actors in the history of transformation. It will study the claims to validity of feminists, conscientious objectors, and homosexual individuals in late Yugoslavia. A variety of marginalized groups cooperatively engaged in anti-war initiatives on the eve of Yugoslav disintegration. While the continuity of their networks has been subject to sociological and anthropological studies, history of transformation has for long understudied the historical agency of marginalized groups in societies undergoing radical change. Integrating gendered perspectives of anti-war activism in the history of transformation will shed light on the double position of marginalized actors in historical processes of transformational societies.