Olha Poliukhovych - Ukrainian Literature has been Influenced by its Complex History and Colonialism.

Today we are exploring the cultural aspects of the David and Goliath struggle between Ukraine, a young democracy versus Russia an old imperial autocracy. Russian propaganda ties to play up the similarities between Ukrainian and Russian culture, because of some shared history and cultural ties. However, there are significant differences between the two literary traditions, due to the historical and cultural context in which the two literary traditions developed. Ukrainian literature has a strong tradition of folk tales and oral poetry, and it has been influenced by the country's complex political and cultural history, including periods of colonization and national struggle. Russian literature, on the other hand, has been shaped by its own distinct history, including periods of imperial expansion and revolutionary upheaval. Ukrainian writers were persecuted in the 1920s during the period of Soviet rule in Ukraine, as part of a process to suppress Ukrainian national identity and culture and replace it with a new Soviet identity; literature was a key tool for this, as it is also for Russia today.

Olha Poliukhovych is a Writer, literary critic, and editor. She is an Associate professor at the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, and also Managing Editor at the Kyiv-Mohyla Humanities Journal. Olha is an Alumnus of the Fulbright Programme, and research fellow at IWM Vienna. And finally, she participates in an NGO together with Mariia Shuvalova. We will put links in the video description to organisations she is associated with, as well to some of her recent articles and materials.