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MALKHAZ TORIA Professors

  • Malkhaz Toria received his doctoral degree (PhD) in history from Iv. Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University in 2009. The PhD thesis dealt with the “Perception of Time and a Sense of History in Medieval Georgian Culture”. He was a lecturer at the Institute of Cultural Studies at Iv. Javakhishili Tbilisi State University (2006-2008); a research fellow at the Department of the Caucasian Ethnology,  Iv. Javakhishvili Institute of History and Ethnology (2006-2010); an assistant professor at the History department of Ilia State University (2008-2014). Currently, he is an associate professor at the same department and the member of the Institute of  Comparative Literature within the School of Arts and Sciences. Since  2015 he serves as a director of the Memory Studies Center in the Caucasus at the School of Arts and Sciences. Within a  range of post-doctoral fellowships (DAAD, OSF, Fulbright, Rustaveli National Science Foundation, etc.) he conducted research projects at various institutions including Central European University (Budapest, Hungary) in 2009; Zentrum für Literatur-und Kulturforschung (Berlin) in 2010; New School for Social Research (NYC) in 2011 and 2016; Harriman Institute, Columbia University (NYC) in 2013; Mount Holyoke College (South Headley, Massachusetts, US ) in 2014; Humboldt University of Berlin in 2016. Results of his research projects are reflected in relevant teaching courses and academic publications.

    In 2021 Malkhaz Toria graduated from MA program in Sociology at the The New School for Social Research (NYC, the USA). Since fall 2021 he has embarked on pursuing a doctoral degree in sociology at the same institution. His PhD thesis titled as “History, Memory and Decisive Events:  the Genealogy of the Georgian-Abkhaz Conflict between the Emergence and Fall of the Soviet Empire” – is envisioned as a as social microhistory, a historical-sociological reconstruction, and analysis of the role of politics of memory and identity in an escalation of the Georgian-Abkhazian relationships during certain key occurrences thoughout the Soviet time (20-30s; 50s; 70s, and 80s of 20th century). The project will illuminate and analyze how the contested Georgian and Abkhazian historical narratives revealed and played out in complex social and political settings, in a real-life and everyday context.

    Scientific interests / research interests

    Malkhaz Toria’s  research interests focus on historical discourse in medieval Georgia; in “post truth” era, memory politics, instrumentalisation of the past and regional conflicts in post-Soviet Georgia; the role of Russain/Tsarist and Soviet imperial legacies in the creation of an ethnic and cultural landscape of Georgia; formation of dividing boundaries,  politics of exclusion and ethnic cleansing in modern breakaway Abkhazia region of Georgia.

    CONTACT

     malkhaz_toria@iliauni.edu.ge

  • Selected publications

    • “Narrating Conflicts in Post-Truth Era: Facing Revisionist Russia (Ukraine and Georgia in a Comparative Perspective)”. In History as an Instrument of the Contemporary International Conflicts, edited by Jan Rydel, the European Network of Remembrance and Solidarity (ENRS), 2021 (Co-author, forthcoming)
    • “In Search of Ethnic Roots: Instrumentalisation of the History and Politics of Exclusion in Georgia’s Breakaway Region of Abkhazia”.  The Instrumentalisation of the Past and Political Mobilisation, special issue of Euxeinos. Governance and Culture in the Black Sea Region, edited by Cécile Druey and Eliane Fitzé. Nr. 29 – 07 (2020): 47-62.
    • “Historical debates and the Likhni declaration as a decisive event in the Georgian-Abkhaz conflict”. In Identities and Representations in Georgia from the 19th Century to the Present, pp. 29-38, 2020. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter Oldenbourg. doi: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110663600-004
    • “Between Traditional and Modern Museology: Exhibiting National History in the Museum of Georgia”. In Museums and Sites of Persuasion. Politics, Memory and Human Rights, edited by Joyce Apsel and Amy Sodaro. Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2019, pp.39-54.
    • “Trapped in the past: silenced voices of Georgian IDPs and dilemmas of social integration”. Nationalities Papers, 2019. 47, Issue 3 May 2019 , pp. 429-444. (Co-author).
    • Remembering Homeland in Exile: Recollections of IDPs from the Abkhazia Region of Georgia” in Journal on Ethnopolitics and Minority Issues in Europe, Vol 14, No 1, 2015, 48-70.
    • The Soviet Occupation of Georgia in 1921 and the Russian-Georgian War of August 2008: Historical Analogy as a Memory Project“ in The Making of Modern Georgia, 1918–2012: The first Georgian Republic and its Successors. Ed. by Stephen F. Jones. London and New York: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2014, pp. 316-336.

    An extensive list of publications

    • “Historical Narratives and Medieval Georgian Historical Consciousness” in Mravaltavi: Philological-Historical Studies Vol. 24, Tbilisi, 2015. pp. 512-526.
    • “Projekty pamięci historycznej i polityka wykluczenia. Korzenie konfliktów etnicznych w Gruzji”, Między ideologią a socjotechniką. Kwestia mniejszości narodowych w działalności władz komunistycznych – doświadczenie polskie i środkowoeuropejskie, red. naukowa Magdalena Semczyszyn, Jarosław Syrnyk, Warszawa – Szczecin – Wrocław, 2014, 606 s. 523-531.
    • “Suchumi: antikes Erbe und umkämpfter Ort am Schwarzen Meer”, in OST-WEST. Europäische Perspektiven Schwerpunkt:
Hafenstädte in Mittel-und Osteuropa 2/2013, pp. 135-142.
    • “Soviet past, Memory Places and Iconoclasm in Modern Georgia”, in Civilization Researches, # 9, Tbilisi: Tbilisi State University Press, 2012. pp. 22-28 (In Georgian).
    • “Representation of the Struggle between David the Builder and Liparit Baguashi: Memory Strategies in Medieval Georgian Historiography” in Political Theology, edited by Giga Zedania, Tbilisi: Ilia State University Press, 2012. pp. 203- 217 (In Georgian)
    • “Norman Cohen: Pursuing of millennium” in History and Theory of Modernity. #1, Tbilisi: Ilia University Press, 2010. pp. 116- 127 (in Georgian)
    • “Using narratives of the past in conflict resolution and peace building process” in Conflict and Transformation: State Rhetoric, Search for Identity and Citizenship in the South Caucasus, Center for the Study of Caucasus and Black Sea Region. Tbilisi: The University of Georgia Press, 2010, pp. 227-232
    • “Perspectives of Georgian-Ossetian conflict resolution in the framework of alternative peace initiatives”. In Caucasian Ethnological Collection, XII. Tbilisi, 2010. pp. 44-56. (In Georgian)
    • “The Role of Identity seeking and Ethnic Mobilization process in escalation of Georgian-Ossetian Conflict in 90s of 20th” in Caucasian Ethnological Collection, XI. Tbilisi, 2009. pp. 113-125. (In Georgian)
    • “The problem of Interrelation between the Time Perception and the Genre of Historical Writing in the Middle Ages (Georgia and the Rest Christian World)” in Studies in Medieval History of Georgia. IX.Tbilisi, 2008.  pp.  47-54. (In Georgian)
    • “Modes of Remembering the Past and the Role of Historians in Formation of collective memory  (According to Georgian Historiography of the Middle Ages)” in Civilization Researches,  # 5, Tbilisi., 2007.pp. 50-53. (In Georgian)
    • “Theoretical legitimization” of Ethnic Cleansing in Modern Abkhazian Historiography (according to work of T. Achugba)” in Caucasian Ethnological Collection, X. Tbilisi, 2007. pp. 57-79. (In Georgian)
    • “Identity, Similarity and Difference as Factors for Intercultural Dialogue” in Proceedings of Round Table “Caucasus – Perspective of Intercultural Dialogue”, Tbilisi, 2007, pp.44-48. (Co-author). (In Georgian)
    • “The Role of Perception of Past and Politics of Memory in the Formation of Conflicting Identities the Journal” in Civilization Researches, # 4, Tbilisi. 2006. (In Georgian)
    • “Forms of Action on Time in “The History of King Vakhtang Gorgasali” by Juansheri and “Heimskringla” by Snori Sturluson” in Civilization Researches,  # 3, Tbilisi., 2005, pp. 7-13. (In Georgian)

  • BA Courses:

    • What is history: studying or ‘creating’ the past? (BA)
    • History of Abkhazia: Georgian and Abkhazian perspectives (BA)

    MA Courses:

    • Political and symbolic borders in Abkhazia region of Georgia (MA)
    • Collective memory, identity and politics (MA)
    • Perception of time and the sense of history in the Middle Ages (Georgian, Byzantine, and European historiography traditions) (MA)
    • Perception of time and historical discourse in medieval Georgia (MA)
    • Introduction to Historiography (schools etc.) (MA)