Dr. Mayhill C. Fowler, Associate Professor of History and Director of the Program in Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies at Stetson University

What stories do we tell about war? The military districts on the borders of the Soviet Union sponsored professional theaters: to raise morale, build community, and entertain the troops fighting the Cold War, and war stories were at the heart of their repertory. My book project focuses on one such military theater, on the frontlines of Soviet socialism, performing from Lviv to Kabul: the "Russian Dramatic Theater of the Sub-Carpathian Military District," or Teatr PrikVO. Through this institution, its people, its location, and its audiences, we can trace the shifting role of the public, the state, and the arts in the postwar Soviet Union and in wartime Ukraine today. In addition to researching book project, Mayhill hopes to contribute to the ongoing and important conversation about contemporary theater and the Soviet past through engagement with students, by teaching at the Faculty of Theater Studies and Performing Arts at Ivan Franko State University, and working with Lviv Interactive project and with the Center’s online resources about theater in the postwar period.