The Future Is History: How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia

by Masha Gessen

There was a caveat: Lyosha had to broaden his subject. He could, for example, include other minority groups in his research. He had to agree, especially because the entire class was fretting about its future: in previous years graduates had found work as political technologists, but with the withering of public politics, demand had plummeted. Still, during his first year Lyosha proposed the following research topic: “Sexual Minorities in Political Discourse.” “I like it very much,” his adviser said. “But you must understand that our academic council is very conservative, some members are very religious, so I’m afraid they won’t allow you to dissertate on this topic.” She spoke in jargon to him, because he was now a member of the academic club. They finally settled on “Minority discourse in public politics.” Lyosha would be looking at sexual and ethnic minorities, and at women as a minority group in politics. Lyosha started teaching, helping a slightly older friend who taught the university’s lone seminar on gender theory. He started publishing: the department’s annual included his paper on women as a political minority. His research was exhilarating. He discovered the word “queer,” wrote a paper on the evolution of the concept, and decided that it applied to him.