The Myth of Circassian Beauty: Chauvinism, Racism and Sexual Fantasy

The Faculty of Philology at Vilnius University is pleased to announce that Alexander Maxwell, an Associate Professor and renowned researcher of linguistic nationalism from Victoria University Wellington in New Zealand, will give a lecture entitled 'The Myth of Circassian Beauty: Chauvinism, Racism and Sexual Fantasy', on 4 December at 17:00 in the Krėvės room.

Abstract: Circassian women once had a pan-European reputation for extraordinary beauty. Given the general human tendency toward self-praise, and particularly the racial/national chauvinism widespread in nineteenth-century Europe, popular belief that the world’s most beautiful women came from a Russian-Turkish borderland calls for some explanation. This paper suggests two causes. Firstly, Enlightenment racial “science” and particularly German professor Johann Blumenbach, imagined Circassia as the Indo-European homeland: by praising Circassian women, would-be Aryans were praising themselves. Secondly, Circassia exported women for the Ottoman slave trade, which linked Circassia to European harem fantasies.

We would like to invite everyone to attend this lecture given by the Associate Professor Alexander Maxwell and explore new perspectives.

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