“So that my son would be proud of me”: Prof. Vitalii Andreiev opened History Week at BSPU

On April 28, 2026, History Week was started at Berdyansk State Pedagogical University. The first event of the series was an open narrative titled “The Historian and the War,” presented by Vitalii Andreiev – Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor, Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities at Borys Grinchenko Kyiv Metropolitan University, researcher of the intellectual history of Ukraine, and author of numerous scholarly works on archeography, ethnography, literary criticism, and the history of historical science.

The meeting began with a minute of silence in honor of the fallen defenders of Ukraine. For Vitalii Andreiev, the war is not only a subject of research but also a personal chapter of his life: from the first days of the full-scale invasion, he and his son joined the ranks of the defenders of the capital. During the first weeks, they directly fought against the enemy. Today, the professor’s son continues to defend the country at the front. When asked where he finds his strength, the guest of the meeting answered sincerely: “I work so that people would be proud of me, and so that my son would be proud of me.”

During this meeting, special attention was paid to the guest’s participation in the publication of the book “Ban Rashism.” Vitalii Andreiev shared an interesting fact: upon reviewing the manuscript, he noted the absence of an analysis of the origins and nature of Russian fascism. This constructive criticism ultimately led to him becoming the author of the corresponding chapter, where he scientifically grounded the nature of the modern rashist regime.

The discussion part of the meeting proved to be extremely emotional. Students and teachers were interested in the changes in historical science following the large-scale Russian aggression. Regarding the shift in research interests, Vitalii Mykolaiovych noted that direct participation in the war forces a historian to look at sources and emphasis in research differently.

They also discussed how war changes the “optics” of the researcher, making methodology more sensitive to issues of national identity and resistance, as well as the strategy of communication between Ukrainian historians and Western colleagues. In particular, Vitalii Andreiev emphasized that this strategy must be decisive, where Ukrainians should not simply deconstruct Russian narratives but dictate their own agenda, relying on the unique experience of fighting against totalitarianism.

The event demonstrated that a modern Ukrainian historian is a person who knows how to hold both the “pen” and a weapon, and that scientific truth today is as important as victory on the battlefield.