Monthly Archives: January 2018

Soviet Nationalities Policy (Hirsch, Lenin, and Stalin)

I apologize for the late post! So, I found the power that ethnographers had in the formation and maintenance of different nationalities within the Soviet Union to be particularly interesting. Early on in her piece, Hirsch distinguishes herself from Ronald … Continue reading

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Wrapping my head around the “need” to nationalize

A major tension seemed to dominate Hirsch’s piece, between the ethnographers who attempted (at first) to accurately and respectfully study and understand identities throughout the Soviet Union and the state goal of consolidating identities into nationalities that could be understood … Continue reading

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Suny + Martin: Nationality in the early Soviet Union

Martin’s reading on the early Soviet Union as an “affirmative action empire” provided an informative context on a seemingly paradoxical response to the “national question” in the 1920s — fostering nations as a “cure” for nationalism. It also raised questions … Continue reading

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A State of Nations: Suny and Martin

As someone who comes into this class with a limited background in Russian and Soviet history, this reading gave me a lot to consider about the unique aspects of empire in the region. I was pleasantly surprised how both authors … Continue reading

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Welcome to HIST 354: Cultural Construction in the Soviet Empire!

Course Description This course explores the methods used by the Soviet government to put culture to work as a soft-power mechanism for legitimizing and strengthening its power across the 15 republics of the Soviet Union. From Ukraine and Belarus in … Continue reading

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