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The David Brooks I Miss; or, What Passes for Commentary about Russia
Again and again I found myself taking sides in our ongoing debate: is David Brooks thoroughly awful or only somewhat awful?
"Dreaming of Duskobor'e: 1917 and Canada's Dukhobors" with David McDonald, University of Wisconsin - Madison
David McDonald presented his research on Canada's Dukhobors, a religious group with origins in the Russian Empire, in a roundtable discussion with other scholars. Yanni Kotsonis moderated.
Do anti-corruption campaigns work? David Szakonyi presents evidence from Russia.
Research from Russia suggests that financial disclosure requirements may dissuade corrupt incumbents from seeking re-election.
A conversation with author Michael David-Fox on Soviet modernity
Michael David Fox speaks on his recent book, Crossing Borders: Modernity, Ideology, and Culture in Russia and the Soviet Union.
Lenin Lives: An Exhibition at the Van Every Gallery, Davidson College
Artists and politicians alike recognized the symbolic significance of Lenin’s public image.
Open Letter on the Termination of Russian Studies Faculty at Ohio University
Like you, we are wholeheartedly invested in the survival and recovery of higher education in the United States amid the COVID-19 pandemic. That recovery depends on the will of universities...
Diplomatic and Undiplomatic Language, or Just say "Ы"!
Lately, it has not only been the vowels that have been hard to stomach in Russia.
Transnistria, Crimea, Russia: There Goes The Neighborhood
None of the former Soviet territories exist in a vacuum and any declaration of independence or separatism will always involve the support or condemnation of more powerful and influential actors.
Protocols of the Elders of Ukraine
The flyer played upon the fears that continue to plague Jews around the world: unstable governments will ultimately turn their forces on the Jews, especially countries with long histories of...
The Fascism That Wasn’t
The media seemed to be surprised by one election outcome: the failure of Ukraine’s right-wing parties to secure significant votes.
First as Tragedy, then as Kitsch: A Bitter Harvest Review
In the middle of a party, Stalin inexplicably shouts “Damn those Ukrainians!”
Easter in Russia: Between Church and State, a New Divide Has Risen
The enormous variances in how priests chose to observe Easter this year in Russia hints at the broader context that frames the divide between those following church-related COVID restrictions and...
In Putin’s Vision of Ukraine’s Past, A Warning About Russia’s Future
On 12 July 2021, Russian President Vladimir Putin published a historical essay titled “On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians.” He frames the essay as a follow-up to a...
Separatism and the Russian Solution: Baja California, here we come!
Everyone’s afraid of the separatists these days; they’re messing up countries all over the place.
Canada, Hockey, and the Cold War
What had begun as score-settling with upstart pretenders to Canada’s pre-eminence acquired its epic qualities because the victory came over the Soviet Union, the hegemon of the Communist bloc.
Necrorealism: Turning Bare Life into Art (Part I)
The peculiar style of life, art, and action practiced by the necrorealists in their early appearances was part of a larger tradition in late Soviet culture that exhibited a mode...
Necrorealism: Turning Bare Life into Art (Part II)
Necrorealism's mediation does to life what photography does to the sign; like milk, it turns, but in it there is also a process of homogenization or a general equivalence that...
Sociology of Corruption: Patterns of Illegal Association in Hungary
Since 2010, Orbán’s government has induced a radical transformation of grand corruption patterns in Hungary: a shift from oligarchic or economic state capture toward political state capture, in which complex corrupt networks are professionally designed and managed by the very top of the political elite.
The Abuses of Enchantment (Russia's Alien Nations)
Tolkien has been accused of many things, but subtlety is not among them.
The Last Will and Testament of Sergei Esenin: Cultural History of a Mystification, Part III
In the end, he was released as partially insane, for it was noted that he considered himself an incarnation of the Buddha and believed that he desperately needed money to...