Border Conditions: Russian-Speaking Latvians between World Orders (NIU Series in Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies)

By: Kevin M. Platt

Sign Up Now! Already a Member? Log In
You must be logged into UK education collection to access this title. Learn about membership options, or view our freely available titles.

Synopsis: Border Conditions combines history and memory studies with literary and cultural studies to examine lives at the limits of contemporary Europe: Russian speakers living in Latvia. Since the fall of the USSR in 1991, Latvia's Russian speakers have balanced between Russia and Europe as well as a socialist past, a capitalist and liberal present, and an illiberal regime rising in the Russian Federation. Kevin M. F. Platt describes how members of this population have defined themselves through art, literature, cultural institutions, film, and music—and how others have sought to define them. At the end of the Cold War, many anticipated that societies globally could agree on the meaning of past history and a just politics in the present. The view from the borders of Europe demonstrates the contradictions pertaining to terms like empire, state socialism, liberalism, and nation that have made it impossible to achieve a consensus. In refocusing the examination of state socialism's aftermath around questions of empire and postcolonialism, Border Conditions helps us understand the distinctions between Russian and Western worldviews driving military confrontation to this day.

Book Quality:: Publisher Quality
Book Size:: 342 Pages
ISBN-13:: 9781501773716
Related ISBNs:: 9781501773709, 9781501773723
Publisher:: Cornell University Press
Date of Addition:: 02/14/24
Copyrighted By:: Cornell University,
Adult content:: No
Language:: English
Has Image Descriptions:: No
Categories:: Nonfiction, Literature and Fiction, Social Studies, Language Arts
Grade Levels:: Graduate Student
Submitted By:: Bookshare Staff
Usage Restrictions:: This is a copyrighted book.