Boris Nemtsov

It is becoming increasingly difficult to find any positive news these days from Russia, and the murder of Boris Nemtsov (1959-2015) does not make it any easier.

Ukraine v. Russia

Since I usually check out the yahoo homepage a couple of times a day, it has been interesting to note recently how many news items there have been about the conflict in the eastern region of Ukraine. Daily, there are links to stories from all sorts of different news sites, some more reliable, than others, and what I find especially paradoxical about this is that while there is all this coverage, there is very little interest in the conflict from the American public, and there has been no real effort on the part of the US government, NATO or the European Union to get physically involved with support for the Ukraine government.

Cohen v ASEEES

Read the New York Times account of the controversy between S. Cohen and the Slavic society over funding an award. S. Cohen's rogue views in support of Russian aggression vis-a-vis Crimea and Ukraine have made him almost persona non grata in the academic community.
ps.  I continue to think of the ASEEES by its old initials AAASS

Newest Edition of The Russian Review

Yes, I know, everyone has been anxiously awaiting volume 74, no. 1 (January 2015) of The Russian Review.  This scholarly journal has been around a long time now, and this issue has a set of four articles on the theme of "Foreign-Language Use in Russia during the Long Eighteenth Century." I found nothing of interest there, except for the fact that most of the articles have more space devoted to footnotes than to narrative text.  The other three articles in the issue are not much better.  I'll check out the book reviews in a later post.

What's Up in Belarus these days

Recent article by Forbes, Belarus's quandary: No longer Putin's dependable ally? outlines some aspects of Belarus' geopolitical situation.  Bottom line is that, in my view, it is unclear just exactly how well-developed a Belarus identity has developed in the last century.  There was little, if any, before the Bolshevik revolution, and the creation of a SSR by the Bolsheviks, for the first time kind of set up a defined territorial unit. But there is still a pretty sizable portion of the population that identify themselves as Russia.

Using Twitter

I have a box of large-format slides that I purchased a couple of years ago on Ebay, and I am trying to identify them.  I know that they are from Moscow and St. Petersburg, and so to give my students a challenge, I am sending out one slide a week for 5-10 points of extra credit, and to make it even more challenging, I'm sending them out via twitter at #nvccEVANSec.
You can also check http://www.ctevans.net/Nvcc/EC/2web.jpg

PBS Frontline: Putin's Way

Just saw about the last half of this program, which aired on 13 January 2015.  It is just another in a rather long series of Frontline shows devoted to Putin, as interested viewers in the US and Western Europe still grapple with understanding the Putin regime. The part that I saw really did not break much new ground.  Russia's economy is not doing well.  There is an enormous concentration of wealth in the hands of Putin and a close circle of men.  The regime has very firm control of media in the country.

Russia's Gangster Regime

There is a new book by Karen Dawisha, Putin’s Kleptocracy: Who Owns Russia? (2015).  See the outstanding review by Anne Appelbaum, "How He and His Cronies Stole Russia," New York Review of Books (18 December 2014). If you follow Russia and Russian history, then you should read the review and the book. Interesting that when I checked on Amazon.com, Dawisha's book was listed number 1 best seller in the category "Organized Crime True Accounts."

Gorbachev and the Wall, 25 Years later

Reasonable article recently on the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunification of Germany:  Fall of the Berlin Wall: The Iron Curtain fell because of Mikhail Gorbachev – yet today he is despised as a traitor by Russians

It does continue to surprise me that attitude of bother Russians and Westerners towards Gorbachev, and I could easily add Khrushchev to the equation. In some way, it reminds me of the attitude of Americans towards President Obama.  Too much of the status quo being threatened.

PBS Show on Khrushchev's Visit to the United States 1959

PBS American Experience is showing, Khrushchev's American Journey, aka Cold War Roadshow aka Travels with Nikita, covering Nikita Khrushchev's ten day visit to the United States in September 1959. Commentary is by Sergei Khrushchev, the son of Khrushchev, and William Taubman, Russian historian and biographer of Khrushchev.  Great film clips.  Definitely worth watching to remember that even at the very depths of the Cold War there was a small chance that it could all be avoided. You can find reviews of the episode in the Washington Post, New York Times, etc.