Nationalism and Historiography in Central Eurasia
Section outline
-
Introduction
Online and personal participation in the course
The program of the course
-
Key Topics:
Nationalism and Historiography. Creation of National Myths.
Who are history makers? Role of historians and politicians in the history and myth-making process.
Readings:
John Coakley, "Mobilizing the Past: Nationalist Images of History,“ Nationalism and Ethnic Policies, 10(4), (2005), Pp. 531-560 (Taylor & Francis Database)
Marlene Laruelle, "National narrative, ethnology, and academia in post-Soviet Uzbekistan. Journal of Eurasian Studies, 1 (2010), pp. 102-110.
Daniel Woolf, "Of Nations, Nationalism, and National Identity: Reflections on the Historiographic Organization of the Past", in: Q. Edward Wang & Franz Fillafer (eds.), The Many Faces of Clio Cross-Cultural Approaches to Historiography, New York: Berghahn Books (2006), pp. 71-103.
The alternative to Woolf:
Stephan Berger, Constructing the Nations through History. In: Stephan Berger and Christoph Conrad (eds.): The Past as History. National Identity and Historical Consciousness in Modern Europe. Palgrave Macmillan (2015), pp. 1-27.
-
Key topics:
Selected concepts of nation-building – primordialism, constructivism, imagined community, invented tradition
Readings:
Eric Hobsbawm, Inventing Traditions. In: Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger. The Invention of Traditions, Cambridge University Press, 1983, pp. 1-15.
Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities. Verso, 2006, p. 67-82.
-
Key topics:
Primordialism constructions, Ethnicity and Ethnogenesis in post-Soviet Area. Why the post-Soviet Area is a paradise of primordialism?
Readings:
Victor A. Shnirelman, „Politics of Ethnogenesis in the USSR and after,“ Bulletin of the National Museum of Ethnology 30(1), (2005), pp: 93–119,
Gregor R. Suny, Constructing Primordialism: Old Histories for New Nations. Journal of Modern History, Vol 73, Issue 4 (December 2001), pp. 862-896.
-
Key topics:
Soviet national constructivism.
Marrism and Marxist Historiography
Readings:
Yilmaz, Harun (2015). A Family Quarrel: Azerbaijani Historians against Soviet Iranologists, Iranian Studies, 48:5, 769-783.
Marlene Laruelle, “The Concept of Ethnogenesis in Central Asia. Political Context and Institutional Mediators (1940-50),“ Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History, 9 (1), (Winter 2008), pp. 169-188.
Alternatively to Laruelle:
Sergei Abashin, “Ethnogenesis and Historiography: Historical Narratives for Central Asia in the 1940s and 1950s”. In: Roland Cvetkovski and Alexis Hofmeister (eds.) An empire of others: Creating ethnographic knowledge in imperial Russia and the USSR. Central European University Press, 2014., 2014, pp. 145-68.
-
Key topics:
Ethnic and Civic nations concepts of the most ancient nations
Who is the most ancient nation in the area? Why this factor matters?
Readings:
Victor A. Shnirelman, “Fostered primordialism: the identity and ancestry of the North Caucasian Turks in the Soviet and post-Soviet milieu.” In Tadayuki Hayashi (ed.) The Construction and Deconstruction of National Histories in Slavic Eurasia. Slavic Research Center, Hokkaido University (2003), pp. 53–86
Smith, Graham – Law, Vivien – Wilson, Andrew – Bohr, Annette – Allworth Edward, “Nation-building in the Post-Soviet Borderlands,” Cambridge University Press, 2011, chapter 3
-
Key topics: Why should the nation feel its greatness? National myth of the Golden Age. The connection of the Golden Age with contemporary times
Readings:
Marlene Laruelle, „The Return of the Aryan Myth: Tajikistan in Search of a Secularized Ideology,“ Nationalities Papers, 35(1), 2007, pp. 51-70 (Taylor & Francis Database).
Batiashvili, Natia (2012). The “Myth” of the Self: The Georgian National Narratives and Quest for Georgianess. In: Memory and Political Change (Aleida Assmann, Shortt, Linda, eds.), Palgrave, Basingtone, pp. 186-200.
-
Key topics:
The fight for independence, anti-colonial struggle in the past and today
Readings:
Martha B. Olcott, The Basmachi or Freemen's Revolt in Turkestan 1918-1924, Soviet Studies, Vol. 33, Issue 3 (July 1981), pp. 352-369
Slavomir Horák, „The Battle of Göktepe in the Turkmen post-Soviet historical discourse,“ Central Asian Survey. October 14, 2014.
Aurélie Campana, „Collective Memory and Violence: The Use of Myths in the Chechen Separatist Ideology, 1991–1994,“ Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs, 29(1), (2009), pp. 43-56. (Taylor & Francis Database)
-
Key topics:
Current regimes place in history and history in the current regimes
Erica Marat, “Imagined Past, Uncertain Future The Creation of National Ideologies in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan,” Problems of Post-Communism, Vol. 55, No. 1 (January-February 2008), p. 12-24.
Bouma, A.: Turkmenistan: Epics in Place of Historiography. Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas. Vol. 59 (2011), Issue 4, p. 559-585.
March, A.: The Use and Abuse of History: ‘National Ideology’ as Transcendental Object in Islam Karimov's ‘Ideology of National Independence’. Central Asian Survey, Vol. 21, Issue 4, 2002, p. 371-384 (Taylor&Francis Database)
-
Key Topics:
Why language matters within nation- and state-building?
Readings:
Smith, Graham – Law, Vivien – Wilson, Andrew – Bohr, Annette – Allworth Edward, “Nation-building in the Post-Soviet Borderlands,” Cambridge University Press, 2011, chapters 8-9
Ayşegül Aydingün, Creating, recreating and redefining ethnic identity: Ahiska/Meskhetian Turks in Soviet and post-Soviet contexts, Central Asian Survey, Vol. 21 (2002), Issue 2, pp. 185-197.
Presentation:
Czech language question in the Austro-Hungarian empire (Tomáš)
-
Readings:
Levin, Jonathan: From Nomad to Nation: On the Construction of National Identity Through Contested Cultural Heritage in the Former Soviet Republics of Central Asia.Djumaev, Alexander: Musical Heritage and National Identity in Uzbekistan. Journal of Ethnomusicology Forum. Vol.14, 2005. Issue 2.Textiles as national heritage: Identities, politics and material culture. Book Review. Shanon Ludington, pages 295-297, Central Asian Survey, Vol. 38, 2019, Issue 2.
Presentation:
Cultural Heritage in Brasil (Deise)
-
Key Topics:
Non- recognized states and their right to create their own histories
Readings:
Emil Souleimanov, Understanding Ethnopolitical Conflict, (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), pp. 51-70; 101-104.
Takayuki Yoshimura, „Some Arguments on the Nagorno-Karabakh History“. Central Eurasian Studies Occassional Papers, Vol. 18 (2007), pp. 52-60.
Ceylen Tokluoglu, "The Political Discourse of the Azerbaijani Elite on the Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict (1991–2009)." Europe-Asia Studies Vol. 63 (2011), Issue 7, pp. 1223-1252.