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From the Renaissance to the Enlightenment, the geopolitical placement of Ukraine drew the attention of some of Europe’s most influential cartographers. Many of these maps, including ones of exceptional rarity, were collected by the Ukrainian scholar and journalist Bohdan Krawciw.

Krawciw traced the physical and aesthetic depiction of Ukraine across its changing borders as a means of self-recognition and as a cultural and political history of the contested nation and its peoples. Of special interest are his maps of Ukraine from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, at the crossroads of four empires: Habsburg, Ottoman, Russian, and Soviet.

As part of his personal archive, Krawciw’s maps were bequeathed to Harvard University upon his death in 1975. This book serves as both a catalog of his collection and a description of how the maps he collected serve as an invaluable source for Ukraine’s history and a symbol of Ukrainian national identity. The book contains nearly 100 examples from the collection, many in full color, as well as indices listing maps by cartographer and by place name.

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This book, one of the first in English about everyday life in the Republic of Georgia, describes how people construct identity in a rapidly changing border region. Based on extensive ethnographic research, it illuminates the myriad ways residents of the Caucasus have rethought who they are since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Through an exploration of three towns in the southwest corner of Georgia, all of which are situated close to the Turkish frontier, Mathijs Pelkmans shows how social and cultural boundaries took on greater importance in the years of transition, when such divisions were expected to vanish.

By tracing the fears, longings, and disillusionment that border dwellers projected on the Iron Curtain, Pelkmans demonstrates how elements of culture formed along and in response to territorial divisions, and how these elements became crucial in attempts to rethink the border after its physical rigidities dissolved in the 1990s. The new boundary-drawing activities had the effect of grounding and reinforcing Soviet constructions of identity, even though they were part of the process of overcoming and dismissing the past. Ultimately, Pelkmans finds that the opening of the border paradoxically inspired a newfound appreciation for the previously despised Iron Curtain as something that had provided protection and was still worth defending. ... Read more

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This book focuses on the newly independent Muslim republics of the former Soviet Union in Central Asia, especially Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Azerbaijan. It examines the recent economic and political developments in these states with reference to the lingering legacy of Tsarist Russian and Soviet rule, the resurgence of an Islamic political identity, the persistence of ethnic allegiances and rivalries, and the nascent democratic aspirations of their peoples. A distinguishing feature of the book is its emphasis on the longstanding religious, ethnic and cultural ties between the peoples of Central Asia and those of the four Southwest Asian states of Afghanistian, Iran, Pakistan and Turkey. Viewing the new alliances, rivalries and potential conflicts among these states within a regional context, the authors provide an informed and incisive assessment of the geopolitics of a new world region with a population of over three hundred million people. The implications of these regional developments for the West are also set out. The contributors to the volume are experts on the region from several disciplines.The book should be of interest to those concerned with the future relations between this region, the Middle East and the West. ... Read more

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Civil Wars, ethnic cleansing and genocide, mass murderers, liberation movements turned gun-running gangsters and eccentric dictators. And all in recent memory. The Balkans has never had its troubles to seek.Jimmy Cormack travels round the parts of Europe the rest of us would prefer to avoid. He examines the history, the geography and the political intrigues that have shaped the region right up to this day. However, he also experiences some lighter moments, meeting a bizarre mixture of misfits and dodgy characters and witnesses some wacky, and some near-to-death incidents. ... Read more

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Sievers draws on his experience of Central Asia to take on the task of explaining the remarkable economic declines of the post-Soviet Central Asian states (Kazakhstan, Kyrgystan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan) in the past decade, and the turn of these states towards despotism. ... Read more

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A genuinely fascinating book
Given the breadth of the issues covered, the abundance of sources, and the insightfulness of analysis, this is probably as good as it gets in terms of scholarly writings about Central Asia these days. Unlike many of his western colleagues, Sievers is multi-lingual, and he takes full advantage of this: his coverage of sources is virtually unprecedented in the English-language literature on the region.Although written by a lawyer, this book is not a legal treatise. A sweeping account of the great expectations nurtured in the region in the early 1990s and the grand failures that ensued thereafter, this volume is a true eye-opener for the Anglophone public as well as a useful addition to the personal library of a student and a scholar alike. Whether he deals with civil society reforms or environmental regimes, Sievers is thoughtful and encyclopedic about his subject. Not only does he describe the experience of Central Asian states during their first decade of independence with enviable insight and commendable accuracy, but he also unhesitatingly challenges the many myths so uncritically popularized by other scholars. The fact that it is easily readable adds further value to Sievers' work. ... Read more

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This book examines the Russian/Soviet intellectual tradition of Oriental and Islamic studies, which comprised a rich body of knowledge especially on Central Asia and the Caucasus. The Soviet Oriental tradition was deeply linked to politics – probably even more than other European ‘Orientalisms’. It breaks new ground by providing Western and post-Soviet insider views especially on the features that set Soviet Oriental studies apart from what we know about its Western counterparts: for example, the involvement of scholars in state-supported anti-Islamic agitation; the early and strong integration of ‘Orientals’ into the scientific institutions; the spread of Oriental scholarship over the ‘Oriental’ republics of the USSR and its role in the Marxist reinterpretation of the histories of these areas. The authors demonstrate the declared emancipating agenda of Soviet scholarship, with its rhetoric of anti-colonialism and anti-imperialism, made Oriental studies a formidable tool for Soviet foreign policy towards the Muslim World; and just like in the West, the Iranian Revolution and the mujahidin resistance to the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan necessitated a thorough redefinition of Soviet Islamic studies in the early 1980s.  Overall, the book provides a comprehensive analysis of Soviet Oriental studies, exploring different aspects of writing on Islam and Muslim history, societies, and literatures. It also shows how the legacy of Soviet Oriental studies is still alive, especially in terms of interpretative frameworks and methodology; after 1991, Soviet views on Islam have contributed significantly to nation-building in the various post-Soviet and Russian ‘Muslim’ republics.

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This short topic book is designed to provide up-to-date resources for detailed investigation of the Commonwealth of Independent States. Beyond the requirements of the National Curriculum it provides a broad and balanced contemporary geography, aspects of which can be integrated into National Curriculum courses to exemplify a range of physical, human and environmental themes. ... Read more

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Stephen Hanson traces the influence of the Marxist conception of time in Soviet politics from Lenin to Gorbachev. He argues that the history of Marxism and Leninism reveals an unsuccessful revolutionary effort to reorder the human relationship with time and that this reorganization had a direct impact on the design of the central political, socioeconomic, and cultural institutions of the Soviet Union from 1917 to 1991.

According to Hanson, westerners tend to envision time as both rational and inexorable. In a system in which 'time is money,' the clock dominates workers. Marx, however, believed that communist workers would be freed of the artificial distinction between leisure time and work time. As a result, they would be able to surpass capitalist production levels and ultimately control time itself. Hanson reveals the distinctive imprint of this philosophy on the formation and development of Soviet institutions, arguing that the breakdown of Gorbachev's perestroika and the resulting collapse of the Soviet Union demonstrate the failure of the idea. ... Read more

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An important work!
This is an excellent and innovative examination of the effects the Marxist approach to time had on the Soviet Union. A masterful blend of historicaland philosophical discourse--a great read! ... Read more

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This series gives young children a simple introduction to primary geography. Each book introduces a country through a series of topics such as weather, farming, homes and food, and each topic is accompanied by short interviews with children from different backgrounds and parts of the country who talk about their own experiences. The books are illustrated with colour photographs and simple maps. This book focuses on the USSR. ... Read more

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The collapse of the Soviet Union has engendered one of the most momentous and critical regional transformations of our times through formation and development of the post-Soviet states. This book explores the politics of post-Soviet transition and the problems which will continue to face these states in the twenty-first century. ... Read more

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Few frontier conflicts have had greater impact upon the world politics in our era than the border dispute between the People's Republic of China and the USSR. Having emerged amidst the Sino-Soviet "political debate" in the early 1960s, this dispute has become one of the major causes of the Sino-Soviet rift in the ensuing years and continues to loom as a crucial determinat of the future relationship between these two great powers. This volume is based upon original research in Chinese, Russian and English sources and stands as a major, new contribution to the field. Tsien-hua Tsui served as an Officer of the Ministry in Australia and he served for four years in the Chinese Embassy in Ottawa, Canada. ... Read more

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To the surprise of many, the Soviet Union ceased to exist in 1991, and out of its ruins arose an independent Ukraine. This was a remarkable achievement, and one that owed much to activities in Galicia, as Paul Robert Magocsi reveals here.

Magocsi begins with a brief historical survey of Galicia, where Ukrainian national and cultural interests have long flourished. His subsequent essays focus on the role played by Galicia during the nineteenth century, when Ukrainians were struggling for recognition as a distinct nationality. He places Galicia in the larger context of Ukrainian and eastern European politics, then follows with studies of the nuts and bolts of nation building - language, culture, ideology and so on. He also explores the influence of the Habsburg Empire in creating unique conditions for Ukraine's national and social revival, and considers the impact of both Habsburg and Soviet rule on the Ukrainian national psyche.

This study provides a solid background for understanding nineteenth-century Galicia as the historic Piedmont of the Ukrainian national revival. It is essential reading for historians, public-policy makers, and all those interested in regional differentiation within Europe's second largest country - Ukraine. ... Read more

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This collection of essays by a series of academic specialists examines the crisis stemming from the Russian invasion of Georgia in August 2008 from a range of standpoints. The chapters probe the geopolitical and strategic dimensions of the crisis as well as the longer term military and diplomatic implications for Europe and the central Asian region. The collection will be of major importance to students of Russia and Eastern Europe, military analysts as well as journalists and politicians concerned with what some observers have termed a "new cold war" between Russia and the West.

This book was published as a special issue of Small Wars and Insurgencies.

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This is a study of the geographical issues, such as environmental change and economic and ethnic unrest, which have been highlighted in the Soviet Union. It provides a basis for all GCSE examination courses, National Curriculum Key Stage 4, and is linked to a BBC schools television series, and a BBC radio series. The USSR is also a key area of the world highlighted in the Geography National Curriculum. Whilst it provides back-up text to studying the Soviet Union in conjunction with BBC programmes, it can also be used alone. There are case studies, facts, and statistics on the USSR and it looks at the people, farms, factories and towns of the USSR now and in the future. The text focuses on key geographical themes - agriculture, population, industry, settlement, town natural hazards, environmental impact and management, and is designed to provide maximum flexibility in relation to GCSE geography syllabuses. Photographs, maps, line drawings, cartoons and authentic newspaper sources from the UK and the Soviet Union are used throughout the text. ... Read more

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An illustrated biography of the leader of the Soviet Union, including a chronology of important dates in his life and a glossary of political words. ... Read more

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Students struggling to find information on the modern lives of those living in Eurasia need not look any farther! Written for high school and undergraduate students, Culture and Customs of the Caucasus fills a major void on library shelves. This unique reference work explores contemporary life in three former Soviet Union republics: Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia. No other reference book offers such exhaustive material on the traditions and customs of all three nations. Students studying world culture, social studies, and multicultural issues can use this engaging and comprehensive volume to learn about the Caucasus's history, urban life, religion, literature, cuisine, holidays, and leisure activities, among many other topics.

In the early 1990's, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia emerged from the grip of the Soviet Union and stood on their own for the first time in almost a century. Today, these three nations are slowly emerging from communism's dark cloud, thriving culturally and gaining strength economically. Written for high-school students, Culture and Customs of the Caucasus is the ultimate one-stop reference source that explores the three countries in the region-no other reference work provides such comprehensive and current material. Students studying world culture, social studies, and multicultural issues can use this engaging and wide-ranging volume to learn about the Caucasus's history, urban life, religion, literature, cuisine, holidays, and leisure activities, among many other topics.

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Like previous titles in the 'focus on' series, "focus on the soviet union" will describe how people live from day to day, and explain the country's social, economic and political structure. There will be sections on moscow and other important cities, soviet schooling and family life, rivers, mountains and the russian winter. The short, simple text will be accompanied by numerous colour photographs. Launch 1.2.88:5000x154px$6.95(6000x137p).252x230mm, 32pp, colour proofs mid march. UK YES ... Read more