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Atomic Steppe tells the untold true story of how the obscure country of Kazakhstan said no to the most powerful weapons in human history. With the fall of the Soviet Union, the marginalized Central Asian republic suddenly found itself with the world's fourth largest nuclear arsenal on its territory. Would it give up these fire-ready weapons—or try to become a Central Asian North Korea? This book takes us inside Kazakhstan's extraordinary and little-known nuclear history from the Soviet period to the present. For Soviet officials, Kazakhstan's steppe was not an ecological marvel or beloved homeland, but an empty patch of dirt ideal for nuclear testing. Two-headed lambs were just the beginni...
In today’s world where other cultures are being tapped to a greater extent than ever before, the processes of mixing and matching are especially relevant in making sense of Russia. Not only do borrowing and assimilation, interaction between the familiar and the alien, constitute a venerable tradition in Russian culture, but during the two last post-Soviet decades a notable Western influence has become apparent. This book provides means for understanding Russianness in this new situation. By bringing together Russian and Western, eminent and younger scholars it provides insights both from inside and outside. By extending its perspectives to three fields – linguistics, cultural studies, and social sciences – it covers different dimensions of creative misunderstandings , hybrids, tensions and other modes of adaptation in the Russian culture. By offering concrete case studies it avoids easy stereotypes, deconstructs clichés, problematizes accepted truths, and identifies points of interaction between Russia and the West.
This book presents an interdisciplinary analysis of the Internet in Russia and its impact on various aspects of social life. The contributions discuss topics such as the features of the Russian media system and digitization processes, the history of the Runet, national Internet markets and the Internet economy, as well as legal aspects. By presenting the results of relevant case studies, it illustrates the process of integrating the Russian segment of the Internet into the international system, offering insights into various country-specific features of the Runet’s functioning and development. The first part of the book focuses on the Internet in the context of development of the Russian media system with respect to historical features and digital inequalities. The second part then discusses economic and legal aspects of the Runet, while the third and the fourth parts offer an analysis of digital culture, including the role of journalism and regional diversities as well as online representations and discussions. The chapter "Runet in Crisis Situations" is available open access under a CC BY 4.0 license at link.springer.com.
This study of the Russian internet explores how, when, and why the internet challenges leaders in non-free states. Using an analysis of content, community, catalysts, control, and co-optation, Revolution Stalled moves beyond 'virtual' politics to show how the internet can threaten and defy information hegemony and re-shape societies.
Exploring the deeply translational and transnational nature of the writings of Vladimir Nabokov, this book argues that all his work is unified by the permanent presence of three cultures and languages: Russian, English and French. In particular, Julie Loison-Charles focusses on Nabokov's dual nature as both an author and a translator, and the ways in which translation permeates his fictional writing from his very first Russian works to his last novels in English. Although self-translation has received a lot of attention in Nabokov criticism, this book considers his work as an author-translator, drawing particular attention to his often underappreciated and underestimated, but no less crucial...
Thirty years after the end of the Soviet Union, multiple ghosts haunt Russia, its elites, and its society, from concern over demographic and economic decline to worry about the country’s vulnerability to external intervention, reviving the old notion of Russia as a “besieged fortress.” Faced with both a West that emerged victorious from the Cold War and a shockingly dynamic China, Russia constantly questions its identity and the notion that its fate is to bridge East and West. This book offers a comprehensive overview of Russia’s fears and challenges that could help the American public to understand how the country deals with its own issues and how this influences Russia’s foreign policy, including the ongoing war in Ukraine. This is critical to understanding Russia’s international stance and its impact on US policy and security.
This volume originates in a conference session that took place at the 2018 International Council of Archaeozoology conference in Ankara, Turkey, entitled "Humans and Cattle: Interdisciplinary Perspectives to an Ancient Relationship." The aim of the session was to bring together zooarchaeologists and their colleagues from various other research fields working on human cattle interactions over time. The contributions in this volume reflect well the breadth of work being undertaken on the ancient relationship between humans and cattle across the continents of Europe, Africa and Asia, and from the late Pleistocene to postmedieval period. Almost all involve the study of archaeological cattle remains and use different zooarchaeological methods, but the combination of these approaches with that of ethnography, isotopes and genetics is also featured. Author Interview