Like their counterparts in the West, Soviet citizens experienced the jet age in the air and on the ground. They walked through newly built, modernist terminals and boarded Tupolev and Ilyushin jets that dramatically shortened travel times—not a small change … Read more
The Bolshevik regime that took power in 1917 aimed to construct a Marxist-Leninist version of socialism. The exigencies of civil war, the reality of being an unpopular workers' party in a largely agrarian country, and the uncertainties inherent in putting … Read more
This presentation will explore the American networks of Eastern European dissidents by highlighting interactions (and competition) with other important activist causes in the 1970s and 80s, such as human rights activism in general and more specifically the anti-apartheid movement and … Read more
Allen Frank earned his Ph.D. from Indiana University. He is an independent scholar who has published extensively on the Islamic history of Russia and Central Asia. His major publications include Muslim Religious Institutions in Imperial Russia (Brill, 2001), Qurban-'Ali Khalidi, An Islamic Biographical … Read more
Hasia R. Diner is the Paul and Sylvia Steinberg Professor of American Jewish History at New York University. She has built her scholarly career around the study of American Jewish history, American immigration and ethnic history, and the history of … Read more
Donald J. Raleigh is an Emeritus Distinguished Professor of History at UNC Chapel Hill. His research and teaching interests focus on twentieth-century Russian history. As a political and social historian, he has published extensively on the Russian Revolution, with a … Read more
Franek and Jozek Kalina, sons of a poor farmer, are brothers from a small village in central Poland. Franek immigrated to the United States in the 80’s, and cut all ties with his family. Only when Jozek’s wife arrives in … Read more
On 24 December 1979, Soviet armed forces entered Afghanistan, beginning an occupation that would last almost a decade and creating a political crisis that shook the world. To many observers, the Soviet invasion showed the lengths to which one of … Read more
After the Second World War, the Czechoslovak borderlands (known as the Sudetenland during the war) endured continued violence and ethnic cleansing, which also affected German-speaking Jews, many of whom had just returned from concentration or labor camps. In 1947, representatives … Read more
As the Cold War winds down, former concert cellist Louka (Zdenek Sverák) barely makes ends meet providing accompaniment at funerals after being blacklisted from his much cushier job with the Prague Philharmonic. For a fee, he marries a Russian woman … Read more
