Stefan Kirmse – Cross-cutting research

Nationalism and Internationalism after Stalin: Experiences along the Southern Soviet Border

PD Dr. Stefan B. Kirmse

Stefan Kirmse is conducting research at the intersection of history and cultural anthropology on the internal and external borderlands of the Eurasian space. Most recently, he has focused on the interplay of nationalism and internationalism in the post-Stalin period. Exploring the ways in which the Ukrainian, Uzbek, and Armenian SSRs displayed and developed their own national identities in international encounters, he compares the similarities and differences between the union republics in regulating and experiencing cultural and economic ties abroad. How much leeway did the republican ministries have in forging these ties, and how did the international interaction affect the national and supra-national identities of Soviet actors on the ground?