Week 3 Flashcards
What is the central theme of ‘Arctic Mirrors: The Uncorrupted’?
The depiction of the indigenous peoples of the North as moral and cultural mirrors for Russian identity.
How did 18th-century Russians view Siberian natives?
As uncorrupted, noble savages who preserved ancient moral values.
What was the role of Orthodox missionaries in the North?
They aimed to convert and ‘civilize’ indigenous populations, but also admired their perceived purity.
Why were Siberian natives idealized in Russian literature?
They served as counterweights to the corrupt urban society, highlighting Russian moral decline.
How did the Russian state use indigenous people symbolically?
As evidence of Russia’s civilizing mission and imperial legitimacy.
What contradiction existed in the portrayal of natives?
They were seen both as pure and primitive—worthy of preservation yet needing transformation.
How were indigenous people incorporated into Russian identity?
As ancestral figures symbolizing spiritual continuity with an unspoiled past.
What does ‘Arctic Mirrors’ suggest about empire and periphery?
That empires often define themselves through idealized images of their peripheries.
What is the concept of ‘internal colonization’?
Colonial practices applied by a state to its own territories and peoples.
How does Etkind define the Russian Empire?
As an empire that colonized both its neighbors and its own interior.
What role did serfdom play in internal colonization?
It structured society hierarchically, treating peasants as colonized subjects.
What examples support Etkind’s thesis?
Siberian expansion, Orthodox missionary work, and the penal system.
What is ‘political ecology’?
A framework linking environmental issues with political, social, and economic power.
Why is aridity a political concern in Russian history?
It influenced settlement, agriculture, and imperial policy in the steppe.
What role did climate play in imperial discourse?
It justified colonization and shaped racial/environmental hierarchies.
What ideology underpinned Russian ecology?
Modernist belief in transformation and conquest of nature.
How did Soviet policy build on tsarist ideas?
By intensifying control over land use and emphasizing human dominance.
What does the article argue about environmental narratives?
They are shaped by imperial needs, not just scientific observations.
What paradox does Khodarkovsky explore?
That Russia was a colonial empire without formal colonies and self-identifying as one.
Why was the Caucasus important in Russian colonialism?
It was a major site of conquest, resistance, and imperial ideology.
How did Russia manage religious diversity?
Through tolerance, surveillance, and missionary activity.
What distinguishes Russian from European colonialism?
Territorial continuity and a greater integration of colonized peoples.
What were Russia’s motives for expansion?
Strategic, economic, religious, and cultural supremacy.
What did ‘colonization’ mean in this context?
Resettlement, modernization, and symbolic integration of peripheral lands.
What role did the Trans-Siberian Railway play?
It symbolized state-driven colonization and economic integration.
Why does Masoero call colonization a multifaceted process?
Because it was driven by various motives—economic, strategic, ideological.
