Table Of ContentIdentity and Nation Building in Everyday
Post-Socialist Life
This book explores the function of the ‘everyday’ in the formation,
consolidation and performance of national, sub-national and local identities
in the former socialist region. Based on extensive original research including
fieldwork, the book demonstrates how the study of everyday and mundane
practices is a meaningful and useful way of understanding the s ocio-political
processes of identity formation both at the top and bottom level of a state. The
book covers a wide range of countries including the Baltic States, Ukraine,
Russia, the Caucasus and Central Asia; and considers ‘everyday’ banal prac-
tices, including those related to consumption, kinship, embodiment, mobil-
ity, music, and the use of objects and artefacts. Overall, the book draws on,
and contributes to, theory, and shows how the process of nation building is
not just undertaken by formal actors, such as the state, its institutions and
political elites.
Abel Polese, senior researcher at the Institute for International Conflict
Resolution and Reconstruction of Dublin City University and Tallinn Law
School of Tallinn University of Technology.
Jeremy Morris is an associate professor in Global Studies, Aarhus University,
Denmark.
Emilia Pawłusz is an early stage researcher in the School of Governance, Law
and Society at Tallinn University, Estonia.
Oleksandra Seliverstova is a Marie Curie Fellow at the School of Governance,
Law and Society of Tallinn University, Estonia.
Routledge Contemporary Russia and Eastern Europe Series
For a full list of titles in this series, please visit https://www.routledge.com/
Routledge-Contemporary-Russia-and-Eastern-Europe-Series/book-series/
SE0766
68 The Return of the Cold War
Ukraine, the West and Russia
Edited by J. L. Black and Michael Johns
69 Corporate Strategy in Post-Communist Russia
Mikhail Glazunov
70 Russian Aviation, Space Flight and Visual Culture
Vlad Strukov and Helena Goscilo
71 EU-Russia Relations, 1999–2015
From Courtship to Confrontation
Anna-Sophie Maass
72 Migrant Workers in Russia
Global challenges of the shadow economy in societal transformation
Edited by Anna-Liisa Heusala and Kaarina Aitamurto
73 Gender Inequality in the Eastern European Labour Market
Twenty-five years of transition since the fall of communism
Edited by Giovanni Razzu
74 Reforming the Russian Industrial Workplace
International management standards meet the Soviet legacy
Elena Shulzhenko
75 Identity and Nation Building in Everyday Post-Socialist Life
Edited by Abel Polese, Jeremy Morris, Emilia Pawłusz
and Oleksandra Seliverstova
Identity and Nation Building in
Everyday Post-Socialist Life
Edited by Abel Polese, Jeremy
Morris, Emilia Pawłusz
and Oleksandra Seliverstova
First published 2018
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor and Francis Group, an informa business
© 2018 selection and editorial matter, Abel Polese, Jeremy Morris, Emilia
Pawłusz and Oleksandra Seliverstova; individual chapters, the contributors
The right of Abel Polese, Jeremy Morris, Emilia Pawłusz and Oleksandra
Seliverstova to be identified as the authors of the editorial material, and of
the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance
with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced
or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means,
now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording,
or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in
writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation
without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Polese, Abel, editor.
Title: Identity and nation building in everyday post-socialist life / edited by
Abel Polese, Jeremy Morris, Oleksandra Seliverstova and Emilia Pawlusz.
Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2018. | Series:
Routledge contemporary Russia and Eastern Europe series ; 75 | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017006084| ISBN 9781138736412 (hardback) |
ISBN 9781315185880 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Nationalism—Former Soviet republics. | Group
identity—Former Soviet republics. | Nation-building—Former Soviet
republics. | Post-communism—Former Soviet republics.
Classification: LCC DK293 .I34 2018 | DDC 306.20947—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017006084
ISBN: 978-1-138-73641-2 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-18588-0 (ebk)
Typeset in Times New Roman
by diacriTech, Chennai
Contents
List of figures vii
List of contributors viii
Acknowledgements ix
Introduction: on informal and spontaneous national identities 1
PART I
Music and cultural events 15
1 Formal and informal nationalism: jazz performances
in Azerbaijan 17
ANETA STRZEMŻALSKA
2 Can musicians build the nation? Popular music and
identity in Estonia 34
EMILIA PAWŁUSZ
3 The Georgian National Museum and the Museum of
Soviet Occupation as loci of informal nation building 52
ALISA DATUNASHVILI
PART II
Consumer practices 71
4 Made in Ukraine: consumer citizenship during
EuroMaidan transformations 73
TETIANA BULAKH
vi Contents
5 National food, belonging, and identity among
Russian-speaking migrants in the UK 91
ANNA PECHURINA
6 Consumer citizenship and reproduction of Estonianness 109
OLEKSANDRA SELIVERSTOVA
PART III
National discourses in everyday life 129
7 How to pronounce ‘Belarusian’? Negotiating identity
through naming 131
ANASTASIYA ASTAPOVA
8 Nuanced identities at the borders of the European Union:
Romanians in Serbia and Ukraine 146
JULIEN DANERO IGLESIAS
9 Can nation building be ‘spontaneous’? A (belated)
ethnography of the Orange Revolution
ABEL POLESE 161
Conclusion: identities for the everyday 176
Index 180
Figures
3.1 Façade of the Simon Janashia Museum of Georgia:
first banner on the right side advertises ‘Museum of
Soviet Occupation’. 59
3.2 On the left wall is the list of people shot by Communists;
there is a also cannon and Wagon (imitation), where occupation
victims were shot. A picture of Georgian Cadets shot during
Russian invasion is on the floor, and there is a red spotlight –
‘blood’ – on the wagon with holes – ‘shooting marks’.
Altogether this creates an immediate emotional effect and
creates unequivocally negative associations that are continued
in the main exhibition hall. 63
3.3 Main exhibition hall, divided by the prison cell doors
and massive pillars covered with concrete; together with
the dimmed lights and dominant black and grey colours
the exhibit makes an oppressive impression. 63
3.4 (Left) ‘Sir John Oliver Wardrop. The UK’s first Chief
Commissioner in Transcaucasia, Active supporter of
Georgia’s independence and sovereignty.’ (Right) ‘Friedrich
Werner von Schulenburg. Consul of Germany in Georgia.
Co-author of the text of founding charter of Democratic
Republic of Georgia.’ This shows the Georgian–European
relationship to emphasize Georgia’s desire to be part of Europe. 65
3.5 Georgian national costume, ‘chokha’, presented as belong-
ing to Kakutsa Cholokashvili, the leader of the first Georgian
Republic government. One of the stumbling blocks between
museumelis and exhibition authors: the chokha did not belong
to Cholokashvili. To present it as such means to lie to visitors,
which is unacceptable for the museum. 66
Contributors
Anastasiya Astapova, University of Tartu, Estonia.
Tetiana Bulakh, Indiana University Bloomington, US.
Alisa Datunashvili, Tbilisi State University, Georgia.
Julien Danero Iglesias, CEVIPOL – Université libre de Bruxelles / University
of Glasgow, UK.
Emilia Pawłusz, Tallinn University, Estonia.
Anna Pechurina, Leeds Beckett University, UK.
Abel Polese, Institute for International Conflict Resolution and Reconstruction,
Dublin City University and Tallinn Law School, Tallinn University of
Technology.
Oleksandra Seliverstova, Tallinn University, Estonia, and Free University of
Brussels (VUB), Belgium.
Aneta Strzemz˙alska, European University at Saint Petersburg, Russia.
Acknowledgements
We had not realized how far we were going until the necessity arose to think
of an edited volume on alternative aspects of identity constructions. Some
of us were just coming out of a project on nation building in the former
USSR, some others were busy with other volumes and their PhD theses. At
the department of Political Science of Tallinn University, where three of the
four authors work, we had received a lot of feedback over the years on the
project TENSIONS (FP7, Marie Curie ITN grant no.316825) that we wish
to acknowledge for allowing us to devote time to this book. The odd thing
was that, when travelling to specialized workshops, topics such as consump-
tion and national singing and their role in identity production were often
received much more positively than in our home department, a thing that
pushed us to look further for more feedback. These meetings gave us also the
chance to interact with extremely pleasant people working on similar topics,
and we attempted to launch a call for papers. An innocent call for papers
posted on some mailing lists sparked so much interest among scholars and
publishers that we thought the times were mature for a volume on everyday
nationalism in the former USSR. We are therefore grateful to Peter Sowden at
Routledge, who supported the idea from the very beginning, and in particular
to the authors of our chapters, for their hard work and capacity to submit on
time, reflect on our feedback and end up with a product that we are happy to
present here.
The way this book was developed was influenced by the feedback that we
received at the workshop ‘Lived Experiences of the Everyday Nation’, organ-
ized by Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO) on June 9-10, 2016. We are
grateful to its organizers Mette Strømsø and Marta Bivand Erdal and also
to the key speakers Marco Antonsich and Michael Skey. It is also the result
of regular interaction with colleagues working on similar topics who have
always been very keen to share their work or provide us with constructive
feedback or simply with inspiring ideas. We wish to thank, in random order:
Donnacha Ó Beacháin, John Doyle, Eileen Connelly, Karolina Stefanczak,
Gezim Visoka, Giorgio Comai, Chiara Loda, Raivo Vetik, Peeter Muursepp,
