Building Stalinism: The Moscow Canal and the Creation of Soviet Space
Book summary:
Today the 80-mile-long Moscow Canal is the source of leisure for Muscovites, a conduit for tourists and provides the city with more than 60 percent of its potable water. Yet the past looms heavy over these quotidian activities: the canal was built by Gulag inmates at the height of Stalinism and thousands died in the process. In this wide-ranging book, Cynthia Ruder argues that the construction of the canal physically manifests Stalinist ideology and that the vertical, horizontal, underwater, ideological, artistic and metaphorical spaces created by it resonate with the desire of the state to dominate all space within and outside the Soviet Union. Ruder draws on theoretical constructs from cultural geography and spatial studies to interpret and contextualize a variety of structural and cultural products dedicated to, and in praise of, this signature Stalinist construction project. Drawing on an extensive range of archival sources, personal interviews and contemporary documentary materials, this is essential reading for all scholars working on the all-pervasive nature of Stalinism and its complex afterlife in Russia today.
Praise:
Quote:
A highly original work, Building Stalinism examines the way human lives were reforged in order for Stalinist clture to succeed. Focusing on artistic representations of the Moscow Canal, Cynthia Ruder brilliantly illustrates the way space could be shaped to fit an ultimately destructive ideology.
Credit:
Olga M. Cooke, Associate Professor of Russian, Texas A&M University and editor of Gulag Studies
Quote:
The history of a canal-building project might be thought in some quarters as an unpromising subject for a good read, but it is some years since I have found myself as drawn to a book as I was reading Building Stalinism: The Moscow Canal and the Creation of Soviet Space. In five meticulously researched and elegantly crafted chapters, Cynthia Ruder excavates the multiple layers of meaning embedded in the landscape of the Moscow-Volga canal...Much of the book is about memory and it is obvious that Cynthia Ruder cares very deeply that the canal's origins in one of the harshest camps of the Gulag will not be forgotten under the new layer of meanings associated with the elite homes and yacht clubs that now line its banks. This thought-provoking and moving historical-geography will help guarantee that this will not happen.
Credit:
Judith Pallot, Professor Emeritus, University of Oxford
Quote:
This is a deeply researched and beautifully written book that will be read by scholars and non-scholars alike. In accessible, flowing prose, Cynthia Ruder explains through the lens of the inception and building of the Moscow Canal what Stalinism looked like, felt like and how it worked in the 1930s Soveit Union...Beautifully written and researched, this book profoundly enhances our understanding of Stalinism and the working of Soviet communism.
Credit:
Deborah Kaple, Research Scholar and Lecturer, Princeton University
Bio:
Short bio:
Cynthia Ruder is an associate professor of Russian Studies at the University of Kentucky. She received her Ph.D. from Cornell University and has previously published Making History for Stalin, which focused on the 1933 Gulag construction project--the Belomor Canal--and on the literary volume written to commemorate it. She was the only non-Russian citizen who participated in the conference to commemorate the 70th anniversary (2007) of the Moscow Canal's opening in 1937. In addition to her two books, she has published a variety of articles on Stalinist and Gulag culture, and most recently was commissioned to write "Reflections on the Soviet Politics of Water in the 1930s" for the journal Europe Now. She also has contributed significantly to data-driven, research based language proficiency tests for the American Councils of International Education, Department of Assessment. She has authored over 1000 Assessment Objects and test items that are used to test K-16 and beyond language learners nationwide.
A&S department affiliation:
Book URL:
https://www.ibtauris.com/Series/Library-of-Modern-Russia
