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Alexandre Bennigsen in the Eyes of the Soviet Press
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 November 2018
Abstract
Soviet reactions to Western writings on the Soviet Union are as old as the Soviet regime itself. They are handled in an organized manner, with targets, delivery vehicles and gradation of response carefully coordinated and measured.
Soviet response is, moreover, not solely connected to the perceived degree of offensiveness of the given Western work; in addition, such considerations as general relations between the USSR and the country from where the publication came, as well as political opportunities of the moment, are given even more importance than the committed “offense.”
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- Symposium: Soviet Responses to Western Studies on Soviet Nationalities
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- Copyright © 1982 by the Association for the Study of the Nationalities (USSR and East Europe) Inc.
References
1. Zevelev, A.I., in “Protiv fal'sifikatorov istorii Srednei Azii i Kazakhstana,” Voprosy istorii, 9 (1963), mentions Wheeler, Kolarz, Caroe, Pipes, as well as Hayit, but not a single French author.Google Scholar
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6. This information on the system comes from a Soviet emigré whose job was to criticize German-language writings on Soviet nationalities affairs.Google Scholar
7. Specifically dealing with French historiography (but not with Bennigsen): Afanas'ev, Iu. V., “Kharakteristika sovremennogo etapa frantsuzskoi burzhuaznoi istoriografii oktiabr'skoi revoliutsii,” Istoriia i istoriki. Istoricheskii ezhegodnik, vol. 7, 1974 (Moscow: Mysl: 1976).Google Scholar
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10. Two of Bennigsen's works are currently most often mentioned in the rebuff press: Alexandre Bennigsen and Chantal Lemercier-Quelquejay, Islam in the Soviet Union (N.Y.: Praeger, 1967), and Alexandre A. Bennigsen and S. Enders Wimbush, Muslim National Communism in the Soviet Union. A Revolutionary Strategy for the Colonial World (University of Chicago Press, 1979).Google Scholar
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20. In addition to Islam in the Soviet Union, two of Bennigsen's articles are mentioned: “Colonization and Decolonization in the Soviet Union,” Journal of Contemporary History, vol. 4 (1), 1967, and “Soviet Nationality Policy in Pracitce,” N.Y.-Washington, 1967 (no journal mentioned).Google Scholar
21. However Bagdasarov, K.A., “Raschety ‘sovetologov’ i sotsialisticheskaia deistvitel ‘nost’ Srednei Azii,” Akademiia Nauk Turkmenskoi SSR, Seriia obshchestvennykh nauk 1 (1979) again ignores Bennigsen and all other French writers.Google Scholar
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