Many contemporary international problems are the result of the worldwide reorganization after World War II. For 70 years, every country developed its own account of the global conflict that took place from 1939 to 1945. The war between the USSR and Hitler’s Germany and its allies became known as the Great Patriotic War. For present-day Russians, this is one of the chief historical events used to construct national identity.

This course examines the War from the point of view of military-historical anthropology and analyzes Russian cultural reflection of Russia’s war-filled past. Graduate students will familiarize themselves with the main schools of thought of Russian historians on the causes, chronology, and results of the Great Patriotic War. Topics covered will include the most controversial events and issues from the War, such as the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact; collaborationism; the fate of non-combatants; economic, demographic, and cultural effects of the War on the USSR; and others. But the course will primarily focus on the forms and mechanisms of memory about the War in Soviet and post-Soviet Russia.