Antony Kalashnikov's Monuments for Posterity: Self-Commemoration and the Stalinist Culture of Time (Cornell UP, 2023) analyzes Stalinist monument-building. From the 1930's through the Great Patriotic War, architectural monuments such as subway stations were designed to emphasize the perpetual endurance of the nation, regardless of the many crises of the peri ... Show More
Jan 13
Fernando Luiz Lara, "Spatial Theories for the Americas: Counterweights to Five Centuries of Eurocentrism" (U Pittsburgh Press, 2024)
To study the built environment of the Americas is to wrestle with an inherent contradiction. While the disciplines of architecture, urban design, landscape, and planning share the fundamental belief that space and place matter, the overwhelming majority of canonical knowledge and ... Show More
53m 47s
Jan 10
Graeme Brooker, "The Story of the Interior: How We Have Shaped Rooms and How They Shape Us" (Thames & Hudson, 2025)
From traditional nomadic dwellings to state-of-the-art airports, through monumental temples and Baroque palaces to high-rise apartments and high-fashion boutiques, The Story of the Interior: How We Have Shaped Rooms and How They Shape Us (Thames & Hudson, 2025) by Professor Graem ... Show More
50m 49s
Jan 7
Jessica Kelly and Neal Shasore, "Reconstruction: Architecture, Society and the Aftermath of the First World War" (Bloomsbury, 2024)
Reconstruction explores the impact of the First World War on the built environment - examining the immediate effects and aftermath of the Great War on the architecture of Britain and the British empire during the interwar years. While much attention has been paid by historians to ... Show More
44 m
Jun 2019
Eleonor Gilburd, "To See Paris and Die: The Soviet Lives of Western Culture" (Harvard UP, 2018)
Josef Stalin’s death in 1953 marked a noticeable shift in Soviet attitudes towards the West. A nation weary of war and terror welcomed with relief the new regime of Nikita Khrushchev and its focus on peaceful cooperation with foreign powers. A year after Stalin’s death, author ... Show More
1h 27m
Dec 2021
Barbara Martin, "Dissident Histories in the Soviet Union: From De-Stalinization to Perestroika" (Bloomsbury, 2019)
In Dissident Histories in the Soviet Union: From De-Stalinization to Perestroika (Bloomsbury,, 2019), Barbara Martin traces the careers of four prominent figures: Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Roy Medvedev, Aleksandr Nekrich and Anton Antonov-Ovseenko. Based on extensive archival resea ... Show More
1h 1m
Feb 2020
Maria Taroutina, "The Icon and the Square: Russian Modernism and the Russo-Byzantine Revival" (Penn State UP, 2018)
In The Icon and the Square: Russian Modernism and the Russo-Byzantine Revival (Penn State University Press, 2018), Maria Taroutina examines how the traditional interests of institutions such as the crown, the church, and the Imperial Academy of Arts temporarily aligned with the r ... Show More
1h 4m
Feb 2021
Roger R. Reese, "The Imperial Russian Army in Peace, War, and Revolution, 1856-1917" (U Kansas Press, 2019)
Roger Reese’s recent book, The Imperial Russian Army in Peace, War, and Revolution, 1856-1917 (University of Kansas, 2019), takes a deep dive into the internal workings of the Russian army. Focusing particularly on relations between officers and the rank and file, as well as on d ... Show More
1h 2m
Aug 2019
Susan Jaques, "The Caesar of Paris: Napoleon Bonaparte, Rome, and the Artistic Obsession That Shaped An Empire" (Pegasus Books, 2018)
In her book, The Caesar of Paris: Napoleon Bonaparte, Rome, and the Artistic Obsession That Shaped An Empire (Pegasus Books, 2018), Susan Jaques offers up a richly detailed and researched account of Napoleon’s fascination with ancient Rome, and how this obsession shaped not only ... Show More
44m 36s