Border Conditions

Border Conditions combines history and memory studies with literary and cultural studies to examine lives at the limits of contemporary Europe: Russian speakers living in Latvia. Since the fall of the USSR in 1991, Latvia's Russian speakers have balanced between Russia and Europe as well as a socialist past, a capitalist and liberal present, and an illiberal regime rising in the Russian Federation. Kevin M. F. Platt describes how members of this population have defined themselves through art, literature, cultural institutions, film, and music—and how others have sought to define them.

At the end of the Cold War, many anticipated that societies globally could agree on the meaning of past history and a just politics in the present. The view from the borders of Europe demonstrates the contradictions pertaining to terms like empire, state socialism, liberalism, and nation that have made it impossible to achieve a consensus. In refocusing the examination of state socialism's aftermath around questions of empire and postcolonialism, Border Conditions helps us understand the distinctions between Russian and Western worldviews driving military confrontation to this day.

Kevin M. F. Platt is Professor of Russian and East European Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. He writes on history and memory in Russia and Eastern Europe, global Russophone and global socialist culture, and contemporary Russian-language

Kevin Platt's Border Conditions offers a bold and ambitious contribution to literary and cultural studies, extending well beyond its immediate focus on Slavic and East European literature to inform broader theoretical discussions in the field.

Nearly half a million ethnic Russians and Russian speakers reside in Latvia, many without Latvian citizenship. Left metaphorically homeless by the Soviet collapse and semi-stateless by post-Soviet passport and language policies, this population has swelled anew owing to emigration from Russia after the invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Kevin M. F. Platt's sophisticated insights into the deeper causes and dynamics of these disputes will help us to understand this situation as it continues to unfold.

Focusing on culture—art, music, monuments, poetry, and film—this study is a useful introduction to how Russian speakers produce and respond to various aspects of culture in Latvia. Particularly interesting is how Platt compares the Soviet-era televised song competition (1986–92) to the New Wave competition launched in 2002. Recommended.

Catriona Kelly, Trinity College, author of Soviet Art House:

Kevin Platt's book is a pioneering in-depth examination of a politically and culturally important group and its context in broader post-Soviet geopolitics. Above all, it suggests the creative energy and flexible thinking of groups whose stance is radically opposed to the "Russian World" evoked in empire-building propaganda.

Ronald Grigor Suny, University of Chicago (Emeritus), author of Stalin:

This is a unique, original, and brilliant study of Russian Latvians. The study is theoretically sophisticated, sensitive to the nuances of its subjects' lives, and takes what could be a narrow study of half a million people to illuminate broader issues of postcolonialism and post-socialism.