For all those interested in the history of the Second World War and Latvia, we have a new author interview for you. Check out our conversation with @harrymerritt.bsky.social on his recently-published book 'Latvian Soldiers of World War II' www.peripheralhistories.co.uk/post/latvian...

I'll be leading the Uni of Staffordshire UCU AGM this afternoon at 13.00 - Staffs members please contact me if you'd like more details (or consult the posters that I've carpet bombed campus with of late). @staffsucu.bsky.social we have a lot to discuss. 📢

Recorded the first episode of my new monthly Central Asia infused musical radio hour at Sphere Radio, an independent radio station in Leipzig The first mix includes some of my favorite retro gems from Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Afghanistan on.soundcloud.com/29fjCOYHfGzS...

Rejection from Leverhulme, so no book on the origins of Kyrgyzstan from me! Not complaining; no doubt my bid was reviewed fairly, and all the best bids were moved to detailed application stage (congrats to those who were!). But it's tough working in an ever tightening national research environment.

Be sure to check out the latest fascinating post on the @peripheralhist.bsky.social website! Peasant Memoirs from Interwar Poland and 'the Power of Irony'. We are always seeking new academic contributors, get in touch if you'd like to know more! www.peripheralhistories.co.uk/post/peasant...

Many congratulations to @dianakudaibergen.bsky.social on winning the Nove Prize for her book The Kazakh Spring! There is no more deserving scholar!

New post alert! This week we have Stanisław Edward Boridczenko on interwar Polish memoirs and the power of irony www.peripheralhistories.co.uk/post/peasant...

The Smolensk archive, one of the most famous collections for the study of Stalinism and Soviet provincial government, and which supported pioneering research from the 1950s can now be found online

Join us tomorrow for a webinar on #CentralAsia-#China relations, hosted by @caspiancenter.bsky.social er.bsky.social. Register here to tune in on Tuesday 10 March, 1000 UK time, 1500 in #Kazakhstan #Uzbekistan www.caspianpolicy.org/events/detai...

Super excited to have this out! Please listen and share! :) With @juanitamarieelias.bsky.social @mybisa.bsky.social!

What a great topic.

The book is out! www.hup.harvard.edu/books/978067...

A PhD opportunity at Malmö University, 'with a focus on administrative law reform and authoritarian legitimation in Central Asia'. Deadline 31st Jan. If anyone's interested I can put you in touch with people at Malmö. web103.reachmee.com/ext/I005/101...

Much has been said about the colonial roots of anthropology. Area studies have been criticized for being an arm of US soft power. Western academia and soft power structures provided employment for those with niche interests in other places. But what happens now that it’s all crumbling?

Honest question, not at all snarky: why don't journal editors ever send brief notes of thanks to peer reviewers? I always submit prompt and (I'd like to think) fair, thorough peer reviews, and a two-sentence email of thanks would really hit the spot sometimes.

'Eurasian exchanges: Central Asian nomadic pastoralists, mountain ecosystems, and market economies in the early twentieth century', by Jennifer Keating UCD [open access] www.cambridge.org/core/service...

Congratulations to Vladimir Hamed-Troyansky, winner of the Barbara Jelavich Book Prize for Empire of Refugees: North Caucasian Muslims and the Late Ottoman State with Stanford University Press. #ASEEESPrizes See all winners: buff.ly/rh9Tt7b

Since this wound up being a popular thread, sharing an excellent backgrounder on the elections in Kyrgyzstan from @aijanco.bsky.social in The Diplomat: thediplomat.com/2025/11/is-p...

We're advertising!!! www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DPK289/a...

Incredible resource for Central Asianists, just as you'd expect from Sergei Abashin: abashin.org

Returning to teaching materials that I devised years ago provides a vivid sense of how far we've moved. The agonising efforts I made to force students to really think about the minutiae of bias, subjectivity, (in)accuracy, in source material; it all seems so quaint in the era of Google's AI summary.

Instead of building on Bishkek’s advantages (it was such a lush and green city, trolleybuses, new bike lanes). The authorities are going tabula rasa with the promise of a bombastic leap into the future, an attempt to imitate Almaty, Tashkent and the Gulf states all at once

My new article has just been made available online, open access, with Urban History. It looks at how Kyrgyz pastoralists, returning to the Chui Valley after the violence of 1916, were received in their new capital city in the early Soviet period 1/2 doi.org/10.1017/S096...

Manas Airport in Bishkek finally changes its IATA code from FRU (to BSZ). FRU was a legacy of the Soviet era when Bishkek was named after Mikhail Frunze, a Bolshevik revolutionary born in the city. 24.kg/english/3391...

The BASEES Eurasian Regions Study Group have put together a roundtable at #ICCEES on publishing in academic journals for postgraduates and early career researchers. Come along to meet friendly editors and ask questions! You can submit questions anonymously here too: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

Heading to #ICCEES2025 next week? We have put together a list of sessions that may be of interest to Peripheral Histories? readers here: www.peripheralhistories.co.uk/post/iccees-...

My forthcoming article on the Thaw in Tatarstan is now available online through The Russian Review. Thanks to colleagues and friends who helped make it possible!

It's easy to roll your eyes at much of the research governance jargon, but 'original contribution to knowledge' does neatly encapsulate some of what we do that ChatGPT absolutely does not do.

Delighted to contribute to this book of essays by authors around the world examining 35 of the world's pressing problems - for me it was "Is Democracy Under Threat?" Thanks to Dosym Satpayev for being the inspiration for the book. Now in bookshops in Kazakhstan + on Kaspi - buy it!

Today's Central Asian Photo of the Day: 📷 The statue of Lenin in Osh, a city in southern Kyrgyzstan. Once the biggest Lenin in Central Asia, Kyrgyz authorities took it down this week. lifeincentralasia.picfair.com/images/02163...

Basically I said the statue story is about the local politics of Osh, and the big question (which I don't think I've seen answered yet?) is less why Lenin came down, but who replaces him on that plinth...

Assuming they use the interview I'll be on the BBC World Service tonight at 10pm chatting to Lyse Doucet(!) about Kyrgyzstan.

The last two days have seen 2 bits of bad news in academic publishing: Oxford UP using AI copyediting, and now Amsterdam UP being gobbled up by T&F. The journal I edit, @contemplevant.bsky.social, is published by T&F, and that’s not something that can be changed in the short/medium term, but…

We are heading to Alaska with our latest post. Many thanks to Aglaia Gulakova for sharing her fascinating research on the history of Old Believers’ migration and resettlement www.peripheralhistories.co.uk/post/in-purs...

I was Chair of my union branch when my university made 10% cuts in staffing and it was extremely tough. I don't have any special insight into how the sector is faring, but what I keep thinking is: in c. 10 years the press/business/civil service are going to ask for an expert in x or y... 1/2

BASEES is delighted to announce three annual prizes recognising the contribution of those teaching Slavonic, East European and Eurasian Studies (and the languages thereof). * Early Career Excellence * Distinguished Excellence * Language Teaching Excellence Full information basees.org/teaching-exc...

Last week we ran a workshop together with Kyrgyz scholars entitled 'Power and Space in Kyrgyzstan', kindly hosted by the OSCE Academy in Bishkek. I am very grateful to have such generous colleagues. www.osce-academy.net/en/news/full...

Heading to Cambridge this week for the Conference on Baltic Studies in Europe? Here's a sneak peek of our 📹 documentary film 🎬 with the wonderful Maarja Merivoo-Parro and Sanita Reinsone for our panel on solidarity in the Baltics in the long 20th century! 📆 25 April 15:30 @balticstudies.bsky.social

Суусамыр 🇰🇬

Ала-Арча 🇰🇬

Slightly obsessed with this little shoe repair place in central Osh.

I've changed my Bluesky handle. It's now the same as my website: @jonathancampion.com. Take a look at the newly updated jonathancampion.com for: – Some escapism, with photographs and stories from Eurasia; – My bio / life story; – Posts about cricket, travel, camel's milk, and Uzbek wine.

Finding your bearings in Osh, Kyrgyzstan: jonathancampion.com/2024/11/06/f...

Beshbarmak

Stephan Rindlisbacher and I have co-organised an event on the modern history of Kyrgyzstan at the OSCE Academy in Bishkek on the afternoon of 17th April. I am incredibly excited about this event, which will bring us together with Kyrgyz and Kazakh scholars. 1/2 www.osce-academy.net/en/events/fu...

From this Friday I'll be in Kyrgyzstan for fieldwork, visiting Bishkek, Osh and Talas. Would be nice to see some friendly faces if anyone else will be there too. Back to UK in early May. 🇰🇬🇬🇧

This will be a very important book, seriously impressive scholarship, out 15th April.

To pass the quality threshold but lose out in randomised allocation once is bad luck; to pass the quality threshold but lose out in randomised allocation twice is...?

In our latest post, you can learn more about the development of LGBT studies and the normalisation of queerness in Estonia. Check out Rasa Kamarauskaitė's (@balticbasees.bsky.social) interview with Estonian sexualities scholar Rebeka Põldsam www.peripheralhistories.co.uk/post/periphe...

Today I begin an AHRC Curiosities Award project 'Staggered Decolonisation: Power and Space in Kyrgyzstan, 1924-2024'. The project follows the distribution of Kyrgyz land across the Soviet and post-Soviet eras. Stephan Rindlisbacher and I will begin working in regional Kyrgyz archives in late March.