Description
Book SynopsisThe Soviet Union is often presented as a largely isolated and idiosyncratic state, but Tobias Rupprecht challenges this view by telling the story of Soviet and Latin American intellectuals, students, political figures and artists, and their encounters with the 'other' from the 1950s through the 1980s.
Trade Review'Tobias Rupprecht has high aspirations in his pathbreaking study of Soviet-Latin American encounters: to put Russia in global history, to put Latin America in Soviet history, and to put culture into the study of international relations. Using sources from Brasilia to Bogata to Moscow, he succeeds admirably in Soviet Internationalism after Stalin.' David C. Engerman, Brandeis University, Massachusetts
'Tobias Rupprecht has written a compelling account of Soviet cultural relations with Latin America during the Cold War. It ranges across a wide variety of cultural sources, from official propaganda to travelogues and films. … this is an interesting and useful study of a topic that has received too little attention in the recent past, and Rupprecht should be commended for having approached it with precision and flair.' Alessandro Iandolo, Journal of Contemporary History
'Overall, this outstanding book deserves a wide audience among Soviet historians and cultural historians of the Cold War. It rests on deep and wide-ranging primary source research (Russian archives, Russian and Spanish-language publications, and a handful of interviews), as well as a thorough command of recent scholarship in English, German, Russian, and Spanish, yet it is well written and engaging.' Julie Hessler, Slavic Review
'… an in-depth study on Soviet instruments, hopes, expertise, understanding and results of cultural and academic policy with regard to Latin America … predestined to serve as a highly valuable work of reference on Soviet-Latin American cultural relations, the more so as Soviet-Latin American relations in general remain on the current research agenda.' Ragna Boden, Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas
Table of ContentsIntroduction: the end of Soviet isolationism after 1953; 1. A modern image for the USSR: Soviet self-representation towards Latin Americans; 2. Moscow learns the mambo: Latin America and internationalism in Soviet popular culture; 3. Paradise lost and found: Latin American intellectuals in and on the Soviet Union; 4. From Russia with a diploma: Latin American students in the Soviet Union; 5. Desk revolutionaries: Soviet Latin Americanists and internationalism in the late Soviet Union; Conclusion: Soviet internationalism after Stalin and its domestic and foreign audiences.
