Two alumni of Harvard Russian studies respond to “decolonization”

In a sense, Russian history in the USA suffered from the fact that with very few exceptions it was being taught by the ‘minority peoples’, that is to say by refugees, their sons and daughters, their grandsons and daughters from the non-Russian ethnic groups of the Russian Empire and the USSR. Very few of them brought shall we say empathy for the subject matter. Now this distortion is going to reach its logical or illogical conclusion by simply cancelling Russia and studying instead those same minority peoples.

One necessary consequence will be the utter uselessness to anyone of the newly dubbed decolonized Russian studies. The field has suffered in the past few decades from hijacking by the trends common to the social sciences in America – discarding what had once been learning languages, learning about rulers and government structures, about wars and reforms. Instead what came in was Women’s Studies, LGQBT Studies as they apply to Russia, not to mention the skewing of all modern history into anti-Putin studies. Now with the launch of the decolonization vector we will witness the utter destruction and marginalization of Russian studies.

This turn of events is a logical progression, but remains tragic to Francis, to myself, and I imagine to others who remain loyal to advanced studies that have some relevance to the national interest.

Harvard is dismantling the Field of Russian Studies.

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The Specter of Dick Pipes now hovers over Russian Studies at Harvard’s Russian Studies Center: Let’s “decolonize” the Russian Federation—RIP.

In a book edited by Chomsky on The Cold War and the University , the author of one chapter whose name escapes me right now points out that the major Russian/Soviet Studies Centers in America were set up by funding from the Pentagon/CIA after World War II in order to better understand Russia and the Soviet Union. Now we are going to “deconstruct” Russian History and the Russian Federation since that coincides with American Foreign Policy in the post-Ukraine-War Era.