Ab Imperio and KRES Poliskola Present Awards for the Best History Research Papers Published in 2018
KRES Poliskola has sponsored AB Imperio’s second annual History Research Paper Contest on the new imperial history of Northern Eurasia, diversity and nationalism in the post-Soviet space.
After carefully reviewing the submitted papers, an international committee comprised of the Ab Imperio editorial board and editors has selected the most worthy publications, which proved an extremely difficult task considering the number of interesting studies produced in 2018.
And now, the winners:
- The best monograph:
Anatomy of a Genocide: The Life and Death of a Town Called Buczacz, by Omer Bartov.
The book, published in English by the New York-based publishing company Simon & Schuster, may be purchased at many large bookstore chains and may be found by the following reference:
Omer Bartov. Anatomy of a Genocide: The Life and Death of a Town Called Buczacz. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2018. 416 pp., ills. Index. ISBN: 978-1-4516-8454-4.
The new book by Omer Bartov, Professor of European History at Brown University, came as the result of many years’ work and has already been called exceptional and outstanding by many of the world’s leading critics. Anatomy of a Genocide uses the centuries-old history of a small Ukrainian town of Buczacz to demonstrate the seemingly invisible inter-ethnic contradictions, as well as the principles and conditions leading to their emergence. The life of the town of Buczacz is shown through the prism of a historical study. However, the facts meticulously documented by the author do not fit into the familiar perception frame and sometimes shock by their brutality or, on the contrary, by their humanity when you least expect it.
Despite the analogy with the works of Ivo Andrić, Anatomy of a Genocide is not a work of fiction and tackles a different topic, the Holocaust. To understand in order to not let this happen again in the future—is that not what we should strive for? The answer is obvious, and this is why this is an extremely important work for a wide audience.
Ab Imperio’s International Contest Committee has also particularly noted the monograph The Rise and Fall of Russia’s Far Eastern Republic by Ivan Sablin, published by Abingdon (Ivan Sablin. The Rise and Fall of Russia’s Far Eastern Republic, 1905–1922. Abingdon; New York: Routledge, 2018. 300 pp., ills. Index. ISBN: 978-1-138-31730-7»).
- The best article in a scholarly journal or an edited collection of essays:
“Vanka Kain, a Sleuth From Among the Thieves: The Anatomy of a Hybrid” by Yevgeny Akeliyev, Ab Imperio, Volume 19, Issue 3 (2018): 257-304.
The article by Yevgeny Akelyev, Associate Professor at the Higher School of Economics, is a study of the legal regulations of investigative activities prior to the 1750s that is recommended not only for history scholars, but also—and above all—for legal experts. The author based his description of the process of formation of law enforcement bodies in the post-Petrine Russia on a remarkable historical example that had never before been so profoundly and meticulously studied. The emerging analogies with foreign institutions of the same period are also of considerable interest.
The article depicts the state’s daily life and mechanisms, an intricate relationship between an ordinary person, society, and government bodies. Who was Vanka Kain in reality? What was his role in the formation of the Russian justice system? There is food for thought and debate here. A worthy work well-deserving of the mention it has received from the Ab Imperio Committee.
We congratulate the winners and wish them continued success!
This concludes the 2018 publications contest. The 2019 publications contest will open in the fall. Please watch our announcements.
