Vol 10 No 3 (2025): Ethnic Processes on the Russian Frontier in the 19th–21st Centuries
The latest issue of the Journal of Frontier Studies (Vol. 10, No. 3, 2025) focuses on ethnic processes across Russian frontier regions from the 19th to the 21st centuries. The issue is based on the materials of the Sixth International Academic Conference “Ethnic Minorities in the History of Russia,” held on April 18–19, 2025, at Pushkin Leningrad State University. Edited by Dr. Vladimir N. Shaidurov, the issue brings together historical, anthropological, and ethnodemographic studies that explore the diversity of frontier dynamics in imperial, Soviet, and post-Soviet contexts.
The section “Frontiers of the Russian Empire” presents articles addressing state strategies toward ethnic and confessional minorities. Special attention is given to Poles in military education, Lutheran Germans in St. Petersburg, Russian settlers in the Murghab Oasis, and German entrepreneurship in Siberia. The visual dimension of the imperial frontier is examined through expedition photographs of Tuva and Tuvan people taken in the late 19th century.
The section “Frontiers in the Soviet and Post-Soviet Spaces” covers a broad chronological and regional scope, from the korenizatsiya policy in the Bryansk province in the 1920s to contemporary demographic shifts along the Russian–Kazakh border. Topics include Jewish communities in Transbaikal, the situation of German peasants in the interwar period, and changes in Soviet religious policy regarding Buryat Buddhists.
The concluding section, “Miscellaneous,” features a critical review of Russian publications from 2024 on Russian America and the American Frontier, highlighting current trends in global frontier historiography.
This issue will be of interest to historians, ethnologists, anthropologists, and scholars engaged in the study of border zones as spaces of ethnocultural interaction, memory, and identity transformation.
