Taming the Wild Field

Colonization and Empire on the Russian Steppe

Nonfiction, History, Asian, Russia, Social & Cultural Studies, Political Science
Cover of the book Taming the Wild Field by Willard Sunderland, Cornell University Press
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Willard Sunderland ISBN: 9781501703249
Publisher: Cornell University Press Publication: March 10, 2016
Imprint: Cornell University Press Language: English
Author: Willard Sunderland
ISBN: 9781501703249
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Publication: March 10, 2016
Imprint: Cornell University Press
Language: English

Stretching from the tributaries of the Danube to the Urals and from the Russian forests to the Black and Caspian seas, the vast European steppe has for centuries played very different roles in the Russian imagination. To the Grand Princes of Kiev and Muscovy, it was the "wild field," a region inhabited by nomadic Turko-Mongolic peoples who repeatedly threatened the fragile Slavic settlements to the north. For the emperors and empresses of imperial Russia, it was a land of boundless economic promise and a marker of national cultural prowess. By the mid-nineteenth century the steppe, once so alien and threatening, had emerged as an essential, if complicated, symbol of Russia itself.Traversing a thousand years of the region's history, Willard Sunderland recounts the complex process of Russian expansion and colonization, stressing the way outsider settlement at once created the steppe as a region of empire and was itself constantly changing. The story is populated by a colorful array of administrators, Cossack adventurers, Orthodox missionaries, geographers, foreign entrepreneurs, peasants, and (by the late nineteenth century) tourists and conservationists. Sunderland's approach to history is comparative throughout, and his comparisons of the steppe with the North American case are especially telling.Taming the Wild Field eloquently expresses concern with the fate of the world's great grasslands, and the book ends at the beginning of the twentieth century with the initiation of a conservation movement in Russia by those appalled at the high environmental cost of expansion.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

Stretching from the tributaries of the Danube to the Urals and from the Russian forests to the Black and Caspian seas, the vast European steppe has for centuries played very different roles in the Russian imagination. To the Grand Princes of Kiev and Muscovy, it was the "wild field," a region inhabited by nomadic Turko-Mongolic peoples who repeatedly threatened the fragile Slavic settlements to the north. For the emperors and empresses of imperial Russia, it was a land of boundless economic promise and a marker of national cultural prowess. By the mid-nineteenth century the steppe, once so alien and threatening, had emerged as an essential, if complicated, symbol of Russia itself.Traversing a thousand years of the region's history, Willard Sunderland recounts the complex process of Russian expansion and colonization, stressing the way outsider settlement at once created the steppe as a region of empire and was itself constantly changing. The story is populated by a colorful array of administrators, Cossack adventurers, Orthodox missionaries, geographers, foreign entrepreneurs, peasants, and (by the late nineteenth century) tourists and conservationists. Sunderland's approach to history is comparative throughout, and his comparisons of the steppe with the North American case are especially telling.Taming the Wild Field eloquently expresses concern with the fate of the world's great grasslands, and the book ends at the beginning of the twentieth century with the initiation of a conservation movement in Russia by those appalled at the high environmental cost of expansion.

More books from Cornell University Press

Cover of the book Dying to Work by Willard Sunderland
Cover of the book From Plato to Platonism by Willard Sunderland
Cover of the book Jew Boy by Willard Sunderland
Cover of the book Varietals of Capitalism by Willard Sunderland
Cover of the book The Good Temp by Willard Sunderland
Cover of the book Reading Classes by Willard Sunderland
Cover of the book Moral Aspects of Economic Growth, and Other Essays by Willard Sunderland
Cover of the book Rigorism of Truth by Willard Sunderland
Cover of the book Labor Relations in a Globalizing World by Willard Sunderland
Cover of the book Breaking the Mold by Willard Sunderland
Cover of the book The End of Satisfaction by Willard Sunderland
Cover of the book Good Governance Gone Bad by Willard Sunderland
Cover of the book Necessary Luxuries by Willard Sunderland
Cover of the book The Supreme Court and Constitutional Democracy by Willard Sunderland
Cover of the book Shakespeare's Medieval Craft by Willard Sunderland
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy