PUBLIC LECTURE
An American in the Soviet and Russian Archives
by Alfred J. Rieber, University Emeritus Professor at Central European University (CEU)
When: Thursday, February 15, 2024, at 6:00 p.m.
Where: Blinken OSA Archivum, Research Room, 1051 Budapest, Arany J. u. 32.
Online: https://ceu-edu.zoom.us/j/95634973722?pwd=ZmRZc2MwVmFqcUxpYXlMR2dSTlFydz09
In his talk Alfred Rieber intends to weave together two themes; first, some brief personal reflections on the place of archives in the craft of the historian and then, primarily, his own experiences in assessing the changes in atmosphere and access to the Soviet and Russian archives over the past fifty-five years since he first conducted research in Moscow as a graduate student during the first year of the Soviet-American cultural exchange in 1958-59 (Lacey -Zarubin Agreement).That same year, his research in the archives also began his personal encounters with Soviet historians which led to several lasting friendships.
Alfred J. Rieber has been teaching and writing Russian and Soviet history for more than 50 years. He was a participant in the first year of the Soviet-American cultural exchange in 1958–1959 and has returned to the Soviet Union and Russia many times to lecture and conduct archival research. He holds the title of Professor Emeritus at the University of Pennsylvania and at Central European University and was awarded the Henry C. Moe Prize and the E. Harris Harbison Prize of the Danforth Foundation. The E.Harris Harbison Award is for one of the ten best history teachers in the US. His book Struggle for the Eurasian Borderlands. From the Rise of Early Modern Empires to the End of the First World War (Cambridge University Press, 2014) was awarded the Bentley Prize by the World History Association, and its sequel, Stalin’s Struggle for Supremacy in Eurasia (Cambridge, 2016) was shortlisted for the Pushkin History Prize. His latest books are Storms over the Balkans during the Second World War (Oxford University Press, 2022) and Stalin as Warlord (Yale University Press, 2022).