Episode 7: The Soviet World of Soviet Georgians with Erik Scott

Reimagining Soviet Georgia

We discuss the book Familiar Strangers: The Georgian Diaspora and the Evolution of Soviet Empire with the author Erik Scott and much more.
In the book, Scott discusses the unique opportunities Soviet Georgians were afforded due to their position within Soviet society as a coherent, institutionalized nationality. Unlike other histories that touch on Georgia, or nationality within the USSR, Scott's book tries and complicates the narrative by focusing on Soviet Georgians as a diaspora within the Soviet Union and participated in a dynamic of domestic internationalism - a multinational cultural-political connectedness within the USSR. In particular, Scott focuses on how Georgians in Moscow were able to benefit from and excel within the Soviet system because of their Georgianness. He also problematizes the idea of nationhood as a purely territorial concept, especially within how Soviet society was built and constructed. In the case of Georgians, their active participation as Georgians was a critical dimension of the Soviet project, not only in the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic but in the all-Soviet capital Moscow, and beyond.