This thesis concerns the Jadidist movement--a reform movement in Russian Central Asia centered around an attempt to westernize the school system in that area. The leader of that movement was Ismail Bey Gasprinskii, a well traveled Tatar educator and journalist. Out of Gasprinskii's attempts at educational reforms grew other movements such as language reform and a small nationalist movement. Gasprinskii and his followers came into conflict with the Russian government. While the Tatars were engaged in an attempt to modernize their society, the Russian government set out on a course of russification. At the beginning of the twentieth century these two forces vied for dominance. The First World War and later Russia's Civil War cut the contest short. This thesis examines these movements, their causes and their affects on Tatar society. By using archival material, some only recently discovered, this paper is a study of a movement not allowed to live and its life. / M. A.

No description available.

Titles in English and German / Christian Spirituality, Church History and Missiology / M.Th. (Missiology)

The construct internal-external locus of control was utilized to examine the Soviet Pentecostal refugees' perception of life experiences in the United States as defined by three dimensions: social, economical, and political. Unlike the majority of immigration research, which focuses on structural variables, this research further addressed the concept of acculturation as a long term process of resettlement. Subjects completed an anonymous forced choice questionnaire consisting of the Rotter (1966) locus of control instrument scale. Pearson Product moment correlation coefficients were calculated to examine the strength of the relationships between the internal-external locus of control scores and five factor analyzed life experience categories. Positive and sometimes strong correlations could be found between the internal-external locus of control scores and the five life experience factors. All five hypotheses were confirmed by the results.

"July 2004" / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 65-68) / 257, 68 leaves : ill. (some col.), map ; 30 cm. / Title page, contents and abstract only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University Library. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Adelaide, School of Humanities, Discipline of English, 2004

Rund 20 Jahre nach dem Ende der Sowjetunion verharrt ein Großteil ländlich geprägter Regionen in der Russländischen Föderation in einer strukturellen Krise, die sich auf ökonomischer, sozialer und politischer Ebene niederschlägt. Auch wenn sich ländliche Räume als vermeintliche Verlierer der Transformation erwiesen haben, so sind sie doch vielfach in sich differenziert und zeigen verschiedenartige Problemlagen und Entwicklungspfade auf, die vom Umgang mit den Herausforderungen des Systemwechsels zeugen. Beispielhaft wird dies am Deutschen Nationalen Rayon Altai (DNR Altai) dargestellt, dessen Transformationsphase in der vorliegenden Arbeit rekonstruiert wird. Der DNR Altai stellt in vielerlei Hinsicht einen Sonderfall dar, da er als räumlicher Fixpunkt russlanddeutscher Entwicklungspolitik in die bundesdeutsche Förderkulisse eingebettet war. Mit dem allmählichen Rückzug der deutschen Förderinstitutionen stellt sich jedoch die Frage nach nachhaltigen Strukturen, Verstetigung von Projekten und der Zukunft russlanddeutscher Kultur im Altai.

[Truncated abstract] Molokans are a Russian sectarian community that has been a transnational diasporic community since their exile from southern Russia in 1839. During the 1839 exodus they were relocated to Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan. These countries make up a region referred to by Molokans as Transcaucasia located in and around the Caucasus Mountains. A further migration to Turkmenistan followed in 1889. Since that time, Molokans have settled in Iran, the United States of America, Mexico, Australia and Brazil. The colonies in Brazil and Mexico have disbanded with members re-joining Molokan communities in the United States of America and Australia. The communities remain in contact with one another and with various Molokan communities still existing in the Russian Soviet Socialist Federal Republic. Molokans are characterised by a religious structure of lay ministers and elders in a traditional, patriarchal social community. They are a collectivity of churches (there is no hierarchy between the churches) and sub-groups who practise varying degrees of adherence to Molokan dogma. They are a millenarian, charismatic religious community similar to Pentecostals and Anabaptists with the exception that they have ceased to evangelise and have become ‘closed’ communities practising endogamy. Given their closed structure, relatively little is known about this group in mainstream society . . . Spirituality, in the form of prophecy, healing, and the shared expression of religious ecstasy (rejoicing in the Holy Spirit) provides a sense of communitas that helps to bind the communities. Persecution in Russia and in the United States of America promoted mistrust of outsiders and contributed to the closure of social boundaries. Interventionist and reform activities in both Russia and the United States of America reinforced the belief that social closure was the only way to maintain cultural continuity. Their shared history of migration and persecution contributes to the building of a core community identity.

Titles in English and German / Christian Spirituality, Church History and Missiology / M.Th. (Missiology)

This study was motivated by a variety of democratic experience in the world that interchangeably perplexes and inspires students of politics. To understand the processes by which democracies emerge, this study was launched to examine new democracies from a discursive perspective. Four main questions guided the inquiry: (1) Is there a rhetorical/discursive counterpart to the process of democratization? (2) If so, what are the rhetorical features and markers of democratic changes? (3) What specific discursive practices correlate with growth and/or decline of democracy? and (4) What practical value might there be to having a more sensitive measure of democratic growth and/or decline? To answer these questions, a critical discourse analysis was conducted on two genres of Russian public discourse juxtaposing lay (letters to the editor) and elite (editorials) voices in three national periodicals during four election seasons between 1996 and 2008. The analysis of lay discourse revealed (a) that ordinary Russians enjoy expressing their opinions, (b) that they are argumentative, (c) that their repertoire of political voices is rather small, and (d) that their discussions are gradually sliding toward trivial matters. These findings portrayed a public that is attentive to public affairs and speaks out in a forum. Elite voices, on the other hand, were found (e) to be mesmerized by politics, (f) to think of the political world as detached from ordinary life, and (g) to envision the audience of ironic bystanders. Together, these findings pointed to a conclusion that ordinary Russians are rarely summoned either to renew democracy or to improve upon it. Consequently, they rarely identify themselves as true democrats, although many of their discursive practices resemble those that are thought of as a staple of the democratic public sphere. / text

The essential objective of this study was to fill a bibliographic void of secondary source material concerning Russian California. This was accomplished by combining available translations and more specific studies on the subject into one extensive work. Introductory chapters provide: (1) a brief statement regarding Russia's massive eastward expansion through Siberia, to Kamchatka and Alaska; (2) an examination of the nature of the Russian-American Company; and (3) a detailed look at the programs instituted by the Company to provision Alaska and Kamchatka. The establishment of Fort Ross in 1811 is viewed as one of those programs. The settlement's primary function throughout its existence was to send foodstuffs to Russia's northern colonies. The main body of the paper describes fully the structure of the settlement and analyzes the various activities, undertaken by the Russians at Fort Ross, in order to provide grain to the Company. Those activities were sea otter hunting, manufacturing, and agriculture and animal husbandry. In closing, the paper focuses on the Native Californians of Fort Ross, detailing their culture and their relationship with imperialist powers in nineteenth-century California. The industries of Fort Ross--hunting, manufacturing, and husbandry--met with failure. Each endeavor proved to be either inadequate or untimely: The harvesting of pelts was quickly curtailed by the depletion of animal populations; a successful manufacturing enterprise was interrupted by foreign competition; and lack of labor and expertise hindered the Russians' effort to transform the Ross Counter into the Company’s “granary.” The research conducted for this study led to the conclusion that the Russians' decision to abandon their California settlement was finalized when another means to provision the northern colonies became available. A Study of Fort Ross necessarily demands an international historical perspective. A consideration of the Spanish colonial enterprise in Mexico and California, the British activities in the Pacific Northwest, and the increasing strength of the United States on the western coast of North America are essential in understanding the failure of the Russians at Fort Ross and in Alaska. A number of published, primary source materials were used exhaustively to complete this study. A complete selected bibliography is included. Several categories of material were of prime importance. Briefly, they are: (1) correspondence between the Chief Manager of the Russian-American Company colonies in Alaska and the Company’s Main Office in St. Petersburg. These documents are available on microfilm in the National Archives and in Vneshniaia Politika Rossii, Series I and II, edited by N. N. Bolkhovitinov. (2) Journals, kept by navigators who participated in Russian circumnavigations which made calls in the Russian America, are invaluable sources of information on the circumstances of the colonies. (3) Reports of Company employees, such as Kirill T. Klebnikov and Ferdinand P. Wrangell provide important statistical information on agricultural production, otter hunting, manufacturing, and the population of Russian California. As mentioned, secondary sources on Russian California are scarce. However, James R. Gibson's work, Imperial Russia in Frontier America, does offer a thorough treatment of Russian trade and husbandry in California.