Tatar nation building since 1991: Ethnic mobilisation in historical perspective’

This study analyses the process of ethnic mobilization in the Soviet and post-Soviet eras and assesses the way in which history, memory and the treatment of the Volga Tatars by the Soviet state, especially under Lenin and Stalin, affected their long term desire for greater independence from Moscow. The central argument of this study is that Volga Tatar’s nation building was influenced by changes introduced under Gorbachev and by the weaknesses of the post-Sovietstate particularly during the Yeltsin era of the 1990s. The article assesses the strategies the President of Tatarstan and his advisors utilized during this period,especially after 1985, to successfully negotiate a bilateral treaty with Moscow in February 1994 granting Tatarstan greater autonomy and independence. Within this framework, the article then provides a detailed analysis of the approach taken in Tatarstan to achieve this goal and to renew the treaty in October 2005, despite Putin’s recentralization policies from 2000-2008

The celestial city brought down to earth : Dmitrij Cernákov's interpretation of Rimskij-Korsakov's opera the invisible city of Kitež and the Maiden Fevronia

Rimsky-Korsakov's penultimate opera is tied to the symbolist movement in fin de siècle Russia. Although the composer did not intend it as a mystical work in the wake of Wagner's Parsifal, his symbolist collaborators invested much symbolist thinking in the production. In contemporary reception, however, the eschatological focus of the work is hard to adjust to the expectations of modern audiences. This paper discusses the solutions elaborated by the Russian stage director Dimitry Tcherniakov in his production for the National Opera in Amsterdam. Tcherniakov succeeded to manipulate the work into the direction of a social and psychological drama. This paper analyses the strategies he employed to arrive at such a significant change of meaning without violating its spiritual tone

Problemy integratsii religioznykh men'shinstv: keysy Evropeyskogo Soyuza i Rossiyskoy Federatsii = The challenges of the integration of religious minorities: case studies in the EU and Russian Federation

This article provides a critical examination and comparison of the contemporary position of three religious minorities: the Muslims in Glasgow; the Sikhs in Novellara and the Kryashens in Tatarstan. This is initially accomplished through an overview of the socio-economic, cultural and political impact of the religious minorities as three important case studies and through their relationship with the dominant form of religion and religious identity. The article will then analyse this information and these relationships using two lenses. First, we will use the four types of claims for recognition proposed by Koenig (2015): (1) claims for recognition of difference (2); claims for more autonomy in public spheres (3); claims for tolerance and (4) call for greater recognition for equal participation in organization of the state. Second, we will use the four acculturation strategies proposed by Berry (1997): (1) integration; (2) assimilation; (3) separation; and (4) marginalisation. The article will conclude with some final comments on gender and youth

Problematic Issues of Institutional Development of Islamic Associations in Contemporary Ukraine

The article analyzes the revival of the Islamic religion which began in Ukraine in the 1990s. The authors point to the problematic issues of the institutional establishment of Islamic associations in contemporary Ukraine. In particular, four stages of development of Islam in independent Ukraine, which have their own institutional and ideological characteristics, are distinguished. Thus, the first stage was the creation of the first three spiritual administrations (the Spiritual Administration of Muslims of the Crimea, the Spiritual Administration of Muslims of Ukraine, and the Spiritual Center of Muslims of Ukraine), the development of which defined the ideology of future development of Islam in Ukraine (national orientation, leadership projects, etc.). That ideology was unacceptable to many independent Muslim communities who refused to participate in national and leadership projects. This led to the formation of the second stage (2007-2010) of the local development of Islam. The completion of the stage was marked by the creation of the common Council of Spiritual Administrations and Centers of Muslims of Ukraine. The next stage (2010-2016) is characterized by the artificial creation of associations affiliated with other Spiritual administrations. In the fourth stage, which has been going on since the end of 2016, the processes of self-identification of Muslims in a multi-confessional and multi-ethnic environment, the participation of Muslims in the protection of their homeland, etc., have intensified. In total, nine Muslim Spiritual Administrations or Centers have been established during the years of independence, four of which (DUM of Crimea, DCM of Ukraine, DUMU “The Unity” and DCM of Crimea) now operate in the territories of Ukraine occupied by Russia and have embarked on the path of collaborationism. The authors draw attention to the numerical indicators of accounting of Muslim communities and believers in general, the peculiarities of the Islamic educational process, the dependence of Ukrainian Spiritual administrations on foreign Islamic centers, and the attempts of political activity of the Ukrainian Islamic Ummah