Russia employs a dual identity strategy, presenting itself as a bastion of whiteness and traditional values to Western audiences while positioning itself as an anti-colonial power to the Global South. This approach exploits the fluid nature of racial identity, where whiteness expands and contracts based on political convenience, creating a tripartite relationship between Russia, Hungary, and American far-right movements based on shared notions of exclusionary whiteness. This strategy allows Russia to maintain influence across different regions while undermining European integration and challenging the post-war international order.
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Historian Kimberly St. Julian-Varnon on Russia, Ukraine, and the Politics of Whiteness | How ComeAjouté :
Hello, my name is Christopher Atwood.
You're watching How Come, a series by Ukrainer International where we talk with people from around the world about the underlying dynamics that shape our modern times and our understanding of global events. Uh, today we are speaking with historian and writer Kimberly St. Julian Varnon. Kimberly is a prominent American scholar and regional expert whose primary research focuses have been the former Soviet Union, East Germany, and Russia. In 2022, she became one of the most critical commentators in uh American media on Russia's full-scale war against Ukraine uh as on Russian American relations and on the issues of race and racism in Russia and Ukraine.
Um Kimberly, it is absolutely wonderful to see you.
>> Thank you for having me.
>> Thank you so much for joining us. Um, you know, I think that we're starting this conversation in such a really interesting time. Uh, because I'm I'm I'm in KV. Uh, obviously there are, you know, periodic uh strikes on KV. Uh, you know, more frequently when um when when when there's a reason to destroy the infrastructure and make people suffer in the winter. Uh, but still, nevertheless, there's periodic strikes. Um, but you are also somehow far from being completely safe. Uh, you like as I described, you are um you're a historian. You're a black female scholar working in the field of area studies, a field that the current presidential administration in the US has actively targeted. Um, shutting down some programs. Um, and I know that I know from my conversations with people in that field, uh, from directors of programs that they're afraid that that that their program might be targeted.
Um, so how how how are you surviving?
What has it been like? What have you been dealing with? Um, how are you processing things?
>> Um, the the the joke I make with my friends is, I've seen this movie before in Russian and in German. And that's kind of how I think if you're a soie day story, you have to have a dark sense of humor. And so it's it's been difficult in terms of just the loss of faith and I think of in American institutions and these are institutions I've held dear my entire life, but also um a very heavy feeling of responsibility. Um, and I kind of go between those two things in terms of, oh my goodness, academia is on fire. What am I going to do? I'm a black woman who works on a region people, you know, it's currently under attack and and it seems like the current administration supporting that attack. And then also, as an American who has regional expertise, I do feel a responsibility to continue to educate Americans as much as I can about the war that's still going on, that Ukraine is still being invaded.
people are still dying. Um, and also as an American, not just an academic, but as an American citizen, the heavy responsibility of my country's role in the chaos. Um, and I sit with that a lot and I think about that quite a bit. And so I think, yeah, it just goes between the academic concern versus, uh, this is kind of stupid. There are people who are not safe in their own homes. Um, so yeah, it and I've been thinking a lot about this historical moment and this is a historical moment. I think we're we're living through the fundamental undermining I think of the pillars of what we thought the post-war world post World War II world were going to be for Western Europe um for Eastern Europe for the United States. And we're living through the collapse of those pillars. And so I I think in terms of my responsibility as an American, my responsibility as a historian to bear witness to this, but also to try to use my knowledge to to give people an anchor to get through this. This too shall pass. I studied the 1930s.
>> We will get through this.
>> So uh there's so much in just what you said that already has me uh deviating from my my notes. Um uh first I want to say that when I've when I've spoken with black Americans um in 2024 and 2025 uh very often I found a sense of like um an easy sense of of building solidarity because a lot of black Americans that I would interact with like they would say I'm so sick of people talking about Trump and asking me about Trump and and thinking about Trump like we've got our own problems and and when I would like I remember distinctly one conversation where I spoke to a woman and she was completely shocked that this like random white man at her door was uh saying like yeah like I I can understand because in any time in American history when you've had this kind of upheaval um and this kind of uh these kinds of attacks towards uh the black community um you find the only way you resist that is within your own community. Um, and I I've seen that firsthand in Ukraine like like very similarly to what you're describing where um you have this feeling of responsibility and this feeling of responsibility is to your compatriots. It's to the people who um like you said like who need this sense of grounding and this understanding. Um, and so what you really reminded me of uh with this idea of having this loss of faith and this feeling of responsibility is I was in Trishv a couple months ago and I I I wrote a thing about this um uh that I will hopefully publish in the next couple of months. But uh but basically I was walking through downtown Chunikov and I saw a bunch of like Soviet plaques and they're still from the Soviet time. They still just haven't taken them down and eventually they'll be taken down. And um and I I just remember feeling this like deep sense of empathy for the Ukrainians who were on those plaques because they become part of this machine. Like it's it's it's I can't hold that against them. Like they were in a tough spot. Um but I also have to recognize that their actions led to the um led to the suppression of their own neighbors. And um and then I came across a plaque of uh a Ukrainian um uh linguist called uh uh Seord Hansov. Um very few people know about him. He's originally from Chunica.
That's why he has a black there. Uh but he was a linguist who helped like standardize the Ukraine language in the 1920s and he was repressed for that. and uh he basically spent his whole life uh in goologs and exiled and working for scraps after he eventually was allowed to like live in his hometown again. Um and so I kind of see this similar dynamic where I also have this very deep sense of responsibility of like you have to pursue that life. Like unfortunately that's the reality is like when you have this base of knowledge um like you like yes I have empathy for anyone who just wants to try to survive but I feel like I'm in a position where I need to do that. Is that something similar to you?
Is that something that like like how how do you how do you process that? Like how do you understand that? Because again you are like like I'm I'm a white guy saying this, right? you are, like I said, a black female scholar saying this, like you feel this sense of responsibility and I would see a parallel directly to Hansolv in what you're describing to me.
>> Definitely. And I think it comes from I think this heavy sense of responsib I think it just comes from like growing up in the south and I grew up in like rural southeast Texas. If you can't hear it, my accent is very rural southeast Texas.
Um, and I'm a first generation college student and my parents went to segregated schools. And so in my family, education was the most important thing because so much of my family have been kept from education. And so I think that's one part is I take my role as an educator like this is my this is my duty on this earth is education. And so that's one part of it but also I have been able to reach people across the world just because I'm a nerd and I really love working on this particular region of the world and I want to share that knowledge and just how cool my region is and like Ukraine is so fascinating. Central Asia is so fascinating and I want to share that with people and I just think back to when I was in Ukraine in 2013 and I just remember people ask me why are you studying Ukrainian history here you're an American like why do you care and I thought I have never heard an American say why do you care about American history and I think that also drives me to to work on this to do this work um but I also think as A as an American I have a responsibility because I am I come from the country that is the hegeimon. I come from the most powerful country on earth and our whims lead to death for many people as we've seen at the war in Iran. our, you know, in 20 earlier last year when President Sinsky visited the White House and he was ambushed and that led to us stop sharing information with Ukraine, people died because of that, right? And so I just feel this heavy sense of responsibility and as long as one person learns from what I'm doing, it's worth it. I'm contributing to the betterment of society and humanity. And that's just my my long- winded academic way of saying like I want my nerdiness to matter. I want it to help people.
>> No, I think I think that's very I think that's very very poignant. And um and and and I think that uh very often the the the long academic nerdy uh response is the one that's actually necessary to kind of dig into the the weeds of it.
Uh, but I was really fascinated by how you um how you understood uh the question of why you would care about uh Ukrainian history in 2013 because like when you were when you were saying that like my brain is very much primed to see the parallels between different like historical struggles. And when you were mentioning that, I was like thinking of uh like again like as as as a white guy, I also grew up in Texas, but I grew up in in in in in North Texas, so the the accent is like the accent was drilled out of me by by teachers in middle school. Um but um but but yeah, like I I remember like if I when I had an interest in um like I had an interest in black music in high school. Um, I was listening to punk and I was listening to black music and people like people really asked me like why would you care about that? Like why?
Because like it wasn't just that I was listening to Eminem and I was like and I was listening just the music. It was I was always fascinated by the messages.
Like I used to make mixtapz that combined um like Moaf and Talibi and like these different rappers who were rapping about these social issues. Um because I was listening to punk that was about social issues. The message was the same and the message was what I cared about. But some of my peers did not understand that. They were very confused.
>> And so like I I'm wondering like if you how how like because obviously there's two parts of you in this context.
There's the representative of the hedgeimon, but there's also like the woman who like is comes out of that culture that that like my that my like yeah my schoolmates did not did not like understand why I would care.
It's it is really interesting. And so like I grew up listening to like death metal and I I have an eclectic mix of you know musical interests but yeah I was like listening to metal and the the messages. So I'm like yeah I like you know Steph and Pi but I also like to listen to you know Slayer and it was also like that's not your music right that's that's not you. And so I think maybe that's kind of I've always kind of been interested in transcending those boundaries. But I also think what really got me into working on the Russian Empire was when I was in middle school, I watched this long mini series called Russia Land of the Zars. And I was like, hm, Russia's like Texas. And that's how I fought, you know, like, okay, it's big. Um, like, you know, we like to beat up our neighbors. I was like, okay, I understand this as a 13-year-old. This makes sense to me.
you know, and the intense incredible like the nationalism, like Texas nationalism is a very big deal. And so I understand like, okay, yeah, Russia, this makes sense to me. Um, and it's just held my interest since then. And so I think I think it comes from a place a place of privilege to never have to ask why someone would care about your culture or your history.
>> And that comes from being the hedgeimon.
Everyone in the world has to care about American history. you you better know American history. Um, and so I think that is something that is really I think it is interesting. A lot of people I've met who work on the region who are from Texas. We all kind of have this Yeah, Texas helped me understand a lot of Soviet history. It's just it's a thing.
It's hard to explain to people are from Texas, but we get it. You know, I grew up on a farm, so like I tell people I'm like I study the peasantry because I get them.
>> Yeah. Yeah. I think I think I think there's also a lot of parallels between Texas and Ukraine in particular like um and especially when I lived in I used to live in Donetsk 2011 um and Donetina and and and and Texas are so similar like it's it's hard to pin it down and that's that is the fact that Russia was able to exploit in 2014 was like like was trying to undermine like its place within Ukraine because the people there have this very um fierce understanding of freedom and independence and self-reliance. Um, so yeah, that's that that is that is wild.
But I will say um being from Texas and particularly being a white man from Texas um I also like that is that is that very much helped me better understand the current situation in America to be frank um but also Russia because um I've spoken a lot with uh with different people about this idea that like like really Russian identity reminds me very much of white identity in that it continues to expand and contract. You have people who are kind of accepted into that club, but that acceptance is not is not necessarily permanent. Um we've seen this under the second Trump administration where um the discussion around like Jewish uh conservatives has become very alarming where um the Jewish population was considered part of white people and now you have far-right commentators saying no no no they never were white and >> so I wonder I wonder because that is that like that dovetales like directly with the research that you do and with um with with how you understand the region like has that has that framework helped you at all? Um how do you how do you understand Russian identity in in this context?
>> It's been interesting in terms of I think when we I first started thinking about this I read a book by Claudia Saddowski Smith and it was called the new immigrant whiteness. It was about Russian immigrants who were who had immigrated to the United States after the collapse of the Soviet Union and they're kind of occupying the space in America of being white but not fully white because they were still immigrants. Um but also there was a big market for adopting Russian children, Ukrainian children because they could be adopted from those countries and passed on as white in the United States. Um, and I think I've been really paying attention to this and I before 2020, but I've been seeing a lot of connections between the Russian farright, the American farright, and ideas of whiteness. And I mean, we've seen in the news in the United States, there have been a few families from Texas who have moved to Russia >> um, in the last year who said they wanted to move there because Russia was Christian and it was a and it was a white place where they would fit in better than like woke Texas. And the idea of Texas being woke as a black woman from Texas is hilarious. And I've been fascinated by this because what these people are doing are seeing Russia is white when historically east of Germany has never been seen as white.
And I talked about this when the war started and people got mad at me and I was like, Ukrainians being European and being able to be white enough to be a European is a very new historical development. Even under Brexit, we saw how the British talked about Eastern European migrants and immigrants the same way Latinos are talked about in United States. And so I think what I've tried to do with my work is to help Americans one understand that racial dynamics are different, you know, across the pond, but also to help people from Europe understand that although the racial dynamics aren't the same in the United States, we can still use that knowledge to help us better understand what's happening. And so when it comes to Russianness, and of course like you have the Russian ethnic minorities um who are denied Russianness and denied whiteness, but there's kind of like a tripartite or or a three-part relationship that I'm seeing now between Russia, Hungary, and the far right in the United States. And that relationship is based on an idea of shared whiteness, an exclusionary idea of what it means to be Russian or Hungarian or American. It's white. It's male and it's also Christian. And this is what interests me is that the Orthodox in Russia, I mean, and many and I grew up as a Catholic in Southeast Texas surrounded by Baptist. I got called a heretic all the time for being Catholic. So, the idea that like Russian Orthodox, Orthodox people and Southern Baptists are communing is very weird to me. Um, but what brings them together is whiteness and it's based on exclusion and it and it does contract and expand when it's necessary. Like right now JD Vance is in Hungary. So that whiteness is is expanding to encompass Hungary and to encompass Russia. But when the war first started, the way Americans talked about Russians, you saw that idea contract, right? And so I I think we have to think about the Russian identity. Russia, and I've always said this, Russia is two-sided, has two faces.
At the same time, this country projects itself in America as a bastion of whiteness, of racial purity, and of Christianity, Christian, you know, traditional morality. While it does that, at the same time to the global south, it presents itself as an anti-colonial non-racial state, and it's heavily, you know, sucking the blood of the Soviet legacy in these countries to maintain that that identity. So, it's two-sided.
And I and I guess what has always interested me, I'm like, how is it that people aren't seeing both of these sides? Because Russia is playing both sides of the coin. And it does it very well. Um, and I think that's what concerns me is that what is what will be the outcome when we have our pillars of kind of the postwar society fall apart? What fills that gap?
And I think that expanding whiteness that is very exclusionary, very kind of traditional and Christian nationalist, I think that will work to expand that to to kind of fill that gap. And so that that's what keeps me up at night about that.
>> Well, I I I completely hear all of that.
Um the only the only the only I I I see that too. I haven't done I haven't I haven't looked into it the way that that you have. But but my instinct also tells me that there's an inherent problem in this unholy union, which is that Russians have a superiority complex as well, just as white Americans. And um when I've explained whiteness to Ukrainians, sometimes I will describe it as this expanding and contracting thing.
Um, but like I will always be white in in the idea of whiteness because my ancestors come from Germany and from England and I am I am white Anglo-Saxon Protestant. Like that is that is the core group of American whiteness. Um, but everyone outside of that group like whiteness expands but it it contracts and uh when it becomes unconvenient for Russians to be part of white um they will lose that status. Um, and when it becomes in or if it becomes inconvenient for white Americans, white Baptists to be considered part of this kind of Russian conservative community, then the Russians will throw them aside. So, um, I I just I that's that's how I would that's how I would imagine um the long-term playing out. Um, and I think that my concern and I'd be curious at your at your at your your perspective of this because I mean you you you alluded to it, but like that interim period with this like expanding idea of whiteness like like how dangerous do you do you do you think of it or do you think it is really like what what are the practical potential implications of it? And I know that's a big question but but it is one that clearly you're you're thinking about.
I think I love your point about the exclusion because I think we've already seen this those families that have moved to Russia. Um they learned that okay they're like okay you're here but you're still an American.
>> You don't know the language, you don't know the culture. We're better than you.
>> And I think that that kind of that that kind of exclusion is what will end up making this crumble.
>> Um because it's also very imagined. It's an imagined identity of shared whiteness in Christianity that completely falls apart. I'm like Orthodox and Southern Baptist, those two do not jive together.
You know, those don't work. And I think the danger comes from the immediate danger. And I think it goes back to I just remember the way JD Vance talked to President Zilinsky. Did you say thank you?
>> That's it. hit me because it was also it's the kind of language that he also said to um a former MSNBC commenter um Joanne Reed and he was like well being black in America is so hard but like look at what this country's giving you've been on TV you have a TV show did you ever say thank you did you ever like show gratitude for your country so the same message of how dare you where's your gratitude um from for Zalinsky who can be perceived as white but I think we see in that situation he is not equal to the Americans represented by JD Vans Trump.
He's not competitive with Russia when it comes to that level. And I think we see the same thing with his messaging uh towards black women. And so I think for those of us who are always going to be outside of that concept of whiteness, it's kind of always dangerous. But I think for Ukraine in particular, and I've been really interested in this because even when I was in Germany in 2023, I started hearing how people are talking about the Ukrainian who were there, the refugees who were there. And I could already tell people were they were chafing. They were getting angry with the presence of Ukrainians there.
Um, and I was like, "Wow, it's only been like four months, you know, and you're already talking about them." and just it's it's just hard to explain and to put into words like I see the limits of Ukrainians being seen as European and I see in how people talk about Ukrainians.
I see it in how people um kind of talk about anyone really east of Germany. And I and I think we have to remember that because at the beginning of the second invasion everything was Ukrainians or Europeans. Ukrainians are Europeans. And now what are we talking about?
Corruption scandals and can they really exist in the EU? should we really bring them into the EU? Right? So I think we see once again while whiteist European has expanded to incorporate Ukrainians at the very beginning of the second invasion is still contracting. Right?
It's getting smaller. And as we have JD Vance, Victor Orbum, Vladimir Putin working together in a concerted effort to undermine the EU and we see these very far-right parties, these anti-immigrant parties getting bigger and stronger, including in Germany.
the idea of Europeanness and whiteness contracts and Ukrainians are going to find themselves outside of that again.
And I think this is where the Ukrainian story really connects well to the story of the global south following deolonization.
Having to navigate being in between major powers, both of whom use you when it's when it's beneficial to them, but don't really are vested aren't really vested in your interest. How do you navigate that? And also, how do you navigate sometimes we're included, sometimes we're not? Because your identity, your state, your nation just isn't big enough to be considered. And I've been thinking about those parallels a lot. Um, especially just kind of thinking about the Cold War. And I think that's where an important solidarity stands between Ukraine and a lot of the countries of the global south. And those ties should be emphasized. I mean, it's Ukraine, it's Kazakhstan, Usbekistan, that's the former Soviet Union. you were not Russian, you know, you were the you were the first among second place. You were not the first among equals. Um, and I think that's a story other people can listen to.
>> No, I I think I think that's really I think that's a really profound point that I I certainly have not considered.
Um, which is something I guess like for me it just felt it just felt implicit, but I never I never like tried to articulate it. Um, but when you were speaking, I also was thinking of um uh like like even whiteness in America uh like it can be temporarily or like very like like very um uh narrowly uh like lightly applied to like visibly like non-white passing people. Like I remember VC Ramosami's campaign where he basically ran a quasi white nationalist campaign >> and then after his campaign he interviews or yeah he he interviews Anne Coulter and she starts the interview by saying I loved your campaign. You were the best candidate but I would never vote for you because you're Indian. And I think that is like to me that's like the the logical endpoint of all of these relationships.
Um, and I think that that applies in his world and in and Coulter's world that applies to Ukrainians. So I I fully I fully I fully am on board with what you're you're describing. Um, and to take it like one step further like psychologically is with this same concept of like you have Ukrainians who can be white passing, Ukrainians can also be Russian passing which is um which is it it creates a completely different dynamic that is that is frankly underststudied. Um, Makola Rebuk, the Ukrainian scholar has has written about this. um he called it uh he wrote a paper called um uh whiteskins black languages which is a reference to uh Fenon and he basically argues that like >> so yes Ukrainians historically could be pass it could pass as Russian but the the dynamic here like it doesn't make it easier to be Ukrainian it doesn't make it harder um than it means to be like a colonized people like who is visibly has v visibly darker skin Um, but it creates separate psychological problems where Ukrainians like have to internalize self-hatred.
Um, and I'm curious to get your thoughts on how this like like how has that uh like how have you seen that in your in your own uh research because you've also looked at um you've also looked at the history of I mean like the history of this like false anti-racist anti-colonial Soviet Union, right? um where also theoretically right like there should be everybody can become a good Soviet citizen but at some point there is that stopping point like how have you how have you engaged with this kind of tension in in in in in this overall identity >> it's been interesting in terms of I mean in some ways I felt like the field didn't address racism until like 2020 and that's what I was oh racism oh that's the thing we should think about and despite my own experiences and other black scholars experience with racism.
Um, I mean, when I started writing about Ukraine, talking about Ukraine, the the death threats I was getting like from Russians and also white Americans.
Um, there's a there's an international language of racism that they definitely share. Um, but what I've been really interested in, especially working with and thinking about interracial children and in the Soviet Union, is the way in which nationality policy when it was supposed to, you know, promote the nation and the language, but it also what it a lot of times what it did is it also racialized it made certain particular national traits in inherent, right? They were racialized.
You were born with these traits and you see that with the the respect towards Ukrainians, towards us, towards Kazaks.
Um, so even though and I think it's it's the only way I can think about it is I have students who are Latino who can pass as white and they talk about how people change when they think you're white and the things that they'll say, the racist things they'll say like anti-Latino things. Um, and how they have to kind of sit with that and do they feel comfortable saying something because they're Latino and defending Latino people. But also if you do that you could lose that ability to pass and that means a loss of social standing and a loss of social comfort.
And I think Ukrainians are dealing with that and they dealt with that. Um when your language is denigrated as Ukrainian was and when I mean in in the the slurs for Ukrainians that I've seen like you know in sources and stuff and even like foreign visitors pick up on things. They pick up on things like that. So I think what my research has been really good at is kind of breaking down these these slogans of anti-racism and you know internationalism and anti-imperialism but to show how in the Soviet Union you had all those things and but you had anti-black racism you had xenophobia you had Islamophobia but also you have a very deep-seated prejudice towards Ukrainians and they were seen as not as modern as Russians.
um their language was denigrated as the language of the countryside and you can't so celebrate the countryside in a modern you know industrial country >> and so I I hope that coming forward we can see more interaction and work between American scholars on race Ukrainian scholars and scholars from the former Soviet Union so I think there's a lot of crossover >> and I think we we have to kind of break down the iron curtain of thinking and and and resources. Um, so I love like that there was an article that's using KA to really in like interrogate what's happening for Ukrainians and I think that's really important. Um, and I know there are people who disagree with Ukrainians and people from the former and people from the former Soviet republics, you know, using Africana literature and stuff like that, like, oh, well, you can't use that. It's different. Um, like our experience is different. And yes, our experience like AfricanAmerican experience in America, the French colonial experience is very different. But at the same time, Fenol was not writing only for the black African French experience. It's universal.
>> And I that's the point. This experiences of being socially and racially ostracized, of feeling oppression, those are universal experiences. And the closest I can get to kind of what I saw is I remember um when Queen Elizabeth died and I remember on Twitter like Irish Twitter, Nigerian Twitter and Jamaican Twitter were like all celebrating, you know, like yes, the may the empire die. I like this is multicultural, this is multi-racial, but it's a shared experience of oppression of an an empire. And so I think that's kind of the next phase for me is in my work and how I'm thinking. I see the internationalism of racism in the far right and is growing.
And so we have to force those of us who want to be progressive in our politics and show solidarity with other countries. We have to also work on our internationalism and solidarity. And it won't mean it it's gonna it's not going to be Soviet internationalism, but we need to have a true internationalism because the far right's got it. So we got to do something. Um, and I think that's kind of where I'm at. And I and I've and I know and I've read and I've talked to Ukrainians who were who were thinking the same way. And I love that.
>> No, I I I I I love that. I think that I I mean I think that the parallels of the Latino community is really really really profound. Like I think that that is something that like I saw as a kid um in a diverse neighborhood, North Texas is >> is Yeah. uh like you put someone in that position where they either out themselves as as the other or they have to engage in self-hatred. And that's just it's it's so so so tragic. And it's something that, you know, it's something that so many Ukrainians have told me, even even Ukrainian millennials and uh and and Jenzi, like who before the full-scale invasion, felt this like deep sense of discomfort when you would go to a place even in Ukraine that was uh that was uh that was uh uh uh like Russian speaking. And what you said, I'm I'm I'm curious. I just had this thought while you were speaking. So, um I I'm curious to hear your your your perception on what I'm about to say, which is based on what you said, um it occurred to me, uh Yurushalov, the famous uh uh Ukrainian, uh linguist, uh who was a Colombia professor born in Haru, um left during World War II and settled in the US. um he wrote or you know he gave a he gave a lecture at Colombia in Ukrainian about uh the issues with um the issues with uh uh the Ukrainianization policies that obviously the Soviets actually want Ukrainianization to take hold because if they did then what you would do like you would do what what the Czech Republic ultimately did which is you uh you bring people from it's it's it's a rural culture so you bring people from the rural area you bring the natives to the urban areas and you you native urban areas that way. Um but based on how you just described things as though there's a way to interpret this as and again I haven't looked at the historical documents because I'm only having this thought now. There's a way to interpret this as like the Soviet like the Ukrainianization policies were anti were inherently anti- Ukrainian because they sought to Ukrainianize the like Russian speaking population of urban centers rather than accept Ukrainian identity as it existed in the rural areas. Again, very fresh thought, but but I'm curious uh at your at your your per your perception of that.
So I think it's it's kind of twofold, right? I think so what Ukrainianization would do is it creates a generation and a cadre of people who benefit from the state and those people. So it's kind of and this is how really understanding empire helps me understand this and every empire you have the group of people who are from the native population but who take the jobs as clerks and imperial bureaucrats. And I think that's what Ukrainianization does.
It creates a group of people who are beholden to the state who speak the language, but it is the staticization of Ukrainian language and Ukrainianness, right? It is not the Ukrainian of the countryside of the peasantry. At the same time, we're pushing Ukrainianization. We have the man-made famine, the whole one, which was to kill um and I argue and I have a piece coming out like the purpose of it was to create and to turn the Ukrainian peasantry into Soviet subjects to become beholden to the state. So the the the fact it was either you do what we say or you will die and that is the decision the state showed it made millions of times. And so when we think about Ukrainianization, you have you remove the you remove the countryside from the Ukrainian identity equation of what's left. You have culture and language, but you get to remove the heart of that culture and the heart of that language and the pillars of what that is. And you move it to an urban area. you teach it the Soviet ways and they learn Ukrainian and they become beholden to the Soviet state and it makes it a lot easier I think to enact policy but end up hurting those in the countryside because you no longer identify with those people right and so that's that's the way I think about it and I think about it really as a quintessentially imperial practice we see this the French did this the British did this um and so I think if we think of it the Soviet as a Soviet way of doing that I think It helps me understand what happened. And this is what the Russian Empire did in Georgia.
You know, that's why Stalin learned Russian. And so, we shouldn't be surprised that he used the same tools to break the Ukrainian peasantry.
>> This reminds me of um there's a there's a great book uh called I believe it's called uh uh I I forget I forget the title, but it's it's something about Stalin's like memory policy in Ukraine.
It's by um uh an author called a professor in Canada called Seri Yakulchik. Um and he wrote this book is brilliant book basically outlining how poorly the Soviet authorities understood psychology. Um where basically like what you're describing where they're trying to erase which I yeah that is exactly what the Soviets did. They tried to erase the country aspect, like the rural aspect, the the the horizontally structured aspect of Ukrainian society um and make it a a society that is centered on the major urban centers. And and what they lost in that is that you can't erase memory. You can't you can't take things away. There was a there my favorite part of the book is uh there was a a play about uh Bdanitzki that the Soviets put on in the ' 50s um in in like to uh celebrate the 300 year anniversary of the uh Per Paslov uh treaties and uh they they wrote this play to talk about the reunification the reunification of Russians and Ukrainians and uh the idea was to like you couldn't get Kumalitzki out of Ukrainian like memory. So you had to reshape him as Russian. And so they were trying to get this idea that Ukrainians are Russians.
And uh they put on the play and they asked some school children about the play and the school children they and the school children said, "I'm very proud to be Ukrainian after seeing that." And it's like blows up completely in your face. And I think that this is just such a it it it it happens so often. I mean, it explains the full invasion itself. Like they they just there's this there's this there's this uh I mean, I guess you can in from an imperial perspective, I guess I would say like um and I'm I'm I'm I'm sure you would probably agree that this is like this uh uh hubris from the metropole that we know everything and it turns out no actually uh no actually if you come to Ukraine you shouldn't bring parade uniforms assuming that you're going to be marching in Kiev in three days.
>> Oh yeah, I remember that. Oh yeah, they're gonna it's going to be three days. I'm like it's and I when I in my research on the whole of them were I was fascinated by and think about memory Ukrainian peasantry. They were there's so many peasants who were going to their grandparents and using their knowledge because their grandparents had survived famine. Their grandparents had survived grand recositioning and and they ask they're looking for the historical the memory. How do we survive this? What do we do with this? Um, and for me that was interesting that some of their grandparents said this was different.
It struck me. Um, and so the memory that's the hard part. Memory is a really hard thing to kill. And we see I mean you see it in with the British and in the Mama emergency in the 1950s where they're trying to create this idea that there's some secretive, you know, group trying to undermine the empire. I was like, "No, it's it's the Kuyu people who are tired of empire." And you see the British fighting for dear life to try to hold on to empire for seven more years.
And now we can look we can look back like that's so it's sad because it's clear the empire's dying.
But the empire isn't dying to those who are in the in the the metropole because they can't allow empire to die because if the empire dies, what is the point of the state? What is the point of the culture? What is the point of society?
And I think that's the scary thing for people in the in the hegemonic state to recognize. I mean, I'm this is what and I've, you know, I had a thread about this on Blue Skies that we really need to think as Americans.
What does it mean to not be the hgeimon?
Are we prepared for that? And I think that is what allows empire to go on so long. It's because the people who live within the empire fundamentally can't take that change in power. And I think that's exactly what's going on with Russia. I think that's what's going on with the United States and Iran. I think that's what's going on with um Hungary and their continued efforts to undermine Ukrainian security in the EU because they can. Um and so I think the world also has to contend with this. If you have a hegeimon that cannot be trusted what happens to the world system and world security and I think that's where we are right now >> with the United States. Um, and I think Ukrainians have kind of always been prepared. When you have a violent neighbor who doesn't respect your independence, you always have to stay prepared. But I don't think Western Europe is prepared. I don't think most Americans are prepared for what could happen. Um, but I think it's where we can look to Ukraine. And I love how Ukrainians are like, "Y'all, the drone warfare, we got this. We can help you.
Please listen to us." And I I do love that. I think Ukraine has really Iran to a lesser extent, but I think Iran and Ukraine are really showing the world this is what the future might have to be for those powers that are not hegemonic.
You won't have nuclear weapons. You have to deal with countries much bigger than you, invading you, violating your sovereignty, but you can do a hell of a lot of damage if you're scrappy. And the drone is the new way of that warfare. And I it's been amazing. They people predicted Ukraine wasn't going to last a week and look at Ukraine.
I I just have to recall uh a viral um I saw it on Instagram. I think it probably was probably viral on on Tik Tok as well last year. Um it was after um uh ICE tried to uh tried to arrest people in Little Haiti in Brooklyn and the Haitian community came out in waves and there was a Tik Tok that was amazing. It was this woman um a Haitian-American woman explaining the history of Haiti and being like, "Yeah, like like we were like speaking from the perspective of Haitians, Haitians were enslaved and um and we were like, "Yeah, this has to end yesterday." Um and uh and so we we fought them and we got our liberty and then the French came back to reinslave us and so we fought them again and we got our liberty >> and >> and the message she was like she was it was a two-part reel and the second reel was like to everybody facing state violence. You might not have have much but you have arms and you have legs. Use them. And this is that was such a like to me that was like the most like solidarity message between like somebody who has certainly no like this. You know, you're you're a Haitian-American woman in in New York making Tik Tok reels. You're not thinking about Ukraine, but oh my god, there there are few things more Ukrainian that I could possibly think of than you have arms and you have legs. Use them. Um that's literally my dawn. literally the history of of the country and it's the history of so many peoples. It's it's do you want to survive and it kind of gets to um I'm curious to hear your thoughts on this idea um you know uh there was a piece in the Cub Independent a couple months ago about um about calling Ukrainians resilient and and the idea of resiliency leading to people uh thinking that Ukrainians can do anything. For me, the more I wrote an essay for PBS um that uh I talked about uh uh unbreakable um like talking about Ukrainians as unbreakable. No, no, no. That's not the beauty of Ukrainians. The beauty of Ukrainians is that many feel broken, but they're still moving on. keep going.
>> That's the underlying that's the under that's one of the underpinning uh aspects of all of these peoples who can survive this kind of violence is you have to be able to accept that yes I will be broken but I will survive. Um yeah.
>> Oh I love that. I think that's what that is the key to I think the solidarity that we need is the types of repression and oppression that Ukrainians have felt versus Haitians, African-Americans. It may not be the same historically, but we've had to rely on the same tools.
You have to you have to keep going. You have to believe in yourself and believe in your community and like you have arms and legs. You have to fight. And I think that's that is something that kind of brings us all together in terms of you can't give up because if you give up, you're erased. To the victor go the spoils. And the spoils have been consistently used to erase our history. If that's how Russia monopolizes Soviet history and erases every other republic and erases the holore and the famine in Kazakhstan, if that is erasing African-American slavery from our national monuments in America.
So we have to you have to keep going because if you don't there will be a hole where you used to be and they'll fill that with like you know lies essentially. And so I think that's something that I I've been really thinking about.
How do I engage with the public in Ukraine? How do I engage with the public in Europe and in America to push for this solidarity and to not say and I think some people think I'm saying oh well like Ukrainians are suffering like you know African-Americans did. I'm like no I'm not saying that. What I'm saying is though we can learn from each other. We have a lot to learn from each other and globally many of us are in the same position because I and I tell people I said how many times have you heard Ukraine is Europe since 2025 and that should tell you Europe is contracting again and Ukrainians have made so many sacrifices to show we are European we believe in European values.
and the doors still closed.
And I think that's important to think about, but also I think when Ukraine appeals to Ukra to European values, it makes Europe think about what those values are. And Europe doesn't necessarily appeal to those anymore.
>> And I think that can be scary for a lot of people. What are European values?
Is it democracy? What does that look like? Does it look like you know, better treatment of immigrants.
It also Ukrainians are also forcing France and Germany and Britain to really grapple with their own imperial histories and how they treat people of the empire of the people who come to the metropole. Are you welcoming with open arms or are you treating them like Russia treats Ukrainians?
>> So, that's how I view it. That's how I put things together. I mean it makes that I I I see it so similarly I think that um there's and and from an academic perspective um I'm sure that you have encountered this because especially working in area studies um I felt it so much because I I appreciate academic theory. I really do. I think that is brilliant, but like so often academic theory is used as a means not to actually engage with the populations we're discussing. And so you have this very abstract way of viewing the world through these abstract theories. And yes, you can have a theory that like helps explain part of something, but unless you go to uh I was in Zaparia last year um 15 kilometers from like Russian shelling uh the Russian positions across the river. I was in a village. I went to I found a library that we did not realize was in the village we were staying in. I go into the library and there's a there's a little eight-year-old girl uh preparing for a reading club and she's telling me all the books in Ukrainian that she loves and we we talk for an hour uh with the librarian and with this little girl and like >> I just I think of these academic theories that like feel they they're just so you become so removed from these lived experiences that I think you're completely right that you end up with the situation in Europe where you have this like abstract concept of democracy and equality and you have these abstract concepts of the principles of the French Revolution that have not been actually applied, you know, basically since the since the liberation of of of uh then sentiment like like it was it was it was it was immediate that it that it came back and and so yeah, I think I think I think there's this there's so much that I have to there I have so many gripes with with abstract active.
>> It's I and I I think that's why I try to really I do as many talks as I can. I write as much as I can because one I think we have a duty as experts.
Um because what I mean what's the point of knowing all this if you don't share it? That's kind of how I'm see why am I doing all this? But and I see it with my students and they'll come and ask me, you know, they say, "Jay, I saw this video online and it says this and I'm telling you, if you as an expert don't use your expertise to tell people, people are going to look for this information and you're going to have people who couldn't show you where Ukraine was on a map last week who are now experts on the benefits of Stalinism, you know, to Ukraine." And so I think we have a responsibility. You have a responsibility to the public. Um, our research is important, but a lot of our research and as a lot of academics in America found out, a lot of our research is undergurtded and supported by public funding. And when the public can't see why your work matters, it's a lot easier to completely undermine what we do. Um, and that's and that's why I started tweeting in 2022. I was like, "Oh, I know a lot about Ukraine. I've been in Ukraine and you know I'm just going to tweet and I'm just gonna tell people you know what I know about this country and that's how that's kind of my contribution to the war effort is I write and talk and try to explain to Americans why Ukraine is so important.
Um so hopefully I can still do that. I I know in America in America we started a few wars and so those are the fire hose of awful is going in the United States.
But I I see everything is connected. Um particularly when when you have JD Vance going to visit Hungary and hang out with Victor Orban and we know Hungary is giving sensitive information to Russia from EU meetings and you know Hungary's running interference um with natural gas shipments to Ukraine.
>> So America is still involved in that >> and Ukrainian lives are still being lost. So, the least I can do is, you know, use this big brain of mine to to help people better understand it. Well, I think I think I mean I I'll give you a compliment here. I think that uh it's not just that you're able to like that you're able to distill these ideas. I think it's also that um it's what we talked about a little bit before we we started talking um um in the interview.
It's that it's that it's this sense of like empathy of like of like wanting the other person wanting your interlocutor to like like having a respect for them and wanting them to have access to this information. It's it's it's when you like because again like we talked we joked earlier about like having some like very intellectual answer to a question which is necessary and that's kind of this format but at the same time if you or I were speaking to like a random person in Houston or Dallas or New York like >> it's it's about finding a common language. It's about understanding and and meeting people where they are and and we really lack that. And I think I think again it gets back to this like hubris of the metropole that you don't think that you need to do that because you're so powerful and that's how that's how you view the world. And it's it's really difficult um to get people to recognize that that no no guys like you don't know the world like you you need to go and talk to people and understand them on their level. So, I I I I I admire the the your ability to like actually like uh to to be able to allow people to empathize. Um like you're you're giving them that like that platform and that's that's really really wonderful.
>> Thank you. I like that though the the empathy because I don't know I just like I was raised by the golden rule. treat others the way you want to be treated and that's and I tried to and I explained to people and as I think about when if America loses our hegeimon status I said a lot of this is you don't ever want to be treated the way Venezuela and Ukraine have been treated Americans we don't we can't take a lot of hurt I mean gas in Texas is almost $4 which if if you're not from Texas that's almost crisis for gas to be this expensive and people are complaining and I'm like that is the only thing that's changed for many people is gas is more expensive >> where Cubans don't have they don't have energy or running water. Ukrainians are constantly under bombardment but we can be like oh gas is high and so yeah I think about that a lot. So empathy we can just maintain empathy we can overcome this. I I Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We need to um you know uh uh this is the opposite of um of the far right um American uh uh uh uh framework for for spreading um for spreading democracy. Um uh but yeah, I don't know. I think I think I think that's a big thing. And I think that um I think that it's also a thing of um and I'm curious because you've also written a lot on uh or done a lot of research and a lot of commentary on like how how successful Russia and the Soviet Union originally, but Russia has become in framing itself um it's really fascinating. It's both, it brings itself both as the victim of western imperialism, but also the big defender of like anti- like the the one like resistor of American or of Western colonialism and imperialism. Uh but like those messages have like really taken root in in both both in like I mean in in in in you know um in in every time I talk to anybody we all say we don't want to use the term the global south but then we end up using that term anyway because like there's not an alternative term that's really good. So um I understand that it's a problematic term but the thing we understand as the global south um so many of those of peoples in in in those regions like they have bought this um you know the there are people within like you know in in there was uh uh there's a uh just completely I just completely remember this um at the beginning there's a there's a so there's a there was a there was a rap group in the '90s uh called dead press and they they released one album like that was like on a big record label that was like super like like like like black nationalist, black radical um like like very very uh uh like very profound uh like topics.
And the it the album begins with like uh a like a speaker giving this like really beautiful analogy of like um of of what it means for the colonized to like harm themselves and to understand that like when we are like he he talks basically about um in the black community of like you don't you shouldn't be overly harsh to the people operating within the conditions that have been imposed on them. So if someone is selling drugs like it's because they've been put in that position to where that is the they've been incentivized to do that.
The the issue here is the person who put them or the people that put them in that position system. Um but then you look up who that guy is and he was like arrested in like >> Yeah. Yeah. He was he was arrested for um for for acting as an unregistered Russian agent. Um so like you you see how profound and how like deep it goes into it. Um, and I I I there's a lot of ways to approach this, but I'm curious to hear your thoughts um on the sense of like just purely from the perspective of feeling validated like Russia comes to you. And I think it's also a lot how Trump operates. He comes to you and he says, "Yes, your problems actually are real. I see them. I feel them. I feel you and I'm fighting for you." And people in in a world um especially in a world that is dominated by a metropole typically that is repressing the people on on in the periphery um that is such a just a refreshing thing to feel and even people within the metropole who feel that they're not reaping the benefits of being within the retropole like just the feeling of validation that oh my god someone actually hears and feels my my my plight.
Russia. I I always tell when I was teaching world history, I was like, how do you think Russia got that big? Do you think they just went next door and asked Siberia, hey, and I think that's one of the Russia's been able to hide empire.
How do you think you become the largest country in the world, go from Muscoam to what we have now? So, I think Russia's been really good at hiding that. But also I think sometimes we forget the impact of the bolster revolution on the world including the meaning of the bolster revolution to the colonized people of what we call the global south now. It was huge. It was an empire that you know died at the hands of its own people. the metropole killed the empire within the so it's huge deal and it's kind of first way of thinking like okay are there alternatives to the empire and capitalism that we see and so it's it's interesting that's in 1917 but in 1905 when Russia beat when Russia lost to Japan and the Russo Japanese war that was seen as a huge deal for the colonized countries that Japan had beaten Russia so Russia's kind of since the you know 20th century it's kind of occupied And I think the important thing is what Russia has been really good at. The Soviet Union was good at this too is reaching out and not just paying lip service to deolonization. The Soviet Union invested a lot of money and time and effort into the deolonizing countries. And this is why I often make this argument that Ukrainians have to also reclaim Soviet history because Ukraine was also home to thousands of foreign students. I think over like 8 8,000 African students trained and lived in Ukraine. Um, and so that's important too because it helps Ukraine fight this narrative that Russia did everything.
Russia did not do all that. Ukraine was part of that too and part of and playing a role in building the new societies and deconist Africa.
But another problem is when really after the Bush years in United States history, the George W. few bush years when America pulled away from investing and and time and effort into subsaran Africa and focus more on the Middle East. Russia filled that gap um in a lot of ways they were still extracting they're still extracting natural resources. They're still supporting dictators. Um but they see that there Russia's and Russia and China are fighting for influence across subsaharan Africa and so people can still it's easier for for people I think to make the connection between Russia's anti-imperial look Russia's here they build a hospital um compared to what Britain and France and Germany have done and I think that that is a key element in terms we think about solidarity and because uh my Emily and I wrote this piece about when Ukraine Ians say we're for European values. We're going to join the EU. People in the global south, European values are fundamentally different to them because the metropole attracted everything from them. They were denied citizenship. They were denied and are still denied equality.
And so I think this is where I hope the empathy works for Ukrainians to see why people in the global south will turn towards Russia because they don't get that attention and funding and support from Europe.
um you know Gide Basal will not be able to join the European Union and I think we have to remember that and so in a way and I call this kind of parallel kind of parallel suffering in terms of Ukraine leaning heavily on the EU for that support because it's facing an imperial you know revenge but at the same time many subaran African countries are leaning heavily on Russia and China because they're still dealing with the fallout of imperial extraction.
And it's just something I I've seen and I've thought about a lot and and we see in the Soviet Union in the 1960s and 70s where you have Soviet Jews who are, you know, immigrating to the United States and everyone in the United States is focused on Soviet anti-semitism and then people in the Soviet Union are focused on American anti-black racism. But in both situations, you have a minority population that's being oppressed by the state and they're using those two, you know, to fight the Cold War. So in that way I see it as an extension of that. Um but Russia's been I will say Russia's been incredibly good at when I I've been looking at reports of Russian Orthodox churches in subsaran Africa and I've just been mortified by what I've been seeing. They're now doing missionary work >> with the Russian Orthodox Church and they're and it's it's it's fascinating and horrifying at the same time.
No, I Yes. Yes. Yes. Absolutely.
Absolutely. It is. And actually, I can say that um when I've spoken to uh like to uh I spoke to when I've spoken to people who do activism in the US who like have worked with Black Lives Matter and have done things like that.
the way to help people understand that Ukraine matters and that what Russia is doing in Ukraine is colonialism and is imperialism um is to point them to what Russia is doing in Africa and like just examine what actually Russia is doing and examine the fact that like Russia switches sides like in in in conflict in Africa like Russia will switch sides like it just wants the resources all it wants is to extract resources from these countries >> and when you see that you can't unsee it and when you and um uh the the writer I was recently reading an essay by the writer uh Ursula Lewen, Ursula Kaen um and she said like when once you've seen injustice you can't unsee it. And now if you do not resist you are now uh you're you're you're collaborating with it.
You're part of it. You're part of that injustice unless you're resisting it.
And so when people who are like like not not necessarily ideologically minded but like but like who have a worldview based on like egalitarian principles, let's say. Um, when you see what actually Russia is doing and what Russia's designs actually are, it's really hard to unsee that. Um, and actually I I I I'm curious to hear your thoughts as well on like I I've come across a lot of people on the American left who they struggle to understand that there can be multiple empires, there can be multiple hedgeimons, there can be multiple different people. And as you were describing Russia conquering the lands next to it, it it it occurred to me that like like I think a lot of people view manifest destiny um as this exceptional American crime that only America could could carry out manifest destiny when in reality that's what Russia did too. Like Russia had its own manifest destiny.
>> Oh, thank you. That's going to be one of my books. Just believe it.
Like I teach, you know, my teaching career is US history and I'm I'm like, do you not see? Like come on. And so I try to I try to make sense of this because I I think you're completely right. It it >> but it's also such a hegemonic idea, but only the United States could call. No, but Russia was doing Russia was conquering and Russia's just been much better at hiding its empire. But in terms of taking taking away land, internal colonization, moving Russian peasants into southern Ukraine into parts of Kakistan, um mass migration, forced migrations. I mean, Russia looks very similar to the United States. And I think we really have to understand nuance.
Just because someone says Russia did something bad, we don't have to retort with but America also did.
Am I pointing out I think one key thing is and I'm I think I'm going to offend some people.
Some people are dedicated to an idea of socialism that never existed in the Soviet Union and feel that critiquing the Soviet Union or Soviet socialism automatically means you are critiquing the practice of socialism. And I don't think that's true. And I think what a critique of the Soviet Union and what a critique of how socialism has been put in practice, I think those are necessary critiques to see how to improve it. Um, but to act like what Russia is doing is somehow good in any way, shape, or form is to be to be blunt. I think it's incredibly naive um and is willfully ignorant of history and how foreign policy works. I mean honestly it's and if like you said the the example of Africa, Russia has been engaged in extracting diamonds, incredibly important natural resources. They have supported bloodthirsty dictators. Um the civil war in the Central African Republic is covered in Russian mercenaries. the voder group. I mean, so a and like you know, Russia's there, but Russia isn't necessarily a benevolent actor in Africa. Neither is China.
And this is why I need people I need people to know you can walk and chew gum at the same time. You can critique the United States and also critique Russia at the same time. I can support Ukraine as an American and also recognize that what America has done in Venezuela and what it's doing to Cuba is just as wrong. We can do both.
And this has actually been a weakness just historically if you look at the global left that has been a weakness is the inability to critique Stalin, right? And you have to be able to walk and chew gum and we can do that. Um like me critiquing Russia does in no way, shape or form excuse what my country is doing.
That's that's how it is.
>> Yeah.
>> I wish we could understand that.
No, I I as you were speaking I also I recalled uh there was uh a Ukrainian socialist intellectual who whose whose name I will not I will not grace. Um but um but he he he wrote a tweet recently um he saw like there was a criticism of uh the far right that there are no intellectual thinkers currently on the far right and like this this this like no no impressive in social thinkers on the far right right now. Um and uh was comparing it to like like the philosophers that like that like um that like underpinned the farright movements in in the war period. Um, and this intellectual uh who spends all of his time criticizing the US for imperialism and refusing to criticize Russia for its actual imperial violence in Ukraine. Um, he immediately invoked the names. He said like there were no uh leftist like intellectuals who are super impressive right now. Um, nobody nobody on the level and the first two names he put were on the level of Linen or Trosky.
And I'm just like, you literally just named two authoritarian like things like like and it's it's the whole discussion about like the far right having these authoritarian tendencies and the rise of authoritarianism is coming without this like like great intellectual like like like community and and he meet and his pivot or his his retort is there's these two great intellectual leftist thinkers who are both also authoritarian like explicitly. So it it makes it makes the mind boggle.
>> It's like I have my my you know wall of dictator memoirs because I'm a I'm a servant historian so I got to know Lyn and Trosky and Stalin and Christian B.
Um but I think this is like when people people point to Troskyism as like an alternative son. Like what part of red terror do you not that's chotssky?
I mean the dictatorship of the proletariat you know it's it's and this is what I'm saying. I you don't have to be beholdened to Lenin and Trosky to be a socialist.
Um I mean Mark surely wasn't. So I think that's what that's also to and it's also like I have a book here you know black Marxism. There are whole modes of Marxist thinking and socialist thinking that have nothing to do with Lynen and Trosky. They're actually critiques of them. Um because a lot of Marxism is blatantly it ignores or erases the impact of race on class.
Um and so I I just but also I think the whole point is the right hasn't needed an ideologue.
They're incredibly successful.
So perhaps that's the point.
>> Well, I think I think here I mean my immediate parallel here is what you said earlier about this like unholy union between like Russianness and whiteness. Um because if you look at the rise of Putin like Putin has a really fascinating uh propaganda apparatus which is it's non it's non ideological like there's not really an ide ideology other than Russian supremacy. It's just like Russians are better than everyone else.
All of our problems are because everyone's jealous of us and everyone just is out to get us. It's this very conspiratorial like we are we are we are superior to everybody. Um and all of our faults like all of our shortcomings are because the world is conspiring to to prevent us from expressing our greatness. Um and that's that's the same like like like you said like the these movements are very similar and they're very vapid in this way. like the the like JD Vance's ideology is explicitly just like how dare you like you're not as like that that is his idea that's it like even even when he tries to create a word salad to describe it like it that's just what it is like he I mean the whole the whole like Curtis Jarvin right like the like there's no there's no actual there's nothing there it's just he thinks thinks that uh that that that there's a class of people who are better than everyone else and we should make a representative of that class the CEO of the country. It should be a dictatorship.
>> Yeah.
>> Like >> I mean like you're not that different.
You're just kind of dumbing down what Hamilton was saying in the the debates about the constitution. And I think this is the thing right fundamentally an ideology of supremacy is empty because okay then you're supreme. What now?
There has to always be an enemy in the in the gates. And we're seeing that. I mean, what's the enemy? Putin, what's the enemy? It's Ukrainians. It's a CIA.
It's NATO. It's always NATO. Um, and it's like, and I feel the same way the United States, like when JD Vance says like, "Oh, in America now you no longer have to apologize for being white." And I was like, JD, who's ever made you apologize for being white? You have two brown children in a brown life. Um, but your party has made you apologize for having a brown life.
And it's just I don't know, maybe it's because I grew up in southeast Texas where I'm like, yeah, I know I know this this kind of people. I grew up around this kind of people. You know, it's always the other. It's always someone else's fault. A politics of supremacy is empty.
>> And because it's empty, it always has to have a scapegoat. And I think this is this is what we see. I fundamentally with the Nazi party, once you've killed every other group, who else is left to blame for your failures?
And I think that's what eventually Russia's going to have to figure out, the United States is going to have to figure out. Um, when you're a hegeimon and you willfully weaken what has made you a hegeimon and you've emptied your power, you've emptied your influence, what is left besides healthy, deep introspection, which isn't going to happen. Chaos and war, >> you turn it outside of yourself. And I think that's what we're seeing. Um, and I say this now as my president, the current president has threatened to kill a civilization.
And I think only in America can we think of that as a joke because Putin has said very similar things about Ukraine and it's not a joke. Thousands have died, right? And so I think what really worries me, I think what worries me as an American is my worried for the world because the rails are off and our international system depends on a rational thinking America and we're no longer rational thinking or behaving.
Ukrainian lives matter on America getting it stuff together.
This is this is this is I mean just to like like go back to to what you said at the very beginning which this sense of like this sense of both a loss of faith but also this like very deep profound sense of responsibility like I also I mean I I I typically when I've done events publicly in Ukraine like I try to start every event by saying listen like I believe that Russians have a responsibility and a duty to intervene in what their government is doing on their behalf because this war is being waged on behalf of Russians. Like that that is you cannot escape that and the actions of Donald Trump. Um and again like I think there there are there are there are layers to it. Like it doesn't have to be all or nothing, right? Like my responsibility within all of this is lesser than someone who joined ICE after voting for Trump. But at the same time, like it's partly on me. Like I I worked in politics. I tried to prevent um atrocities from from from taking place.
Um but but but they are still taking place in my name even if I scream to the heavens that that they don't. And and in fact like like any any any things targeting you as as a a a a black female scholar again like those are being done like to you in my name like when they're being done and I I have to own that.
Like I cannot hide from that. Um but also o owning that also provides like a profound sense of uh I don't know the right word. The word that is coming to me is like this profound sense of like liberation that like I know exactly what I need to do. I know what my my ethical and moral duties are to whom I have these duties and >> and I I I have no fear of of anything that is facing us in the future because I know precisely that I have chosen that I'm you know I I I'm if I'm in solidarity I'm practicing solidarity and practicing solidarity uh does not look like um hiding away somewhere in a cave and and accepting that privilege like no solidarity to me is going going to frontline areas uh and living and and experiencing those areas the way that the people who have to live there experience those areas. Um and and so yeah, like I I I I applaud that from you. Um and I I do want to try to end uh our conversation on a more positive note. Um now, uh there's a couple of things, but first I will say first of all, building on this idea of responsibility, I think that the idea that there's people like us that have a sense of responsibility. Um I I think that we're in a historic moment where ever since the French Revolution, um and and I always pair the French Revolution with the Haitian Revolution. Um ever since those two revolutions, um there's been this backlash to like social progress. And every time the backlash never lasts because it's vapid. It doesn't like it's it's un othering. And what's great is that you and I are the people who are like helping the world get over this current backlash. And there's a lot of I I I feel a sense of like I feel a sense of energy sometimes when I when I think about that just because it's like yes, I get to be one of the people who like is going to bring this history forward. Um, do you do you have that like what what other like like senses of uh like what what gets you kind of like with an extra hop in your stop?
I I think I kind of I vasculate between like, oh my god, it's all terrible. And honestly, it's it's my historical knowledge and I I think about my grandparents survived the Jim Crow South and the racial terror. And so I automatically I already think now like I'm so I have so much that I'm blessed with in terms of resilience, but also like if my grandparents can get through that, I can get through this.
And I think and I also and I were I was talking to a few of my colleagues. I was you know thinking about how people survived the great terror in the Soviet Union.
Millions of people kidnapped, shot, put in and then the Nazi onslaught shortly after that.
But like Soviet people survived, Ukrainian survived, Usuzbck survived.
And so I think about that. And I think about that cat that cataclysmic mo moment the intra war period World War I to World War II. And then sometimes honestly when it gets really bad I'm like the Nazis lasted 12 years.
12. They said they're the one in a thousand. It was 12. So that helps me put the horrible in perspective is we can do this. You know, unfortunately, our history, the world history, American history, European history, is filled with these horrible moments, but they're also filled with really good moments.
So, I focus on that. Um, and it's hard.
I think it's really hard. And I think we also have to kind of give attention to and respect like just how hard it is to be like as an academic right now. And I like I work on the Soviet Union and everyone thinks socialism, Soviet, they put everything together, you know. So it it's difficult, but I think if we don't keep going, they will.
And I'm from I'm a Texan from I'm from Southeast Texas. I'm like, "No, I'm not going to let y'all win."
>> That's how I feel.
>> That's how I know it.
>> There's a certain beauty in being in being uh there's a there's absolutely a certain beauty in being that stubborn.
like when when when you're that stubborn because you see wrongs being done to your fellow citizens. I think I think there's something like you know there's there's something like and ironically I also like just like as as we're as we're kind of wrapping up I'm going to kind of air some of my own personal grievances as as a uh very um egalitarian Texan.
Um, I really resent the idea, this like myth of Texas and of like cowboy culture as like this like right-wing thing. Like listen, >> oh my god, yes.
>> Johnny Cash ever ever ever ever freaking sang. Like listen to anything he said.
Listen like he he did a cover. He created a country superb band and did a cover of of the Woody Guthrie song Deportee, which is literally a song about about about like decrying the US government deporting uh undocumented workers. Like like this is this is literally at the core of Texas identity >> is this like idea that as someone with privilege it is your duty. I mean like again listen to Johnny Cash, listen to the lyrics of the man in black. Like literally he wrote a song um because people asked him why do you keep wearing black? And he said and the one of like the most profound lyric is um as long as there's uh uh as long as there's all this suffering in the world um there ought to be uh like as long as there's people suffering in the back there ought to be uh um uh in the front there ought to be a man in black. And like it's this is the weight that you're supposed to carry when you are a man from Texas.
Like like like this is this is how I was raised. I'm sorry. And yeah. Anyway, I I I can't apologize for the fact that this this is my culture is is fighting for everybody until until you know it's it's a never- ending fight, but it's a fight that I I'm worth I'm worth I'm worth I I find worth fighting. I think Texans have to remember that and also because like you know as I'm a born and raised Texan and so I have I remember I went to college up north for the first time and I met Californians and I was like oh uh California but I I'm deep and protective of Texas and I've said it before I won't let the politicians who call themselves Texans run me out of my state that I was born and raised in. My my family goes back my family was enslaved here and in Louisiana. So I will not let the likes of those people such as Raphael Cruz run me out of my own state. But also as Texans, we have to remember what were we here for? Don't mess with Texas have meaning, right? And me like don't mess with Texans, but also like you know we are a community of people.
We support each other. Um, and I think what what I've really noticed is that that's kind of crumbled.
And I think we have to really focus on bringing that back. And I think Texas can, but I think and that's what brought me into studying Russia and Soviet Union because it reminded me of Texas.
Literally what you're describing what you're describing reminds me so much of a uh of a conversation I had in the Hard region uh last fall with a woman who was like we we only left our village and and like went to Hardk um when the Russians were like you know on the precipice of occupying our village because like you know >> but the moment that the moment that their that their that their village Um it was their herma that their their district uh was liberated. The next day they were back home with shattered windows. Like they they would rather be in the cold with shattered windows and build back from that moment than not be home. And I think like it's the same exact thing that we talked about earlier of of this like you have arms, you have legs, and like you're going to like it's this is my home. like and this is what ultimately the the fight for Ukraine is for is is is for the people who live there and for their for their um yeah for for their right to have a home.
>> To have a home and to be Ukrainian in that home.
>> Yeah.
>> And I think that is the most basic principle of solidarity and human rights. People should be able to live freely, speak their language, teach their children the language that they speak and celebrate their culture and not be told that culture is second rate, that their culture is derivative.
And so I I think for people who support Russia's behavior in Ukraine, from what you've seen of Russian behavior, does that look like a country that respects other people?
No, it's an imperial country much like the one I live in. I mean, I think I sometimes I think now to tell you the truth, I was a kid. I was in elementary school in middle school when the United States invaded Iraq and Afghanistan.
But I've been thinking, especially in the past, I think I I start to understand. I'm thinking, do I think like how Russians think now where my country's invaded another country and we've invaded three countries? um blowing up Venezuelan ships with reckless regard, mass deportations, blowing up schools in Iran. And I wonder and I thought, but I'm like, but no one no one will ever call for America to be boycotted at the Olympics.
>> Everyone's coming to the United States for FIFA.
>> And those are the the privileges of the hedgeimon.
And so I think about that's been weighing on me is I think about that. So I remember I saw a clip of like I think it was um it was the Olympics and it was a neutral Russian athlete. They turned their back when they played the Ukrainian national anthem um for a Ukrainian athlete and I was mortified and I was like well so so much for being neutral. Um, then I think about as an American, will the people ever not allow us to participate, not invite us?
>> And that's never the case.
>> So when the only the only way America can be punished for America's actions is by Americans.
>> We have to do better.
>> Yep. Yep. That's on you. That's on me.
Um, >> that's on us.
That's that's that's super beautiful um for an ending. But I do want to ask you one final final question. Um just because like I said on an uplifting note um you mentioned earlier that you are uh that you have very eclectic music tastes. Um, I get the feeling that like me, you are someone who definitely listens to the lyrics and because like I also had like some like black metal and some death metal in my in my rotation in the high school period I mentioned to you. Um, so if you have uh like three to five like songs that that just have like a deep sense of meaning and bonus points if there's any songs that kind of connect uh like these these like underpinning things uh between that we've discussed between between different peoples, between different cultures. Um uh yeah.
>> Oh, that's a good point.
The one one song I've been listening to a lot is All Right by Kendrick Lamar >> and it's like we're gonna be all right and that's been in heavy rotation. Um when the second invasion happened I was listening to that song quite a bit. Um I think it's also I think it's Sam Cook. A change is going to come >> is >> a big one. And there's another one and it's not and it's not heavy. It's just a fun song. I mean, it's it's also kind of it's very French. Um I'm trying to find I heard it I heard it in an Instagram like post and I was like, "Oh, I like this song." Uh okay. It's by a He's Belgian. It's a Belgian performer and it's called Allora And by What's his name? I see his face. He has gorgeous hair. That's why I was like, "Oh, okay. I'll listen to this.
Um, I'm gonna find it. I'm looking on my phone. I was just listening to the song in there. We go. I was just listening to the song in my car. It's called Okay.
Absol.
>> So, I will type that because it's just a fun it's a fun song and it's like upbeat. I mean, he's talking about like heavy stuff like you know.
>> Yeah.
>> But it's sometimes you get beat, you know, just just have fun. So, I think that's >> that's beautiful. I I think all those >> So fresh and so clean uh by Outcast is >> I mean again Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
>> Those are my top four that I haven't had right now, but it helps me just like, okay, we're gonna be all right. We're gonna get through this.
>> I I I can say that. Yes. Um, uh, Outcast and Kendrick Lamar have also been in my rotation and sometimes some Kendrick Cook, too. Like, by the way, like he's got he's got a pretty good he's got a pretty good >> Yeah. catalog. Um, Kimberly, thank you so so so much. This was very, very, very fun. Um, and sometimes very depressing.
Um I I I but you know such as the work that that you and I do such as the world that we currently uh inhabitate um inhabit and I I am all I can say to you to end this is I am very glad that I share this feeling of responsibility with people like you like you are you are doing incredible work and we sincerely appreciate you. No, thank you so much. And I mean, literally, I just feel like this is my little bit, this is my contribution to Ukrainian war effort is I'm just going to help people understand Ukraine better and hopefully fall in love with this amazing country that I did.
>> Thank you.
>> Thank you.
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