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Living Under the Soviet Shadow: Postcolonial Critique of Soviet Politics in Mongolia

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Shifting Forms of Continental Colonialism

Abstract

This chapter conceptualizes the disintegration of the Soviet as a milieu to examine the weight of the Soviet role in Mongolia. It provides an analytical framework that is grounded in first-person experience of growing up during the period to illuminate the various material, symbolic, and embodied implications and manifestations of the Soviet political influence in Mongolia. The essay is informed by conceptual tools that are rooted in literatures on critical political geography and postcolonial studies and is organized around several personal vignettes all of which speak to a larger theoretical framework. The vignettes are spatially tied to my hometown, Bulgan, from whence the stories emerge and through which we can situate our theoretical contestation of the lived experience of everyday Mongolia during the Soviet era.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    This was a culmination of series of complicated historical moments. For more details see Bawden (1968), Lattimore (1986–87).

  2. 2.

    A prominent scholar of Mongolia and China, Owen Lattimore, in contrast, portrayed Choibalsan in a positive light and regarded him as “a great man” (see 1986–87, 13).

  3. 3.

    For an extended discussion on Baron Ungern, see Sunderland (2014).

  4. 4.

    To the south of the country’s border, incidentally young children in Inner Mongolia underwent a similar cultural training albeit in a Chinese context.

  5. 5.

    I borrow this term from Derek Gregory’s analysis (2004) of Guantanamo Bay in which he argues that the site functioned under American ‘complete authority’ although the ‘ultimate sovereignty’ rested with Cuba.

  6. 6.

    Born in Russia, Filatova spent most of her adult life in Mongolia. She spent her final years in Moscow and was survived by the couple’s two children. As she was married to the most influential figure in Mongolia, she was suspected of having an unduly influence on Mongolian political affairs.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Geography and Development, The University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA

    Orhon Myadar

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  1. Orhon Myadar
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Correspondence to Orhon Myadar .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, Halle (Saale), Germany

    Dittmar Schorkowitz

  2. Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX, USA

    John R. Chávez

  3. Department of Cultural and Social Anthropology, Philipps University of Marburg, Marburg, Germany

    Ingo W. Schröder

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Myadar, O. (2019). Living Under the Soviet Shadow: Postcolonial Critique of Soviet Politics in Mongolia. In: Schorkowitz, D., Chávez, J.R., Schröder, I.W. (eds) Shifting Forms of Continental Colonialism. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-9817-9_15

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-9817-9_15

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