Eastern European Studies

Eastern European Studies

episodes

Interviews with scholars of Eastern Europe about their new books.

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Armenia moves West, Georgia moves East: What next for The Caucasus?

July 15, 2026

Armenia moves West, Georgia moves East

Thomas de Waal
Hosted by Jason Pack

Armenia just re-elected populist PM Nikol Pashinyan, confirming voters are ready to move on from the lost Karabakh war and lean toward Europe over Rus…

Jay Szpilka, "BDSM Practices in Contemporary Poland: Barbed Wire Floggings, Rope Orgasms, and the Problem with Desire" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2025)

July 7, 2026

BDSM Practices in Contemporary Poland

Jay Szpilka

In BDSM Practices in Poland: Barbed Wire Floggings, Rope Orgasms, and the Problem with Desire (Palgrave Macmillan, 2025), cultural anthropologist and …

Molly Crabapple, "Here Where We Live Is Our Country: The Story of the Jewish Bund" (Random House, 2026)

July 5, 2026

Here Where We Live Is Our Country

Molly Crabapple
Hosted by Michael Stauch

Molly Crabapple joins Michael Stauch to discuss the history of the Jewish Labor Bund, the subject of her new book, Here Where We Live Is Our Count…

Max Weinreich and the Meaning of Yiddish

July 3, 2026

Max Weinreich and the Meaning of Yiddish

Naomi Seidman, Kenneth Moss, and Jeffrey Shandler
Hosted by YIVO Institute

Max Weinreich spent the entirety of his adult life building YIVO and the field of Yiddish Studies. A 'convert' to the cause of Yiddishism in his adole…

Kate Dannies, "Conscripting Breadwinner Soldiers in the Late Ottoman Empire: Family, Law and War" (Edinburgh UP, 2026)

July 1, 2026

Conscripting Breadwinner Soldiers in the Late Ottoman Empire

Kate Dannies
Hosted by Miranda Melcher

Conscripting Breadwinner Soldiers in the Late Ottoman Empire: Family, Law and War (Edinburgh UP, 2026) by Dr. Kate Dannies examines the gender and fam…

Christopher de Bellaigue, "The Golden Throne: The Curse of a King" (Bodley Head, 2025)

June 29, 2026

The Golden Throne

Christopher de Bellaigue
Hosted by Lucas Tse

What does a 16th century ruler reveal about the nature of power, past and present? Istanbul, 1538. The greatest of the Ottoman Sultans is at the pinn…

Peter Paul Dobek, "The Public House in Central Europe: Inns, Tavern, and Alehouses in Cracow during the Jagiellonian Dynasty" (Lexington Books, 2024)

June 20, 2026

The Public House in Central Europe

Peter Paul Dobek

In his new book The Public House in Central Europe: Inns, Tavern, and Alehouses in Cracow during the Jagiellonian Dynasty (Lexington Books, 2024), Pet…

Anna Calori, "Engineering Global Socialism: Ownership, Non-Alignment, and Corporate Culture in a Bosnian Company" (Indiana UP, 2026)

June 19, 2026

Engineering Global Socialism

Anna Calori

Engineering Global Socialism: Ownership, Non-Alignment, and Corporate Culture in a Bosnian Company (Indiana UP, 2026) chronicles the journey of the Bo…

European Jews in the 21st Century

June 18, 2026

European Jews in the 21st Century

Daniel Solomon, Stéphane Bou, Macha Fogel, and Danny Trom
Hosted by YIVO Institute

What is the status of Jews in Europe in the 21st century? How do they maintain vital communities? Do they desire to remain in Europe? To remain Jewish…

Cristina Florea, "Bukovina: The Life and Death of an East European Borderland" (Princeton UP, 2025)

June 16, 2026

Bukovina

Cristina Florea
Hosted by Roland Clark

Bukovina, when it has existed on official maps, has always fit uneasily among its neighbors. The region is now divided between Romania and Ukraine but…

Jewish Identity in Lithuania Today

June 16, 2026

Jewish Identity in Lithuania Today

Miglė Anušauskaitė, Anna Avidan, Kęstas Pikūnas, and Mindaugas Kvietkauskas
Hosted by YIVO Institute

Join YIVO for a conversation about the resurgence of interest in Jewish identity and history in Lithuania today. Jonathan Brent will moderate a conver…

Tania Sengupta and Stuart King eds., "Reclaiming Colonial Architecture" (Routledge, 2024)

June 9, 2026

Reclaiming Colonial Architecture

Tania Sengupta and Stuart King eds
Hosted by Matt Wells

Reclaiming Colonial Architecture (Routledge, 2024) explores the built inheritance of colonialism and considers how architects, heritage practitioners,…

David Petruccelli, "A Scourge of Humanity: The Origins of Interpol and the End of Empire in Central and Eastern Europe" (Oxford UP, 2025)

May 31, 2026

A Scourge of Humanity

David Petruccelli
Hosted by Miranda Melcher

As the First World War came to a chaotic end, Europeans feared that a wave of crime and anarchy would sweep across their continent. The upheavals …

Yiddish Ethnography and An-ski

May 29, 2026

Yiddish Ethnography and An-ski

Hosted by YIVO Institute

Sh. An-ski (Shloyme-Zanvl Rappoport, 1863-1920) was a writer in Russian and Yiddish, a revolutionary, a wartime relief worker, and an ethnographer who…

Ruth Balint, "Destination Elsewhere: Displaced Persons and Their Quest to Leave Postwar Europe" (Cornell UP, 2021)

May 22, 2026

Destination Elsewhere

Ruth Balint

In this unique “history from below," Destination Elsewhere: Displaced Persons and Their Quest to Leave Postwar Europe (Cornell University Press, 2021)…

"My Heart is in the East": How Yiddish Speakers Moved to the East

May 19, 2026

"My Heart is in the East"

Shaul Stampfer
Hosted by YIVO Institute

The question of origins is often difficult to study because originators do not always leave a paper trail. Therefore, uncovering origins can be challe…

Carlos Martins, "Fascism: Beyond Hitler and Mussolini" (Desassossego, 2022)

May 18, 2026

Fascismos

Carlos Martins
Hosted by Joe Williams

Carlos Martins joins the New Books Network to discuss his book Fascism: Beyond Hitler and Mussolini (Desassossego, 2022) (in Portuguese Fascismos: Par…

In the Midst of Civilized Europe: The Pogroms of 1918-1921 and the Onset of the Holocaust

May 18, 2026

In the Midst of Civilized Europe

Jeffrey Veidlinger in conversation with Steven Zipperstein
Hosted by YIVO Institute

Between 1918 and 1921, over a hundred thousand Jews were murdered in Ukraine by peasants, townsmen, and soldiers who blamed the Jews for the turmoil o…

The Light of Days: The Untold Story of Women Resistance Fighters in Hitler’s Ghettos

May 13, 2026

The Light of Days

Judy Batalion
Hosted by YIVO Institute

Witnesses to the brutal murder of their families and neighbors and the violent destruction of their communities, a cadre of Jewish women in Poland—som…

Radio ReOrient S14:6: The Road to Sarajevo, with Haris Tagari, hosted by Claudia Radiven and Saeed Khan

May 8, 2026

Radio ReOrient S14:6: The Road to Sarajevo, with Haris Tagari, hosted by Claudia Radiven and Saeed Khan

Hosted by Radio Reorient

In this episode, Claudia Radiven and Saeed Khan spoke with Haris Tagari about his recent journey to Sarajevo in a 20 year old Toyota Yaris. Along the …