Empires of the Silk Road

Empires of the Silk Road PDF Author: Christopher I. Beckwith
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 1400829941
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 506

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Book Description
An epic account of the rise and fall of the Silk Road empires The first complete history of Central Eurasia from ancient times to the present day, Empires of the Silk Road represents a fundamental rethinking of the origins, history, and significance of this major world region. Christopher Beckwith describes the rise and fall of the great Central Eurasian empires, including those of the Scythians, Attila the Hun, the Turks and Tibetans, and Genghis Khan and the Mongols. In addition, he explains why the heartland of Central Eurasia led the world economically, scientifically, and artistically for many centuries despite invasions by Persians, Greeks, Arabs, Chinese, and others. In retelling the story of the Old World from the perspective of Central Eurasia, Beckwith provides a new understanding of the internal and external dynamics of the Central Eurasian states and shows how their people repeatedly revolutionized Eurasian civilization. Beckwith recounts the Indo-Europeans' migration out of Central Eurasia, their mixture with local peoples, and the resulting development of the Graeco-Roman, Persian, Indian, and Chinese civilizations; he details the basis for the thriving economy of premodern Central Eurasia, the economy's disintegration following the region's partition by the Chinese and Russians in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and the damaging of Central Eurasian culture by Modernism; and he discusses the significance for world history of the partial reemergence of Central Eurasian nations after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Empires of the Silk Road places Central Eurasia within a world historical framework and demonstrates why the region is central to understanding the history of civilization.

Empires of the Silk Road

Empires of the Silk Road PDF Author: Christopher I. Beckwith
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 1400829941
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 506

Get Book Here

Book Description
An epic account of the rise and fall of the Silk Road empires The first complete history of Central Eurasia from ancient times to the present day, Empires of the Silk Road represents a fundamental rethinking of the origins, history, and significance of this major world region. Christopher Beckwith describes the rise and fall of the great Central Eurasian empires, including those of the Scythians, Attila the Hun, the Turks and Tibetans, and Genghis Khan and the Mongols. In addition, he explains why the heartland of Central Eurasia led the world economically, scientifically, and artistically for many centuries despite invasions by Persians, Greeks, Arabs, Chinese, and others. In retelling the story of the Old World from the perspective of Central Eurasia, Beckwith provides a new understanding of the internal and external dynamics of the Central Eurasian states and shows how their people repeatedly revolutionized Eurasian civilization. Beckwith recounts the Indo-Europeans' migration out of Central Eurasia, their mixture with local peoples, and the resulting development of the Graeco-Roman, Persian, Indian, and Chinese civilizations; he details the basis for the thriving economy of premodern Central Eurasia, the economy's disintegration following the region's partition by the Chinese and Russians in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and the damaging of Central Eurasian culture by Modernism; and he discusses the significance for world history of the partial reemergence of Central Eurasian nations after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Empires of the Silk Road places Central Eurasia within a world historical framework and demonstrates why the region is central to understanding the history of civilization.

Spirited Performance

Spirited Performance PDF Author: Nienke van der Heide
Publisher: BoD – Books on Demand
ISBN: 3945021324
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 334

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Book Description
In the heart of Asia, straddling the western Tien Shan mountain range, lies the former Soviet republic Kyrgyzstan. The country prides itself in an age old oral epic tradition that recounts the mighty deeds of the hero Manas. When explorers first encountered Manas performers in the late nineteenth century, they hailed their art as a true representation of the heroic age, and compared it to masterpieces such as the Kalevala and the Iliad. Today there are still many excellent performers who can keep their audiences spellbound. They are believed to draw their inspiration from the spirit of Manas himself. This book portrays the meaning of this huge work of art in Kyrgyz society. Based on extended periods of anthropological fieldwork between 1996 and 2000, it explores the calling of its performers, describes the transformations of the oral tradition in printed media and other forms of art, and examines its use as a key symbol for identity politics. It deals extensively with the impact of the Soviet period, during which Kyrgyzstan became an autonomous republic for the first time in history. The tremendous changes initiated during these years had far-reaching consequences for the transmission and reception of the Manas epic. The specific Soviet approach to ethnicity was also elementary in the decisions to assign the Manas epic the role of national symbol after 1991, when Kyrzygstan was thrown into the turnoil of a post-socialist existence.

Nation-building in the Post-Soviet Borderlands

Nation-building in the Post-Soviet Borderlands PDF Author: Graham Smith
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521599689
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 312

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Book Description
This book examines how national and ethnic identities are being reforged in the post-Soviet borderland states.

Revisionist Revolution in Vygotsky Studies

Revisionist Revolution in Vygotsky Studies PDF Author: Anton Yasnitsky
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317500423
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 335

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Book Description
Revisionist Revolution in Vygotsky Studies brings together recent critical investigations which examine historical and textual inaccuracies associated with received understandings of Vygotsky’s work. By deconstructing the Vygotskian narrative, the authors debunk the 'cult of Vygotsky', allowing for a new, exciting interpretation of the logic and direction of his theory. The chapters cover a number of important themes, including: The chronology of Vygotsky’s ideas and theory development, and the main core of his theoretical writings Relationships between Vygotskians and their Western colleagues The international reception of Vygotskian psychology and problems of translation The future development of Vygotskian science Using Vygotsky’s published and unpublished writings the authors present a detailed historical understanding of Vygotsky’s thought, and the circumstances in which he worked. It includes coverage of the organization of academic psychology in the Soviet Union, the network of scholars associated with Vygotsky in the interwar period, and the assumed publication ban on Vygotsky’s writings. This volume is the first to provide an overview of revisionist studies of Vygotsky’s work, and is the product of close international collaboration between revisionist scholars. It will be an essential contribution to Vygotskian scholarship, and of great interest to researchers in the history of psychology, history of science, Soviet/Russian history, philosophical psychology and philosophy of science.

Ethnic and Religious Minorities in Stalin's Soviet Union

Ethnic and Religious Minorities in Stalin's Soviet Union PDF Author: A. S. Kotli︠a︡rchuk
Publisher:
ISBN: 9789176017777
Category : Minorities
Languages : en
Pages : 283

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Book Description
This anthology presents studies of Stalinism in the ethnic and religious bor-derlands of the Soviet Union. The authors not only cover hitherto less researched geographical areas, but have also addressed new questions and added new source material. Most of the contributors to this anthology use a micro-his-torical approach. With this approach, it is not the entire area of the country, with millions of separate individuals that are in focus but rather particular and cohesive ethnic and religious communities. Micro-history does not mean ignoring a macro-historical perspective. What happened on the local level had an all-Union context, and communism was a European-wide phenomenon. This means that the history of minorities in the Soviet Union during Stalin's rule cannot be grasped outside the national and international context; aspects which are also considered in this volume. The chapters of the book are case studies on various minority groups, both ethnic and religious. In this way, the book gives a more complex picture of the causes and effects of the state-run mass violence during Stalinism. The publication is the outcome of a multidisciplinary international research network lead by Andrej Kotljarchuk (SOdertOrn University, Sweden) and Olle SundstrOm (UmeA University, Sweden) and consisting of specialists from Estonia, France, Germany, Russia, Sweden, Ukraine and the United States. These scholars represent various disciplines: Anthropology, Cultural Studies, History and the History of Religions.

Studies in Evidentiality

Studies in Evidentiality PDF Author: Robert M. W. Dixon
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
ISBN: 9789027229625
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 374

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Book Description
Printbegrænsninger: Der kan printes 10 sider ad gangen og max. 40 sider pr. session.

Handbook of Early Language Education

Handbook of Early Language Education PDF Author: Mila Schwartz
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 9783030916619
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 943

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Book Description
This is the first international and interdisciplinary handbook to offer a comprehensive and an in-depth overview of findings from contemporary research, theory, and practice in early childhood language education in various parts of the world and with different populations. The contributions by leading scholars and practitioners are structured to give a survey of the topic, highlight its importance, and provide a critical stance. The book covers preschool ages, and looks at children belonging to diverse ethno-linguistic groups and experiencing different histories and pathways of their socio-linguistic and socio-cultural development and early education. The languages under the scope of this handbook are identified by the contributors as immigrant languages, indigenous, endangered, heritage, regional, minority, majority, and marginalized, as well as foreign and second languages, all of which are discussed in relation to early language education as the key concept of the handbook. In this volume, “early language education” will refer to any kind of setting, both formal and informal (e.g. nursery, kindergarten, early childhood education centers, complementary early schooling etc.) in which language learning within a context of children's sociolinguistic diversity takes place before elementary school.

Russian-English Dictionary of Idioms, Revised Edition

Russian-English Dictionary of Idioms, Revised Edition PDF Author: Sophia Lubensky
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300162278
Category : Foreign Language Study
Languages : en
Pages : 992

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Book Description
This is the most innovative, comprehensive, and scholarly bilingual dictionary of Russian idioms available today. It includes close to 14,000 idioms, set expressions, and sayings found in contemporary colloquial Russian and in literature from the nineteenth century to the present. The Russian idioms are provided with many English equivalents to render idioms in various contexts. Illustrative examples are cited to show how the idioms are used in context. Each entry also contains a grammatical description of the idiom, a definition—an innovative feature for a bilingual dictionary—and stylistic and usage information. A most notable part of the work is the alphanumeric index that makes finding the right expression very easy.

Information-theoretic causal inference of lexical flow

Information-theoretic causal inference of lexical flow PDF Author: Johannes Dellert
Publisher: Language Science Press
ISBN: 3961101434
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 385

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Book Description
This volume seeks to infer large phylogenetic networks from phonetically encoded lexical data and contribute in this way to the historical study of language varieties. The technical step that enables progress in this case is the use of causal inference algorithms. Sample sets of words from language varieties are preprocessed into automatically inferred cognate sets, and then modeled as information-theoretic variables based on an intuitive measure of cognate overlap. Causal inference is then applied to these variables in order to determine the existence and direction of influence among the varieties. The directed arcs in the resulting graph structures can be interpreted as reflecting the existence and directionality of lexical flow, a unified model which subsumes inheritance and borrowing as the two main ways of transmission that shape the basic lexicon of languages. A flow-based separation criterion and domain-specific directionality detection criteria are developed to make existing causal inference algorithms more robust against imperfect cognacy data, giving rise to two new algorithms. The Phylogenetic Lexical Flow Inference (PLFI) algorithm requires lexical features of proto-languages to be reconstructed in advance, but yields fully general phylogenetic networks, whereas the more complex Contact Lexical Flow Inference (CLFI) algorithm treats proto-languages as hidden common causes, and only returns hypotheses of historical contact situations between attested languages. The algorithms are evaluated both against a large lexical database of Northern Eurasia spanning many language families, and against simulated data generated by a new model of language contact that builds on the opening and closing of directional contact channels as primary evolutionary events. The algorithms are found to infer the existence of contacts very reliably, whereas the inference of directionality remains difficult. This currently limits the new algorithms to a role as exploratory tools for quickly detecting salient patterns in large lexical datasets, but it should soon be possible for the framework to be enhanced e.g. by confidence values for each directionality decision.

Learning to Unlearn

Learning to Unlearn PDF Author: Madina Vladimirovna Tlostanova
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780814211885
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
A complex, multisided rethinking of the epistemic matrix of Western modernity and coloniality from the position of border epistemology.