Table of Contents

Introduction
1. Making Minorities and National Hierarchies
2. Territory, War, and Nation-Building in the South Caucasus
Interlude: After Stalin: Reform and Revenge
3. Defining the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic
4. The Vanishing Minority: Scholars, Politicians, and the Production of Soviet Assimilation Narratives
5. Minority Activism and Citizenship after Stalin
Conclusion

About the Author

Krista A. Goff is Assistant Professor of History at the University of Miami and coeditor of Empire and Belonging in the Eurasian Borderlands. Follow her on X @krista_goff8.

Reviews

This is a meticulous study of Soviet nationality policy, focusing on Azerbaijan, based on extensive archival research and oral history from 120 interviews.
*Choice*

Across this book, Goff juggles a laudable range of detail with clarity and persuasion, reminding at each turn how much further one could go.
*Slavonic and East European Review*

To find out how things worked in the republics, you have to go to Krista Goff's fascinating story of the Caucasus, the product of dauntingly difficult research in recalcitrant archives and with oral history informants inclined to look anxiously over their shoulders.
*London Review of Books*

In this impressive first monograph, Krista Goff offers new insight into Soviet nation-building in the non-Russian republics, particularly in the Southern Caucasus. [T]he book offers rich, archivally grounded detail on a range of complex issues in the South Caucasus. Written in accessible prose and with clear argument, it will prove to be essential reading for scholars of Soviet nation-building and the South Caucasus.
*The Russian Review*

[A] pioneering study, illuminating a hitherto unknown perspective on the history of the Soviet nationality policy, and the USSR generally. Moreover, it will serve future generations as an essential reference work on the history of Soviet Azerbaijan and the development of Soviet Azeri national consciousness, surpassing all other previous works on this subject. Enriched by lively and engaging prose, and a first-rate source base of archival materials and interviews, it makes for insightful and dynamic reading. A new classic in the field, it is a highly recommended work!
*The Soviet and Post-Soviet Review*

A core value of the book lies not only in the originality of its thesis but also in the utilization of archival and oral history sources that are presented to us for the first time. It is a testament to Goff's investigative tenacity that the final product is an empirically rich and cogent work of scholarship.
*Canadian-American Slavic Studies*

Krista A. Goff produces a groundbreaking work of historiography that examines Soviet nationality politics in the context of the "nontitular" ethnicities of the Caucasus, with particular attention given to minority groups in the Azerbaijan SSR. Nested Nationalism is an achievement in its own right.
*Ab Imperio*