Identity and Nation Building in Everyday Post-Socialist Life

This book explores the function of the “everyday” in the formation consolidation and performance of national sub-national and local identities in the former socialist region. Based on extensive original research including fieldwork the book demonstrates how the study of everyday and mundane practices is a meaningful and useful way of understanding the socio-political processes of identity formation both at the top and bottom level of a state. The book covers a wide range of countries including the Baltic States Ukraine Russia the Caucasus and Central Asia and considers “everyday” banal practices including those related to consumption kinship embodiment mobility music and the use of objects and artifacts. Overall the book draws on and contributes to theory; and shows how the process of nation-building is not just undertaken by formal actors such as the state its institutions and political elites.