Gammalsvenskby is the only Swedish settlement to the east from Finland, founded in 1782. In the past of Gammalsvenskby the history of the Soviet Union, Sweden, the international communist movement and Nazi Germany combined in a bizarre form. And even when the ploughmen of the Kherson steppes did not left their native village, the great powers themselves visited them with the intention to rule forever. The history of colony is viewed through the prism of the theory of “forcednormalization” and the concept of “changes of collective identity“. The author intends to study the techniques of forced normalization and the strategy of the collective resistance.
Andrej Kotljarchuk is an associate professor in history, working as a university lecturer at the Department of History, Stockholm University; and as a senior researcher at the School of Historical and Contemporary Studies, Södertörn University. His research focuses on ethnic minorities and role of experts’ communities, mass violence and the politics of memory. His recent publications include the book chapters “The Nordic Threat: Soviet Ethnic Cleansing on the Kola Peninsula” (2014), “The Memory of Roma Holocaust in Ukraine: Mass Graves, Memory Work and the Politics of Commemoration” (2014); as well as the articles “World War II Memory Politics: Jewish, Polish and Roma Minorities of Belarus”, in Journal of Belarusian Studies (2013) and “Kola Sami in the Stalinist terror: a quantitative analysis”, in Journal of Northern Studies (2012).