Diener, Alexander C.

Alexander C. Diener is an Assistant Professor of Geography at Pepperdine University. His research interests center on questions of homeland psychology and identity politics in former Soviet Central Asia and Mongolia. Dr. Diener received his undergraduate degree from Pepperdine University (International Studies) and master’s degrees from the University of Chicago (International Relations) and the University of South Carolina (Geography), before attaining his Ph.D. in Geography from the University of Wisconsin –Madison (2003).

Homeland Conceptions and Ethnic Integration Among Kazakhstan’s Germans and Koreans

2004 0-7734-6311-9
Through comparative analysis of the reactions of Kazakhstan’s Germans and Koreans to the emergence of an independent Republic of Kazakhstan, this book enhances understanding of firstly, the conflicting dynamics of socio-political integration in post-Soviet space; secondly the role played by “kin-states” in the creation or negation of “return myths,”; and thirdly, the significance of small-scale homelands in the process of de-and re-territorializing identity. The analysis in this study combines library/archival research with survey and interview data from the late independence period (1996-2002) in an effort to elucidate the interactive nature of place, power, and identity.