Montgomery, Robert

Dr. Robert W. Montgomery is Assistant Professor of History at Baldwin-Wallace College in Berea, Ohio. He received his doctoral degree in Russian History at Indiana University, Bloomington. His research interests include the history and cultures of the Buryats and the other native peoples of Siberia.

Late Tsarist and Early Soviet Nationality and Cultural Policy

2006 0-7734-5916-2
Winner of the Adele Mellen Prize for Distinguished Contribution to Scholarship

This is a monograph on late Imperial Russian and Soviet policies toward the language of the Buryats, a native people of southeastern Siberia’s Lake Baikal region. This work can do much to expand our knowledge of an oft-overlooked area of Russian and Soviet national policy. Although the Buryats are Siberia’s largest indigenous group (numbering around 500,000), they have received far less attention than other non-Russians by scholars of Russia’s treatment of its minority peoples and their cultures. On a more general level, the book will provide an opportunity to introduce readers to a unique and vibrant native Siberian culture. Finally, this study can help deepen our understanding of the challenges facing the cultural survival of all indigenous peoples in the modern age – a matter of urgent importance in the current context of globalization.