Drawn from living in remote corners of the former Soviet Union in 1993 and again between 1995 to the end of 1997, studying the Russian language and post-Soviet affairs (on and off, both formally and informally) from August 1991 to the present, and inspired by the cognitive dissonance between Reagan era propaganda about the Soviet Union and the real thing.
The basic premise of the Webblog Archipelago is that Cold War myths and attitudes persist in U.S. policy and media, clouding our collective perceptions and judgments towards Russia and ourselves, and contributing to poor domestic and foreign policy choices. This blog is also a space for personal reflection on Soviet and post-Soviet culture, the Russian language, and general impressions of the former USSR.