Russian America: An Overseas Colony of a Continental Empire, 1804-1867

by Ilya Vinkovetsky

Overview

From 1741 until Alaska was sold to the United States in 1867, the Russian empire claimed territory and peoples in North America. In this book, Ilya Vinkovetsky examines how Russia governed its only overseas colony, illustrating how the colony fit into and diverged from the structures developed in the otherwise contiguous Russian empire. Russian America was effectively transformed from a remote extension of Russia's Siberian frontier penetrated mainly by Siberianized Russians into an ostensibly modern overseas colony operated by Europeanized Russians.

Under the rule of the Russian-American Company, the colony was governed on different terms than the rest of the empire, a hybrid of elements carried over from Siberia and imported from rival colonial systems. Its economic, labor, and social organization reflected Russian hopes for Alaska, as well as the numerous limitations, such as its vast territory and pressures from its multiethnic residents, it imposed. This approach was particularly evident in Russian strategies to convert the indigenous peoples of Russian America into loyal subjects of the Russian Empire. Vinkovetsky looks closely at Russian efforts to acculturate the native peoples, including attempts to predispose them to be more open to the Russian political and cultural influence through trade and Russian Orthodox Christianity.

Bringing together the history of Russia, the history of colonialism, and the history of contact between native peoples and Europeans on the American frontier, this work highlights how the overseas colony revealed the Russian Empire's adaptability to models of colonialism.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780199385065
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	04/11/2014
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	276
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Ilya Vinkovetsky is Associate Professor of History at Simon Fraser University.

Table of Contents

Introduction
1. The Paradox of Overseas Colonialism for a Continental Empire

Part I: Building a Colonial System
2. From Siberia's Frontier to Russia's Colony
3. Contractor of Empire
4. Indigenous Labor and Colonial Insecurities

Part II: Making Natives Russian
5. Colonial Trade and Co-optation in a Russian Key
6. Dependence, Family, and Russianization
7. Building a Colonial Diocese

Conclusion: The Meaning of 1867
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Editorial Reviews

"A valuable and thought-provoking contribution to the increasingly sophisticated body of literature on Russian America."—Alaska History

"[W]ill likely serve as the standard work on the subject for many years...[T]he book is now the most reliable source on the [Russian] colony."—Journal of World History

"Placing his book within the larger framework of the new imperial history, Vinkovetsky offers an impressive overview of the thoughts and actions of naval officers, the administrators of the Russian American Company, and state actors. Vinkovetsky's narrative deftly shows how practices in Russian America were variations on time-tested ways of administering the Russian Empire."—Kritika

"Written in an engaging style, meticulously researched, tastefully illustrated, and scrupulously documented, Russian America is an authoritative work that makes valuable contributions to the histories of Russia, imperialism, and colonialism. Covers the historical and historiographical terrain with a commendable concision and clarity."—Slavic Review

"An invaluable study for understanding how the possession of Alaska fit into the larger context of the Russian Empire's continuous expansion since the sixteenth century." —Pacific Historical Review

"A well-written and engaging account of Russian interactions with a landscape that would eventually become the forty-ninth state. Although primarily an analysis of Russian strategy in the New World, Russian America is broad enough in scope that it functions as an excellent primer to the history of culture contact and colonialism in Alaska more generally. The book will certainly appearl to a wide spectrum of academics and students, from those studying political history to the historical anthropology of intercultural relations."—Ethnohistory

"A very rich contribution Fills an important lacuna as the first book-length study of Russian colonial presence in America from the arrival of members of Russia's first round-the-world expedition in 1804 until the sale of Alaska to the United States."—Slavic and East European Journal

"Extensively utilizes Russian archival sources, is well written, and makes a valuable contribution to understanding Alaska's colonial past."—Western Historical Quarterly

"The author's analysis shines when he compares developments in Russian America with analogous situations. Readers will appreciate the author's clear and graceful style."—The Russian Review

"[A} sweeping and meticulous analysis...Vinkovetsky s depiction of the Russian encounter with native Alaskans and Californians through economic, political, social, ethnic, religious, and historical lenses provides a panoramic view of a dramatic slice of Russian history."—Journal of Interdisciplinary History

"A thorough, comprehensive study of Russian America...A worthwhile effort that extensively documents the story from the Russian archival sources. Excellent notes and bibliography...Recommended."—CHOICE

"Vinkovetsky successfully demonstrates Russian colonial innovations in its American colonies. More important, his work reveals that adopting European colonial ideas was not to the advantage of the local population."—H-Net

"Drawing on an impressive command of both Russian and English-language sources, Vinkovetsky provides intriguing insight into the sustained Russian effort to 'Russify' the indigenous people with whom they had constant contact."—BC Studies

"Rather than treating the colony as a failure, Vinkovetsky considers it an indication of the flexibility and innovation of Rusian Imperial practices."—Ab Imperio

"Ilya Vinkovetsky's book is a penetrating and moving study of the Russian's Empire attempt to establish an overseas colonial empire. Vinkovetsky examines the complexities and contradictions in the effort to subdue and acculturate the populations of a remote and forbidding territory. He accomplishes this with an impressive mastery of the literature on empire and an anthropological sophistication that makes the dilemmas of the Russian American Company, the vision of the naval officers, and the lives of the indigenous subjects vivid and meaningful. He shows how the Russian American Company accomplished much in establishing a Russian presence in the Far East, even if the hope to integrate Alaska into the administrative system of a continental empire ultimately failed."—Richard Wortman, Columbia University

"Alaska was Russia's only experience with overseas expansion and the only part of the Russian empire to be explicitly called a colony. In this important book, Ilya Vinkovetsky brings the historical study of Russian rule in Alaska to a new level by engaging exhaustively with Russian imperial archives. He successfully extends the horizons of Russian imperial history to Alaska and allows us to better appreciate the full diversity of Russia's means of imperial governance. Of particular interest are the differences Vinkovetsky shows that existed between 'Siberian' and 'European' Russian approaches to Alaska and its inhabitants."—Adeeb Khalid, Carleton College

"Wide-ranging, well researched, and analytically astute, this book explores crucial issues in Russian imperial history through an examination of the tsars' only overseas colony. In recounting imperial adaptations to the unique situation in Russian America, Vinkovetsky tells an engaging story that integrates commerce, culture, geopolitics, and native experience. His book will be an essential starting point for future scholarship on Russian Alaska and a core contribution to the study of Russian imperial rule."—Paul W. Werth, University of Nevada, Las Vegas

"The Russian quest for sea otter pelts in the 1700s and 1800s changed the histories of all the peoples that it touched. Ilya Vinkovetsky, with his remarkable command of both the Russian and English-language sources, brings to light a scarcely known century of Russian colonialism, trade, and missionizing among diverse indigenous peoples who experienced this economic and cultural invasion with widely differing consequences. This is an illuminating study, not only of Russians in North America, but of their relations with the Tlingit, Aleut, and other peoples they confronted, and not least, of the challenges facing the Creole populations that arose from these encounters."—Jennifer S.H. Brown, University of Winnipeg

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