Introduction 5
gas torches, as conducted at the Urta-Bulak gas field in Uzbekistan in 1966. 14
Nuclear politics – on both sides of the iron curtain – can only be understood
when attending to the infrastructures of the large-scale atomic technology
programs during the Cold War. This volume extends histories of the atomic
age to include its negotiation and shaping through visual culture, literature,
and the arts (Kaibach, Castringius).
Contributions in this book follow these nuclear trajectories and further
address the consequences and policies of compensating for radiation exposure
situations in the USSR and in post-Soviet states, their regimes of compensation, their Soviet style, and situate these in transitional and environmental
justice literature (Penter). Beyond the nuclear medical expertise, nuclear production and its lingering legacies gave rise to literary accounts in the USSR,
which reflected on the conditions of nuclear modernity in their own ways
(Kaibach). This also includes the long shadow of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
that has been part of the popular and artistic production in the atomic age and
beyond. Seminal photographers have taken up the very materiality of radiation photography, making visible radiation in the aftermath of the Hiroshima
and Nagasaki atomic bombs (Castringius).
Studying the Post-Nuclear: Traces, Heritage, Legacies
As part of the atomic era, radioactive isotopes have been extensively used
as tracers in the life sciences and became a core technique in biomedical
research. 15 While the traceability of radioactive materials has shaped the Cold
War life sciences, this book takes its cue in the humanities and social sciences
to re-examine the Cold War nuclear. In following some of the material traces
of things nuclear, the contributions of this volume attend to memory practices as they encounter and address nuclear legacies. Practices around memorialization are an important recent field of study, especially in post-Soviet
states, which saw tremendous shifts and a complete remaking of their own
historical narratives. This included a realignment of the past, culminating in
the post-Soviet nation states as well as new futures articulated as a shared
goal. Time and temporalities are already present in the very materiality of
the nuclear – half lives, long and short, the long-term of nuclear remainders,
waste issues and long-term exposure effects, or the biological half-lives of
radionuclides in the human body – as well as the memorialization of war, of
the nuclear bombs, paraphernalia, popular culture, and literary engagements
with the nuclear weapons complex (Kaibach).
During the 1980s and 1990s – the years of glasnost and perestroika and the
end of the Soviet Union – new approaches and perspectives in social science
research emerged. Important strands of work have been conducted by Galina
Komarova from the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology of the Russian
Academy of Sciences who very early on studied the everyday life at the banks
of the river Techa, an area of extreme exposure, with soils, water, and bodies
impacted by plutonium production in Southern Urals. As one of the pioneers
gas torches, as conducted at the Urta-Bulak gas field in Uzbekistan in 1966. 14
Nuclear politics – on both sides of the iron curtain – can only be understood
when attending to the infrastructures of the large-scale atomic technology
programs during the Cold War. This volume extends histories of the atomic
age to include its negotiation and shaping through visual culture, literature,
and the arts (Kaibach, Castringius).
Contributions in this book follow these nuclear trajectories and further
address the consequences and policies of compensating for radiation exposure
situations in the USSR and in post-Soviet states, their regimes of compensation, their Soviet style, and situate these in transitional and environmental
justice literature (Penter). Beyond the nuclear medical expertise, nuclear production and its lingering legacies gave rise to literary accounts in the USSR,
which reflected on the conditions of nuclear modernity in their own ways
(Kaibach). This also includes the long shadow of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
that has been part of the popular and artistic production in the atomic age and
beyond. Seminal photographers have taken up the very materiality of radiation photography, making visible radiation in the aftermath of the Hiroshima
and Nagasaki atomic bombs (Castringius).
Studying the Post-Nuclear: Traces, Heritage, Legacies
As part of the atomic era, radioactive isotopes have been extensively used
as tracers in the life sciences and became a core technique in biomedical
research. 15 While the traceability of radioactive materials has shaped the Cold
War life sciences, this book takes its cue in the humanities and social sciences
to re-examine the Cold War nuclear. In following some of the material traces
of things nuclear, the contributions of this volume attend to memory practices as they encounter and address nuclear legacies. Practices around memorialization are an important recent field of study, especially in post-Soviet
states, which saw tremendous shifts and a complete remaking of their own
historical narratives. This included a realignment of the past, culminating in
the post-Soviet nation states as well as new futures articulated as a shared
goal. Time and temporalities are already present in the very materiality of
the nuclear – half lives, long and short, the long-term of nuclear remainders,
waste issues and long-term exposure effects, or the biological half-lives of
radionuclides in the human body – as well as the memorialization of war, of
the nuclear bombs, paraphernalia, popular culture, and literary engagements
with the nuclear weapons complex (Kaibach).
During the 1980s and 1990s – the years of glasnost and perestroika and the
end of the Soviet Union – new approaches and perspectives in social science
research emerged. Important strands of work have been conducted by Galina
Komarova from the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology of the Russian
Academy of Sciences who very early on studied the everyday life at the banks
of the river Techa, an area of extreme exposure, with soils, water, and bodies
impacted by plutonium production in Southern Urals. As one of the pioneers