On February 11th, Estonian government announced the receivers of National Research Awards, including Epp Annus, senior researcher of the Research Group of Contemporary Estonian Culture. Epp got this award for her work on Soviet colonialism.
In the words of the judging panel: “Epp Annus has created and developed the concept of Soviet colonialism and made it part of academic research of culture, society and philosophy. Soviet colonialism means suppression of a sovereign country by a foreign power under the cloak of ideology and the colonists’ attempt to transform the native population into “soviet citizens” convenient to the regime. By this concept Epp Annus creates the new paradigm of Estonia’s recent history, emphasizing colonialism instead of occupation, tying it to sovietization and extensive reconfiguring of peoples’ mindset.”
In English, Epp has written a monograph about Soviet colonialism “Soviet Postcolonial Studies. A View from the Western Borderlands” (Routledge, 2018) and edited the article collection “Coloniality, Nationality, Modernity. A Postcolonial View on Baltic Cultures under Soviet Rule” (Routledge, 2018) and a special issue of the Journal of Baltic Studies, “Between Arts and Politics: A Postcolonial View on Baltic Cultures of the Soviet era” (2016). She has also written a monograph in Estonian “Sotskolonialism Eesti NSV-s: võim, kultuur, argielu” (‘Soviet Colonialism in the Estonian SSR: Power, Culture, Everyday Life’, 2019) and edited the article collections “Mitmele isandale loodud kunst. Sotskolonialism ja Eesti” (‘Art for Different Lords. Soviet Colonialism and Estonia’, 2020) and “Minu lapsepõlvekodu oli Eesti NSV-s: humanitaarid meenutavad” (‘My Childhood Home Was in the ESSR. Memories of Estonian Literary Scholars’, 2019), and also the special issue of the journal Methis, “Sotskolonialism Eesti NSV-s: kultuurist argiilmani” (‘Soviet Colonialism in the ESSR: From Culture to Everyday Life’, 2017).
Congratulations, Epp!