“Peace and Friendship”: Overcoming the Cold War in the Artek Pioneer Camp - in person talk by Matthias Neumann

The famous Pioneer camp ‘Artek’ was used by the Soviet Union to showcase socialism to upcoming generations. It was an iconic space where each summer up to 5,000 children from over 60 nations met to promote transnational cooperation and Soviet-led world peace. The talk reconstructs the experience of American children who visited the famous Soviet Pioneer camp ‘Artek’. It examines how the participants’ encounters challenged and shaped perceptions of East and West, and how their action fed into the upsurgence of citizen diplomacy that played a crucial role in ending the Cold War.

Photo shows the 1986 US Artek delegation with Soviet peers

Matthias Neumann is a Senior Lecturer in History at the University of East Anglia, UK. He has published widely on the history of childhood and youth in revolutionary Russia, including a monograph on The Communist Youth League and the Transformation of the Soviet Union, 1917-1932 (Routledge 2011). His current research examines exchange programmes which enabled American children to visit the Soviet Union and the role of children in citizen diplomacy during the Cold War. The manuscript entitled American Peace Child: Bridging the Cold War Divide in a Soviet Youth Camp is under contract with University of Toronto Press.

NB: This event takes place in-person at the SCRSS centre in Brixton. The SCRSS is exploring options for simultaneous Zoom streaming and for making a recording of this event available for viewing online. Check SCRSS website for details closer to the event date.