B. McGeever: Bolsheviks and Antisemitism in the Russian Revolution

Simon Wiesenthal Lecture Brendan McGeever: Bolsheviks and Antisemitism in the Russian Revolution Datum: 16. November 2017 Ort: Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchivs, 1010 Wien The Bolsheviks came to power with the promise of building a world free of any forms of oppression. These sentiments were put to the test as a devastating wave of anti-Jewish violence broke out across the western borderlands of the former Russian empire. The pogroms posed fundamental questions of the revolutionary project, since they revealed the nature and extent of working class and peasant attachments to antisemitism. Based on archival materials, this talk will explore the significance of antisemitism in the Russian Revolution. It will examine how class politics could sometimes overlap with antisemitism, in the Red Army in particular. In addition, the lecture will explore the as-yet untold history of how the Bolsheviks responded to the antisemitism that emerged within their own ranks. By bri