Department of History

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Nick Baron

Associate Professor in History, Faculty of Arts

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Biography

Nick completed a BA Joint Honours in History and Modern Languages (German) and an MPhil in Russian and East European Studies at the University of Oxford. In 2001 he received his PhD in History from the University of Birmingham. His doctoral thesis, written under the supervision of Prof. R.W. Davies and Dr. E.A. Rees, was titled 'Soviet Karelia, 1920-1937. A Study of Space and Power in Stalinist Russia'.

From 1999-2004, Nick was a Research Fellow (from 2002, Senior Research Fellow) at the University of Manchester on an AHRC project on post-First World War population displacements, under the direction of Prof. Peter Gatrell. Nick took up a post as Lecturer at the University of Nottingham in 2004.

His work has received funding from ESRC, AHRC, Leverhulme Trust, Gerda Henkel Stiftung, British Academy, and the Yeltsin Foundation, and he has participated in projects funded by EPSRC and the European Commission (INTAS).

Nick has published a monograph on early Soviet regional history and a research-based biography of a Northern Irish officer who fought in the Russian Civil War and was later active in Ulster politics. Both of these books have been published in Russian language editions, and the latter also in Finnish. He has edited one volume of essays, co-edited four further volumes, and published numerous book chapters and articles in leading journals in areas studies, history and historical geography.

He has also participated in and directed several public engagement and knowledge transfer projects involving collaboration with schools, museums, libraries, galleries and community organisations. He has co-curated one exhibition on post-1945 Displaced Persons in Europe and acted as consultant to three major British Library exhibitions (in 2010, 2016, 2017) and to a historical documentary film on Ukrainian resettlement to the UK after the Second World War.

Nick was a long-standing member of the AHRC and ESRC Peer Review Colleges and regularly serves as a reader for international journals and book publishers. He sits on the editorial board of several journals, including Cartographica: The International Journal for Geographic Information and Geovisualization.

Expertise Summary

Nick's research focuses on 20th century Russian/Soviet and East European political, cultural and social history and historical geography. His particular interests are

  1. Population histories (migration, displacement, diaspora and exile; the construction of national, ethnic and social identities; community cohesion and conflict; the politics of collective memory and the public use of history; forms of state population management and demographic intervention, e.g. strategies of classification, regulation and surveillance, 'biopolitics'; etc.);
  2. Spatial histories (frontiers, borders and boundaries; territorial planning, centre-periphery relations and regionalism; landscape and environment; city space, architecture and urban cultures; conceptions, perceptions and representations of space and place, e.g. cartography; etc.);
  3. Histories of visual culture, especially film and graphic arts and developments in digital media.

He has extensive experience of supervising PhD projects in these areas and welcomes enquiries regarding postgraduate research and funding.

For further details, see under 'Research' tab above.

Teaching Summary

Please note that until February 2026, Nick is on research leave, funded by the Gerda Henkel Stiftung and Leverhulme Trust, and will not be delivering UG or PG teaching. He will continue to supervise… read more

Research Summary

Most of my work is concerned to explore historical processes of interaction among 'space', 'populations' and 'power'. My approach is interdisciplinary: I draw on methods and theoretical perspectives… read more

Recent Publications

Please note that until February 2026, Nick is on research leave, funded by the Gerda Henkel Stiftung and Leverhulme Trust, and will not be delivering UG or PG teaching. He will continue to supervise PhD students.

Nick's third-year UG special subject Culture, Society and Politics in 20th Century Russia examines the significance and meanings of culture in the political and social development of modern Russia. It reflects his interest in using different genres of sources, including literature, film and the visual arts, to understand historical change, and encourages students to analyse the role of culture in politics and society, to explore the inter-relations among ideas, identities, representations and political and social practices, and to reflect on culture as an historical phenomenon.

He also convenes a second-year survey course Soviet State and Society, 1917-1991 which offers students the background knowledge to inform their in-depth final-year study of modern Russian cultural history.

Please note that the above modules will not be available every year.

In past years Nick has taught a third-year option Film in History/History in Film, which explored the relations and interactions between written history and historical film; the special subject 'Russia in Revolution 1905-18'; and the Level 2 module 'Russian State and Society'.

At PG level, he has previously designed and delivered, either alone or in collaboration with colleagues, the following postgraduate courses: 'Populations, Power and Political Space in Russia and Eastern Europe, 1890s to 1990s', 'Stalinism as Civilisation', 'Russian Transformations, 1880s to 1930s', 'Michel Foucault and Cultural History', and 'The City as History: Urban Spaces in Modern Europe, c. 1850- 1930'.

Current Research

Most of my work is concerned to explore historical processes of interaction among 'space', 'populations' and 'power'. My approach is interdisciplinary: I draw on methods and theoretical perspectives from human geography, cultural studies, social anthropology, sociology, economics and political science. Although I primarily conduct my research on twentieth-century Russian and East European history, much of my work is also comparative in approach.

Within this general problematic, I pursue the following overlapping and inter-related themes:

Soviet Karelia1. How the 'place' and 'displacement' of individuals or groups shapes the construction of social identities (national, regional, ethnic, gender, etc.) and social practices.

2. How, conversely, individuals and groups constitute and contest their identities in space and through spatial practices (e.g. through collective memory, commemoration and the popular use of history; in everyday life).

3. Spatial dimensions of imperial and state power; of nationalism and nation-building; of ethnic mobilisation, conflict and co-existence; of processes of political, social, economic and cultural transformation.

4. Technologies of spatial construction and regulation, both in terms of practice (e.g. territorial and urbaRussian translation of 'Soviet Karelia'.n planning; regional policies; economic development strategies; border settlement and enforcement; migration and mobility controls, etc.) and in terms of discourse or representation (e.g. historiography, geography, cartography, etc.); and modes of popular or peripheral 'resistance' or 'subversion' to these technologies.

5. Representations of space in diverse contexts (e.g. in cartography, film, graphic arts, architecture, town planning, etc.) and the relationship of spatial representations with spatial practices of power and resistance and with the lived experience of space.

This rubric informs much of my teaching and supervision, especially at third-year and postgraduate level, and my research and public engagement activities, which are outlined below.

Note on Publications

For my books, articles and chapters arising from the projects outlined below, please click 'Publications' tab above. I have also written and published on the history of film, comparative historiography, historical theory and methodology, modern British cultural and literary history, and on contemporary questions of post-Soviet political development, cultural transformation and social memory.

Outside academia, I have written on economic, financial and business affairs in the Russian Federation, on conflict and forced migration in sub-Saharan Africa, and on Moscow's architectural history and heritage.

Current Research Project & Public Engagement Activities

'Mapping the Soviet: Cartography, Culture and Power from Lenin to Stalin, 1917-53'

Funding: I developed the project with support from the University of Nottingham and the J.B. Harley Research Fellowship Trust. Some of the archival fieldwork and related impact activities were funded by an AHRC Research Fellowship, 2012-13, within the 'Science in Culture' programme, and a British Academy Small Grant, 2011-13. In spring 2023, I received a Gerda Henkel Research Scholarship and a Leverhulme Trust Research Fellowship, which will co-fund research leave dedicated to this project from July 2023 to September 2025. I am very grateful to all these organisations for their support..

Research:Map This project explores the history of Soviet cartography between the October revolution and the death of Stalin, in particular examining the ways in which the communist regime used maps to construct and control knowledge of space and territory, and the role of cartography in wider discourses of social identity and cultural transformation. The project's wider aim is to establish a new interpretation of the political role and significance of cartographic practice and map culture in the modern world. It has two strands: 'Cartography, Politics and Power', which examines the development of cartographic policy, leadership and organisation, regulation and production; and 'Cartography and Cultural Revolution', which considers the role and significance of maps and mapping in forming the Soviet spatial imagination and creating the 'New Soviet Person'. The research is grounded in a close reading of many thousands of declassified Soviet archival documents concerning the state's administration, control and conduct of mapping, as well as a vast range of published maps and atlases; school textbooks; specialist and popular handbooks on map-making and map-reading; and literary works, films, photography, architecture and graphic arts (including 'ephemeral' materials such as postcards, stamps or newspaper cartoons) featuring cartographic themes or imagery.

Image from exhibition 'Defining the Route'.Public Engagement: With AHRC funding, I acted as Consultant to an exhibition 'Vybiraia marshrut / Defining the route' (examining the spatial structures and subjectivities implicated in the creation and experience of artistic exhibits), designed by Russian artist Sasha Sokolov for the 5th Moscow Biennale of Modern Art, 17 September to 9 October 2013 (links open new windows).

I also acted as Consultant to a major British Library exhibition 'Maps and the Twentieth Century: Drawing the Line' (Nov 2016 - Mar 2017) and as Associate Curator of a second BL exhibition 'Russian Revolution: Hope, Tragedy, Myths' (April-Sept 2017). Earlier, I had served as Consultant to another British Library exhibition, 'Magnificent Maps: Power, Propaganda and Art', 2010.

Research SupervisionFinnish translation of 'King of Karelia'.

I supervise postgraduate and postdoctoral research in most areas of 20th century Russian and East European political, cultural, economic and social history and historical geography. I have a track-record of supporting students in securing University of Nottingham and UK Research Council funding (see below), as well as supplementary travel and research bursaries, and I welcome enquiries or applications from any student intending to conduct either full-time or part-time research within my areas of interest.

Former postdocs:

Dr. Anna Toropova, 'Cinema and Medicine in Early Soviet Russia, 1917-1936', funded by Wellcome Trust Research Fellowship, 2016-2020. Currently Departmental Lecturer in Russian History at Oxford School of Global and Area Studies and the Faculty of History.

Dr. Siobhan Peeling, AHRC Postdoctoral Research Fellow, 2011-12, on impact project Refugees in post-1945 Europe: Experiences in and beyond the DP camp (for details, see above). Subsequently: University-funded 'Community Engagement Consultant' in History and Tutor in History and in Russian Studies, University of Nottingham, 2012-13; AHRC-funded Research Associate (under Sarah Badcock's supervision) and Centre for Advanced Studies Postdoctoral Fellow (under our joint supervision), 2013-14; Honorary Research Fellow and Teaching Associate, Department of History, 2015..

Dr. Tomas Balkelis, AHRC Postdoctoral Research Fellow, 2006-2009, on research project Population Displacement, State Practice and Social Experience in Russia and Eastern Europe, 1930-1956. Subsequently: European Research Council Postdoctoral Research Fellow at University College Dublin, 2009-2013; Director of Lithuanian Research Council funded project at Vilnius University, 2013-15; Visiting Scholar at the Center for Russian and East European Studies at Stanford University, 2015-16. Currently Senior Research Fellow at the Lithuanian Institute of History in Vilnius.

Current Research Students:

Elysia Heitmar, 'Refugee Voices: Exploring the Life Stories of 1956 Hungarian Refugees in Britain' (joint supervisor with Sarah Badcock; 1+3 ESRC-funded; starting MA year 2023).

Domagoj Mihaljevic, 'Contradictions of Modernization between "West" and "East": Yugoslav Development Strategy for Integrating into the World Market, 1958-1980' (joint supervisor with Sarah Badcock; 1+3 ESRC-funded, with UoN International Scholarship; starting MA year 2022).

Liudmila Liagushkina, 'From arrest to arrest: experiences of re-convicted victims of Stalinist terror in the USSR, 1930-1953' (joint supervisor with Sarah Badcock; 1+3 ESRC-funded; starting MA year 2022).

Zack Palmer, 'Selling Space, Controlling Land: A Political Economy of Cartography in Early Modern England' (second supervisor with David Gehring; 1+3 ESRC-funded).

Luke Wain, 'Female Labour in the Late Imperial Russian Cotton Industry' (joint supervisor with Sarah Badcock; 1+3 ESRC-funded).

Helen Lachal, 'Children's Periodicals and the Socio-Political Formation of Young Readers in the USSR, 1956-1982' (joint supervisor with Sarah Badcock, 1+3 ESRC-funded).

Mehmet Akgül, 'Armenian Revolutionaries in nineteenth century Russia' (joint supervisor with Sarah Badcock; Funded by Turkish government).

Korol KareliiFormer Research Students:

Jessica Lovett, 'A Populous Nation? The Political Use of Demographic Statistics in the USSR, 1965-1989' (PhD, 2022, joint supervisor with Sarah Badcock; 1+3 ESRC-funded). Since graduation working in the UK Civil Service.

Szinan Radi, 'Contesting Money: society, public policy and the state in Hungary, 1945-1958' (PhD 2023, joint supervisor with Sarah Badcock; 1+3 ESRC-funded). Since graduation has held Postdoc positions at New York State University and the University of Cambridge.

Jonathan Rowson, 'Out-Migration in the Russian Village, 1880-1914: a Regional Case Study' (PhD, 2020, joint supervisor with Sarah Badcock; 1+3 ESRC-funded). Since graduation has been working in the private sector.

Andru Chiorean, 'Re-Writing the New Man: Censorship in Communist Romania, 1949-1977' (PhD, 2020, lead supervisor; funded by School of History Studentship; Harvard University Visiting Fellowship, 2011-12; Davis Graduate Student Travel Grant, 2013).

Joseph Nicholson, 'Risk and Reward: Anglo-Soviet Economic Relations, 1921-24' (PhD 2018, joint supervisor with Sarah Badcock; 1+3 ESRC-funded). After graduation has worked in HEI library management.

Seonaid Rogers, 'Site-Seeing: Postcards of the Middle East and the Visual Construction of Place, 1890s to 1990s' (PhD 2018, joint supervisor with Maiken Umbach; funded by AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Award in partnership with the British Museum; awarded Library of Congress Fellowship, 2017-18).

Michael Carey, 'British Socialism and the Emotions of Revolution, 1884-1926' (PhD 2017; joint supervisor with Sarah Badcock; funded by AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Award in partnership with the British Library). Since graduation has been working for City of Nottingham Council.

Siobhan Hearne, 'From 'Yellow Ticket' to 'Bourgeois Evil': Female Prostitution in Urban Russia, 1900-1930' (PhD 2017; joint supervisor with Sarah Badcock; 1+3 ESRC-funded). Since graduation has received a Leverhulme Study Abroad Postdoctoral Fellowship in Latvia and Russia, 2017-19; Leverhulme Early-Career Fellowship, University of Durham, 2019-22; and Research Fellowship, University of Manchester, 2022-24.

Laura Sumner, 'Competing Identities: The Construction of Social Identity among Urban Workers in Sormovo, 1917-1924' (PhD 2017; joint supervisor with Sarah Badcock; 1+3 ESRC-funded). Since graduation has been working in secondary education.

Stephen Parfitt, 'The Order in the Empire: The Knights of Labor in Britain, Australia and New Zealand, 1880-1900' (PhD 2014; joint supervisor with Chris Wrigley; funded by University International Research Excellence Scholarship). Since graduation has taught at Loughborough University, Nottingham Trent University, and the University of Derby, and is currently working in secondary education.

Viacheslav Tolmachev, 'Between Theory And Practice: Khrushchev's "Anti-Parasite" Legislation, 1956-1961' (MPhil 2014; lead supervisor). In 2016 secured position as Counsellor on International Affairs to the Commissioner for Human Rights of the Russian Federation, Moscow.

Olga Bertelsen, 'Spatial Dimensions of Soviet Repressions in the 1930s: The House of Writers (Kharkiv, Ukraine)' (PhD 2013; lead supervisor; funded by University International Research Excellence Scholarship; Phi Kappa Phi Graduate Fellowship; Helen Darcovich Memorial Doctoral Fellowship, 2012-13). Since graduation has been awarded Harriman Institute Postdoctoral Fellowship, Columbia University, USA, 2013-14; Postdoctoral Fellowship in the Center for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies, University of Toronto, 2014-15; Fellowship, European University Institute, Florence, 2018-19; then received tenure-track position at a Tiffin University, Ohio, USA, where she is currently Associate Professor.

Alistair Wright, 'The Civil War in Karelia, 1918-1920' (PhD 2011; joint supervisor; ESRC-funded). Since graduation has been working in secondary education in Scotland.

Siobhan Peeling, '"Out of Place" in the Postwar City: Experiences and Representations of Displacement during the Resettlement of Leningrad at the end of the Blockade' (PhD 2010; lead supervisor; AHRC-funded; for postdoctoral work, see above).

Alastair Kocho-Williams, 'The Culture of Russian and Soviet Diplomacy, Lamsdorf to Litvinov, 1903-1939' (PhD 2006; joint supervisor; funded by School Scholarship). Since graduation has been Lecturer in History at Leeds University, then Senior Lecturer in History, UWE, then Senior Lecturer in International and Soviet History, Aberystwyth University; currently Professor of History and Chair of Humanities and Social Sciences, USA).

MGS logoMain research-related leadership and administrative roles

External: Leader of 'Area Studies' and 'Economic & Social History' Pathways, Midlands Graduate School ESRC Doctoral Training Partnership (2016 to present, entailing direction of pathways across Nottingham, Birmingham, Leicester, Warwick, Aston universities); Member of AHRC Research Grants Panel (2014), AHRC Research Fellowships Panel (2013), AHRC Peer Review College (2007-15), ESRC Assessor College (2009-16); Member, Executive Management Group and Public Policy Committee, Centre for Russian, Central & East European Studies (Glasgow University, 2007-10).

University: Member of UoN ESRC Doctoral Training Centre (DTC) Management Committee (2020 to present); Member of UoN ESRC DTC Training Board (2011-20); Convenor, UoN ESRC DTC 'Language-Based Area Studies' (2011-16); Member of UoN Research Ethics Working Group (2009-11); Convenor, UoN Migration Network and Coordinator/PI, Leverhulme Trust Research Centre Bid (2009-2011); Chair of UoN Arts & Humanities Special Interest Group (2007-10); Member of UoN Humanities and Social Sciences Strategy Group (2007-09).

Cross-Faculty: Member of 'Heritage & the Digital' RPA Steering Group (2015-20); 'Digital Humanities Network' and 'Memory and Remembrance' Steering Groups (2010-17); Management Committee, 'Towards Pervasive Media' EPSRC Project (2009-11);

Faculty of Arts: Member of Faculty Postgraduate Strategy Group (2016-19); Faculty Research Ethics Committee (2014-15); Faculty Research Committee (2010-11); Research Strategy Taskforce (2010-11); Arts Graduate Centre Strategy Group (2008-11).

School of Humanities: Director of Postgraduate Research and Chair of School Postgraduate Committee (2016-19); Member of School Management Committee and School Research Committee (2016-19); Research Ethics Officer (2014-15); Member of Research Committee (2014-15).

Department of History (until 2012, School of History): Convenor of ESRC PGR 1+3 'Area Studies' and 'Economic & Social History' pathways (see also 'National' above) (2011 to present); Co-Director of Research and REF Coordinator (2014-16); Chair of Examinations Board (2013-15 and 2017-18); Director of Research and Chair of REF Steering Group (2010-11); Member of Strategy & Finance Committee (2010-11); Director of Postgraduate Research (2006-11); Chair of Research Ethics Committee (2009-11).

Past Research

2011-22 (including legacy activities) - 'Refugees in post-1945 Europe: Experiences in and beyond the DP camp' (AHRC follow-on project, 2011-12, co-directed with PI Prof. P. Gatrell, University of Manchester).

Drawing Homelandson the findings of two earlier AHRC-funded research projects on East European population displacement (see under 'Past Research', below), this public engagement and impact-focussed project aimed (a) to create accessible educational and public resources for the study of refugee and migrant histories; (b) to promote wider public awareness of contemporary issues relating to displacement, migration and asylum, and (c) to transform perceptions of the refugee experience in the past and present. Our means of public engagement included a multi-site exhibition and an educational resource pack, which we developed in collaboration with teachers and students from the Greater Manchester and Nottingham regions, and launched at a Nottingham teachers' workshop in November 2012. Our project partner was the Ahmed Iqbal Ullah Education Trust, and collaborators included the Society of Friends, Imperial War Museum, British Film Institute, and Nottingham City Museums and Galleries. For details of this project, see our web-site (will open in a new windowWarlands).

Between 17 August and 23 September 2012, Nottingham Castle hosted our exhibition 'When the War was Over: European Refugees after 1945', which was seen by over 25,000 visitors. For the University press release on the exhibition, see here (opens a new window). The exhibition poster can be downloaded via this link.

The exhibition has since been displayed at the launch of the Centre for Advanced Studies (link opens in new window), University of Nottingham, October 2012; the University of Glasgow Memorial Chapel, February 2013; Highfield House, University of Nottingham, May-June 2013; New Art Exchange, Nottingham, 16-23 June 2014, to mark Refugee Week; at the UK HQ of Kresy-Siberia, an international organisation dedicated to examining and promoting the history of the Polish diaspora, Manchester, October 2014; and at Friends House in Amersham, June 2015, Friends House in Chesham, September 2015; Ukrainian Cultural Centre, Nottingham, 2022).Poster for premier of film 'A Community in Exile'.

The project has also generated new collaborations. We have advised and supported 'Kresy-Siberia' (see above) in developing an online exhibition on post-1945 Polish migrations. Between 2014 and 2021 I worked with a Ukrainian community historian to produce an educational resource and a 2hr edited and subtitled documentary film 'A Community in Exile', based on oral history interviews (released October 2021).

2017 - Editor, Displaced Children in Russia and Eastern Europe, 1915-1953. Ideologies, Identities, Experiences (Leiden: Brill, 2017). This volume of essays arises from two AHRC-funded collaborative research projects on twentieth-century pDisplaced Childrenopulation displacement (see below) as well as the follow-on project described above. It examines how East European nationalist and revolutionary regimes targeted children in campaigns of coercive re-socialisation associated with state- and nation-building, as well as how they strove to manage the consequences of child displacement caused by war, civil conflict, revolution and social collapse. Many of the chapters also reveal children's creativity and resourcefulness in devising means of coping with the consequences of marginalisation, overcoming trauma and improvising new identities and roles to enable them to negotiate their re-integration into society.

2016-20 - Principal Investigator on pilot project 'Presenting Textual Sources for Public Engagement', which received funding from the University of Nottingham's Research Priority Area 'Heritage and the Digital'. This project involved collaboration among colleagues from the Department of History, Horizon, Manuscripts & Special Collections and the University's Digital Research Team. Using focus groups with academics, postgraduate researchers and community historians, and consultations with museum, library and archive specialists, we produced a set of requirements and options for the design of an open-access digital tool for the curation of online text exhibits. In June 2016 we received £20,000 from the AHRC-funded Centre for Hidden Histories (opens in a new window) at the University of Nottingham to support the further development of this product by the same research team. I was Principal Investigator of this new project 'COREL: Creating Online Resources for Engagement & Learning'. It concluded in summer 2020. For details, see the COREL website.

2014-20 - Co-Investigator on a project 'DHA Praxis: Interrogating Interdisciplinarity', involving collaborators from Horizon Digital Economy Research Institute and the Faculty of Arts, University of Nottingham. The project received approximately £40,000 from the University of Nottingham's Discipline Bridging Scheme, and had produced, among other outputs, a 'Good Practice Guide on Interdisciplinary Collaboration' and a video 'Interrogating Interdisciplinarity' (click on link to open YouTube in a new window). The project is now formally ended, but the team is still active co-authoring an article on using theories of interdisciplinarity to understand and improve collaborative practice, using digital humanities as an example.

King of Karelia

2013-14 - Co-Investigator on a digital humanities project 'People-Events-Places' examining ways to visualize spatially-located data capturing human actions, perceptions and beliefs in the past. This involved a collaboration among the Horizon Digital Economy Research Institute and the Faculty of Arts, University of Nottingham, and the Digital Innovations Lab, University of North Carolina, and was funded by Horizon and the AHRC within the Data-Assets-Methods Network. I was lead author of an article 'Spatial Humanities: Moving Beyond the Dot on the Map', published in Proceedings of the Digital Research in the Humanities and Arts Conference, DRHA2014 (Maragiannis, Anastasios ed.), pp. 111-116.

2011-13 - Principal Investigator on a 2-year British Academy-funded project 'Theories, Ideologies, and Politics of Spatial Planning in Russia and Germany, 1890s to 1945'. This project examined how Russian and German academics in the first half of the 20th century rethought the nature of economic space and how their ideas interacted with political developments and state policy. It aimed to offer new insights into modern European history; the significance of space as object of theory and practice; the complex relations among science, technology, culture, ideology and politics; and the discursive origins and institutional formation of a 'rational' approach to spatial analysis that has shaped both geography's evolution as a discipline and planning and policy in the modern world.

2010-11 - Funded collaborator on the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPRSC)-funded interdisciplinary research project Towards Pervasive Media (2010-2011). As one of the leaders of the theme 'Curating the Landscape' I examined the mediation of spatial experience via mobile technologies. For TPM outputs please click image on left (opens in new window).

2004-2009 - Co-director of AHRC-funded international collaborative research project Population Displacement, State Practice and Social Experience in Russia and Eastern Europe, 1930-1956 (with Prof. Peter Gatrell, University of Manchester).

1999-2004 - Senior Research Fellow and Project Manager on AHRB-funded research project Population Displacement, State-building and Social Identity in the Former Russian Empire, 1918-1930, University of Manchester (Director: P. Gatrell).

For more details on both these projects, please see the website here (opens in new window: please note, the site is now archived).

1997-2001 - ESRC-funded PhD studentship. Thesis title: 'Soviet Karelia, 1920-1937. A Study of Space and Power in Stalinist Russia' (Supervisors: Prof. R.W. Davies, Dr. E.A. Rees).

  • BARON, N., 2024. Visualizing Stalinist Space: The 1951 Geographical Atlas of the USSR for Secondary Schools. In: MARCUS COLLA and PAUL BETTS, eds., Rethinking Socialist Space in the Twentieth Century Palgrave Macmillan. 23-57
  • BARON N., LUMINITA GATEJEL and STEPHAN RINDLISBACHER, 2024. ‘Drawing the line’: border commissions in Eastern Europe. Introduction Journal of Modern European History. 22(1), 1-9
  • BARON N., LUMINITA GATEJEL and STEPHAN RINDLISBACHER, eds., 2024. ‘Drawing the line’: border commissions in Eastern Europe. Special issue Journal of Modern European History.
  • BARON, N., 2023. “Fascist Colors”: Stalinist Spatial Ideology, Cartographic Design, and Visual Learning. In: JOAN NEUBERGER, VALERIE KIVELSON and SERGEI KOZLOV, eds., Picturing Russian Empire Oxford University Press. 364-372
  • BARON N. and STEPHAN RINDLISBACHER, 2023. Ukraine war: Why a ceasefire based on partition of territory won’t work The Conversation. Available at: <https://theconversation.com/ukraine-war-why-a-ceasefire-based-on-partition-of-territory-wont-work-209750>
  • BARON, N., 2022. Cartography. In: KIRILL POSTOUTENKO, ALEXEY TIKHOMIROV and DMITRI ZAKHARINE, eds., Media and Communications in the Soviet Union (1917-1953): General Perspectives Palgrave Macmillan. 49-93
  • BARON N. and C. HOLMES, eds., 2022. Chapters of Accidents: A Writer's Memoir Vallentine Mitchell.
  • BARON, N., ed., 2017. Displaced Children in Russia and Eastern Europe, 1915-1953: Ideologies, Identities, Experiences Leiden: Brill.
  • BARON, N., 2017. Placing the Child in Twentieth Century History: Contexts and Framework. In: BARON, N., ed., Displaced Children in Russia and Eastern Europe, 1915-1953: Ideologies, Identities, Experiences Leiden: Brill. 1-39
  • BARON, N., 2017. Violence, Childhood and the State: New Perspectives on Political Practice and Social Experience in the Twentieth Century. In: BARON, N., ed., Displaced Children in Russia and Eastern Europe, 1915-1953: Ideologies, Identities, Experiences Leiden: Brill. 273-285
  • KAZNELSON, M. and BARON, N., 2017. Memories of Displacement: Loss and Reclamation of ‘Home/land’ in the Narratives of Soviet Child Deportees of the 1930s. In: BARON, N., ed., Displaced Children in Russia and Eastern Europe, 1915-1953: Ideologies, Identities, Experiences Leiden: Brill. 97-130
  • CAREY, M. and BARON, N., 2017. Russia and the World on Fire. In: ROGATCHEVSKAIA, E., ed., The Russian Revolution: Hope. Tragedy. Myths London: The British Library. 181-217
  • BARON, N., 2016. Movement. Mapping Mobility to Mobile Maps. In: HARPER, T., ed., Drawing the Line: The 20th Century in Maps London: The British Library. 190-239
  • BARON, N., 2015. World Revolution and Cartography. In: MARK MONMONIER, ed., The History of Cartography, Volume 6: Cartography in the Twentieth Century Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. 1766-1770
  • BARON, N., CARLETTI, L., ALLEN, R. and ET AL., 2015. Spatial Humanities: Moving Beyond the Dot on a Map. In: A. MARAGIANNIS, ed., Proceedings of the Digital Research in the Humanities and Arts Conference: DRHA2014, London 111-116
  • BARON, N., 2013. Korol' Karelii. Polkovnik F. Dzh. Vuds i Britanskaia interventsiia na severe Rossii v 1918—1919 gg.: Istoriia i memuary St. Petersburg: Izdatel'stvo Evropeiskogo universiteta v Sankt-Peterburge.
  • BARON, N., 2013. The mapping of illiberal modernity: spatial science, ideology and the state in early twentieth century Russia. In: TUROMA, S. and WALDSTEIN, M., eds., Empire de/centred: new spatial histories of Russia and the Soviet Union Ashgate. 105-134
  • BARON, N., 2013. ‘Vremia vs prostranstva’ [‘Time vs Space’], ‘Granitsa’ [‘The Border’], ‘Karta, kartorovanie’ [‘Maps and Mapping’], ‘Proizvodstva sub’ektivnosti’ [‘Production of Subjectivity’]. In: DANILOVA, A. and SOKOLOV, A., eds., Vybiraia marshrut: Catalogue to accompany Exhibition ‘Vybiraia marshrut / Defining the Route’, 5th Moscow Biennale of Contemporary Art, 17 September to 9 October 2013, ARTPLAY centre, Moscow Moscow: The MoSA Press. 16, 22, 31-32, 49
  • BARON, N., 2013. ‘Interv’iu s Nikom Baronom’ [‘Interview with Nick Baron’]. In: DANILOVA, A. and SOKOLOV, A., eds., Vybiraia marshrut: Catalogue to accompany Exhibition ‘Vybiraia marshrut / Defining the Route’, 5th Moscow Biennale of Contemporary Art, 17 September to 9 October 2013, ARTPLAY centre, Moscow Moscow: The MoSA Press. 209-211
  • BARON, N., 2013. Mapping the Soviet: Cartographic Culture and Political Power from Lenin to Stalin. In: ROBERTS, J. and VOLODARSKAIA, E., eds., Proceedings of IV International Conference ‘Language, Culture, and Society in Russian/English Studies', 22-23 July 2013 University of London; Russian Academy of Sciences. 12-25
  • POLIAN, P., BARON, N. and OTHERS, eds., 2013. Sobesednik na piru: Pamiati Nikolaia Pobolia Moscow: Mandel’shtam Society - Izdatel’stvo O.G.I..
  • BARON, N., 2012. K’ poznaniiu Rossii: Mendeleev and the Origins of Russian Spatial Science. In: SOLOMESHCH, I. and TAKALA, I., eds., Grani sotrudnichestva. Rossiia i Severnaia Evropa / Facets of Cooperation. Russia and Northern Europe Petrozavodsk: Petrozavodsk State University Press. 61-66
  • When the War was Over: Refugees in Europe after 1945 2012. At: Nottingham Castle, Nottingham University, Glasgow University, New Arts Exchange (Nottingham), Polish Cultural Centre (Manchester), Friends' Houses (Amersham, Chesham)01/01/2012 00:00:00-01/01/2016 00:00:00.
  • BARON, N., 2011. Stolknovenie imperii: Rossiisko-britanskie vzaimnootnosheniia vo vremia interventsii soiuznikov na severe Rossii, 1918-1919 gg Trudy Karel’skogo Nauchnogo Tsentra Rossiiskioi Akademii Nauk: Seriia Gumanitarnye issledovaniia. 6(2), 90-96
  • BARON, N.P., 2009. A Clash of Imperialisms: Russian-British Mutual Perceptions during the Allied Intervention in North Russia, 1918-19. In: GOLDIN, V.I., ed., 1919 god v sud'bakh Rossii i mira: sbornik statei Archangel'sk: Pomor State University, Russian Academy of Sciences. 124-131
  • BARON, N.P., 2009. Remaking Soviet society: the filtration of returnees from Nazi Germany, 1944-1949. In: GATRELL, P. and BARON, N., eds., Warlands: population resettlement and state reconstruction in the Soviet-East European borderlands, 1945-50 Palgrave Macmillan. 89-116
  • GATRELL, P. and BARON, N.P., 2009. Violent Peacetime: Reconceptualising Displacement and Resettlement in the Soviet-East European Borderlands after the Second World War. In: GATRELL, P. and BARON, N., eds., Warlands: population resettlement and state reconstruction in the Soviet-East European borderlands, 1945-50 London: Palgrave Macmillan. 255-268
  • BARON, N., 2009. Prostranstva utopii : geodeziia, kartografiia i visual'naia kul'tura v SSSR, 1918-1953. In: VEDENIN, IU.A. and LAVRENOVA, O.A., eds., Geografiia iskusstva: sbornik statei. Vypusk 5 Institut naslediia. 7-38
  • BARON, N.P., 2009. D.I. Mendeleev i kartirovanie russkoi-sovetskoi sovremennosti. In: I.I. MITIN, D.N. ZAMIATIN, ed., Gumanitarnaia geografiia: voobrazhenie prostranstva/prostranstvo voobrazheniia Moscow: Agraf. 69-81
  • BARON, N., 2008. New Spatial Histories of 20th-Century Russia and the Soviet Union: Exploring the Terrain Kritika. Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History. 9(2), 433-448
  • BARON, N., 2008. The King of Karelia History Today. 58(6), 34-43
  • BARON, N., 2008. Petr Mikhailovich Eropkin. In: BRUCE F. ADAMS, ed., The Supplement to the Modern Encyclopedia of Russian, Soviet, and Eurasian History 9. Academic International Press. 225-227
  • BARON N.P., 2007. Nature, nationalism and revolutionary regionalism: constructing Soviet Karelia, 1920-1923 Journal of Historical Geography. 33(3), 565-595
  • BARON, N.P., 2007. La Révolution et ses limites. Conscience de la frontière soviétique et dynamique du développement régional, 1918-1928. In: SOPHIE COEURÉ and DULLIN, S., eds., Frontières du communisme. Mythologies et réalités de la division de l’Europe, de la révolution d'Octobre au mur de Berlin Paris: La Découverte. 87-104
  • BARON, N., 2007. New Spatial Histories of Twentieth Century Russia and the Soviet Union: Surveying the Landscape Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas. 55(3), 374-400
  • BARON, N., 2007. Aleksandr Petrovich Dovzhenko. In: BRUCE F. ADAMS, ed., The Supplement to the Modern Encyclopedia of Russian, Soviet, and Eurasian History 8. Academic International Press. 136-40
  • BARON, N.P., 2005. “Cherez natsionalizm k kommunizmu”: k stanovleniiu Karel’skoi avtonomii. In: O.B. GLEZER and P.M. POLIAN, eds., Rossiia i ee regiony v XX veke: territoriia, rasselenie, migratsii Moscow: OGI. 76-95
  • MAKUROV, V. G., FILATOVA, A.T. and BARON, N.P., eds., 2005. Sovetskaia lesnaia ekonomika. Moskva-Sever. 1917-1941.: Sbornik dokumentov i materialov Petrozavodsk: Karelian Research Centre, Russian Academy of Sciences.
  • BARON, N.P., 2004. Central Control Commission, Guberniya, Lev Natalovich Kritzman, Yuli Martov, Sergo Ordzhonikidze, Rabkrin, Andrei Tarkovsky, Uezd, Grigory Zinoviev, Zinoviev Letter. In: JAMES R. MILLAR, ed., Encyclopedia of Russian History 2. New York: Macmillan Reference.
  • BARON, N.P. and GATRELL, P., eds., 2004. Homelands. War, Population Displacement and State-building in Eastern Europe and Russian, 1918-1924 London: Anthem Press.
  • BARON, N.P. and GATRELL, P., 2004. Introduction. In: Homelands. War, Population Displacement and State-building in Eastern Europe and Russia, 1918-1924 London: Anthem Press. 1-9
  • BARON, N., 2004. Totalitarianism: Recent Studies in Theory and Practice [Review article] Journal of Genocide Studies. 11(1), 101-109
  • BARON, N.P. and GATRELL, P., 2004. Conclusions: On Living in a New Country. In: Homelands. War, Population Displacement and State-building in Eastern Europe and Russian, 1918-1924 London: Anthem Press. 201-208
  • BARON, N.P. and GATRELL, P., 2003. Population displacement, state-building, and social identity in the lands of the former Russian empire, 1917-23 Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History. 4(1), 51-100
  • BARON, N.P., 2003. Ekonomicheskoe planirovanie i gosudarstvennoe masilie nakanune Bol'shogo Terrora, 1935-36 gg. [Economic Planning and State Violence on the Eve of the Great Terror, 1935-36]. In: T. VIHAVAINEN, ed., The Soviet Union: A Popular State? / Sovetskaia vlast' - narodnaia vlast'? St Petersburg: Evropeiskii dom. 202-31
  • BARON, N.P., 2003. Population Displacement, Political Space and Social Identity Ethnopolitics. 2(3-4), 92-99
  • BARON, N.P., 2002. The Karelian ASSR. In: REES, E.A., ed., Centre-local relations in the Stalinist state, 1928-1941 Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. 116-148
  • BARON, N.P., 2002. The Language Question and National Conflict in Soviet Karelia in the 1920s Ab Imperio. 2(2), 349-60
  • BARON, N.P., 2002. Production and Terror: The Operation of the Karelian Gulag, 1933-1939 Cahiers du Monde Russe. 43(1), 139-180
  • BARON, N.P., 2002. Regional'noe konstruirovanie Karel'skoi Avtonomii Ab Imperio. 2, 279-308
  • BARON, N.P., 2002. “Empire” and “Nation” as Categories of Spatial Practice and Historical Study: Methodological Notes Ab Imperio. 2, 117-32
  • BARON, N.P., 2001. Conflict and complicity: the expansion of the Karelian Gulag, 1923-1933 Cahiers du Monde Russe. 42(2-4), 615-648
  • BARON, N.P., 2001. War, Population Displacement and State-Building in Latvia and Lithuania, 1918-1924. In: R. BUETTNER, ed., Problemy natsionalnoi identifikatsii: kulturnye i politicheskie sviazi Rossii so stranami Baltiiskogo regiona v XVIII-XX vv Samara: Parus. 104-116
  • BARON, N.P., 2000. History, Politics and Political Culture: Thoughts on the Role of Historiography in Contemporary Russia Cromohs: Cyber Review of Modern Historiography. 5,
  • BARON, N.P., 2000. Escaping the Shadows of the Past. A Comparative Approach to Problems of Cultural Disorientation, Collective Identity and the Role of History during the Russian Transition Storia della Storiografia. 37, 101-134
  • BARON, N.P., 1999. The Historiography of the Kirov Murder Slovo: An inter-disciplinary journal of Russian, East-Central European and Eurasian affairs. 11, 1-22
  • BARON, N.P., 1999. Regional’naia istoriia: novye podkhody. In: A. SEVASTIANOVA, ed., Regional’naia istoriia v rossiiskoi i zarubezhnoi istoriogfii Riazan: Riazan Pedagogical University. 71-5
  • BARON, N.P., 1999. Poniatie “Tsentr-Periferiia” v sovietologicheskykh issledovaniiakh: teoriia i praktika. In: I. SOLOMESHCH, ed., i Finliandiia na poroge novogo tysiacheletiia Petrozavodsk: Petrozavodsk State University. 20-24.
  • BARON, N.P., 1997. The Present and Future Importance of Soviet History Comparative Economic Studies. 4, 44-52
  • BARON, N., 1997. Perestroika, politicians and Pandora's box. The collective memory of Stalinism during Soviet reform European Review of History/Revue europeenne d'histoire. 4(1), 73-92

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