To Get Ukraine

Oleksandr Shyshko

• Publisher: Glagoslav Publications B.V.
• eBook ISBN: 9781784379421
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Ethnic Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

Since Maidan in Kyiv and Russian presence in the Crimea, Ukraine has never been the same. In 2014, the country is deeply divided by the conflict imposed on the Ukrainians. But since nobody actually asked the nation, author Oleksandr Shyshko decided to take matters into his own hands and look for the answer to the ultimate question – who are the Ukrainians and what do they want. Shyshko spent his time researching the national identity of native Ukrainians, and as he went he stumbled on a discovery that led to yet another question – where is Ukraine going, the so-called Quo vadis? of the Ukrainian people. His findings and critical comments gave birth to this new book that is now for the first time being published in English. To Get Ukraine.

Table of contents

• Foreword by the author
• Why are we required to provide proof that we exist?
• Who are the Ukrainian people?
• The origins of the name Ukraine
• Rus, Muscovy and Ukraine
• Who stopped us from forming an alliance with Poland?
• The Cossacks
• Ukraine’s first attempt to gain independence
• Ukraine’s second attempt to gain independence
• The left bank of Ukraine under Russian rule
• The right bank of Ukraine under the Rzeczpospolita
• An association of Ukrainian lands inside the borders of the Russian empire
• The first renaissance of Ukrainian self-consciousness
• The Ukrainians under the rule of Austria-Hungary
• The events of the First World War in the territory of Ukraine
• The third attempt to obtain independence – and the most likely to succeed?
• The occupation of Ukraine by Austro-German forces
• Another attempt to create a Ukrainian state
• The Ukrainian peasantry takes up arms
• French troops in Ukraine
• The Act Zluky (the Act of Unification)
• The Red army in Ukraine
• The White Army is in Ukraine – yet the Red Army triumphs. Ukraine is carved up once again
• Relations between the Communist powers and the Ukrainian people
• The manoeuvrings of the Bolsheviks to quell Ukraine’s resistance
• The Bolsheviks show how they really feel about Ukraine
• Why did the Bolsheviks in Moscow harbour such hatred for Ukraine? A few thoughts on the matter
• What exactly is a "collective farm"?
• The consequences of forcing the peasants to join collective farms
• Paranoid Stalinist terror in Ukraine
• Ukraine before the SECOND World War
• The Second World War and Ukraine
• The Ukrainian rebel army
• The post-war period. What changed for Ukraine?
• The period which became known as the ‘thaw’
• A mouthful of ethnic freedom?
• Ukraine’s ‘men of the sixties’
• The ‘period of stagnation’
• The disaster at Chernobyl
• The attempt to modernize the USSR
• A new era approaches
• The population of Ukraine today
• Ukrainians living outside their native land
• Religions in Ukraine
• Languages in Ukraine
• The national character of the Ukrainian people
• Relations between the sexes
• Financial relations in the family
• Prostitution
• Ukrainian mail-order brides
• A touch of the exotic: age-old traditions and customs
• Embroidery
• Let’s talk about food
• What do Ukrainians really eat, then?
• Pork "salo"
• Public holidays and festivals in Ukraine
• The Economic and Social Environment in Modern-Day Ukraine
• The captains of Ukraine’s market economy
• The Hetmans of modern-day Ukraine
• Statistics and real life
• Slaying the dragon
• A few conclusions that can be drawn at this stage
• The things we dislike
• A few things that we like
• In place of an epilogue
• Some traditional Ukrainian recipes which you should try in order to get a fuller understanding of the ideas set out in this book
• Endnotes