it was right about the time that I was going to give a talk in Kodiak, Alaska at the Baranov Museum. I
came across the reference and it just jumped right out, so that became not only the title of my talk but
also of the dissertation. It is difficult to condense an entire project down into an acceptable title that at
once conveys the subject matter and intrigues the prospective reader.
The “Drunken Republic” is really how the Russian authorities referred to the Alaska territories. They were
more concerned about the “Republic” part and that aspect is what scared them the most. “Drunken” refers
to the fact that the individuals they were sending to Siberia to hunt seal furs had often been arrested for
public drunkenness. There was a great deal of concern about the colonies when they use that phraseology.
What benefit do you see in a dissertation in the humanities field, other than a position in academia?
First, I got the opportunity to tell a story, backed by source materials, that seems to get forgotten every
generation or so: that the US and Russia have a long and complex history that is not always negative,
particularly in the 19th century. Second, I was able to distill all of the things that I learned from my
coursework into my