"The authors have succeeded in presenting the history of the East with Europe as an interesting succession of skillful political moves and rhetorical reinterpretations. Their approach of linguistically inspired new geopolitical research is original and certainly path-breaking in international studies. Recommended for serious scholars interested in European politics, as well as for European and international relations courses."—Kari Palonen, Academy of Finland Professor, Leader of the Centre of ExcellencePolitical Thought and Conceptual Change"The contributors have weaved their multidisciplinary approach into a coherent whole. With extensive knowledge of languages and cultures, their analysis is deep and illuminating. The text is lucid and informative, with advanced theoretical and methodological argumentation intertwining with historical and empirical observations. Recommended reading for scholars of social sciences and history, both in Asia and in Europe."—Emiko Ochiai, Professor of Sociology, Kyoto University, Leader of the Centre of ExcellenceReconstruction of the Intimate and Public Spheres in 21st Century Asia"This edited volume offers fresh and critical ideas about the meaning of 'the West' and 'Europe' as seen from peoples and countries on the 'periphery' or outside the 'West,' like Finland, Hungary, Japan, and Russia. Its six chapters highlight important aspects of the linguistic and political construction of borders referring to binary orders which are used to structure geopolitical landscapes. The East and the Idea of Europe constitutes a significant contribution to such various discourses as those on globalization, the meanings of European and Western identities, geopolitical conflicts, and migration."—Dr Árpád von Klimó, DAAD Visiting Professor, Department of History, University of Pittsburgh"How do nations and states construct their own 'placing' –and each other's -- in a world signed by the forced juxtaposition of 'East' and 'West?'" "How are these 'placings' negotiated and reshaped at especially critical cultural and political junctures?" To shed light on these questions, editors Katalin Miklóssy and Pekka Korhonen have engaged a uniquely distinguished and uniquely diverse group of authors. That they have been able to create a fruitful dialogue between them without straight-jacketing them into methodological conformity is one of the great strengths of this book. Our own conceptualizations of what is 'East' and 'West,' and of the shifting role of 'in-between' states, as Minna Rasku's contribution on "Placing Greece on the Boundary of Europe" reminds us, is culturally and politically contextualized, fuzzy, and changing. The essays in this book go beyond mechanistic understandings of 'Orientalism' and 'Westernism' to paint a nuanced and multi-hued picture of the many elements—from the power of naming to economic policies and trade reorientation to views of geopolitical order— that go into the 'placing' and self-placing of nations, states, empires and boundaries themselves. This book makes an important contribution to our understanding of both cultural representations of East and West, and of borders, their meaning and their cultural shifting."—Margarita M. Balmaceda, PhD, Professor of Diplomacy and International Relations, Seton Hall University"The book The East and the Idea of Europe brings an important contribution to the field of mental mapping and discursive construction of collective identities. It combines well-thought methodological approaches with huge empirical material from different countries. Studying how the East understood itself vis-à-vis the West it focuses on critical periods where the stability of status quo have been questioned. The book contributed for better understanding geopolitical frames of references that determine both contemporary world politics and everyday thinking."—Professor Olga Malinova, leading research fellow of the Institute of Scientific Information for Social Sciences, Russian Academy of Sciences