(Posted January 17, 2005)


HUNTINGDON, Pa. -- Douglas Stiffler, assistant professor of history at Juniata College and an expert on Chinese-Soviet history, will give a talk on "The Other Cold War: China and the Soviet Union," at 4:30 p.m., Wednesday, Jan. 26 in Neff Lecture Hall in the von Liebig Center for Science on the Juniata campus.

The lecture is free and open to the public. The talk is part of the Bookend Seminar series, which features afternoon lectures each month by Juniata College faculty.

For most Americans, the Cold War refers to the antagonistic stance between the United States and the Soviet Union from 1945 to the late 1990s. Stiffler points out that relations between the Soviet Union and China from 1960 to 1980 were hardly friendly and sometimes at the brink of warfare.

The talk will focus on the two superpowers' "honeymoon period" of alliance and mutual assistance in the 1950s and detail how this once-promising alliance deteriorated.

Stiffler also will talk about how the "other cold war" affected the political, social and cultural life of both countries, and how it affected the political policies of the United States.

Stiffler joined Juniata's faculty in 2002 as an assistant professor of history. He earned a bachelor's degree in East Asian studies from Harvard College in 1990. He went on to earn a master's degree in East Asian history in 1993 and a doctorate in East Asian history in 2002, both from the University of California-San Diego.

His research has been presented at conferences in Moscow, Russia, Harvard University and at UC-Berkeley. He received the UC-San Diego Chinese History Fellowship in the academic years 1992-1993 and 1996-1997.

He teaches World History and several courses on Chinese and Russian history. He also teaches a popular course on samurai culture in Japan. His research interests center in Chinese-Soviet relations in the 20th century.


Contact April Feagley at feaglea@juniata.edu or (814) 641-3131 for more information.