In 1991, there were more than 1,000 "Americanists" – experts in U.S. history and politics – working in the Soviet Union. The Americanist community played a vital role in the Cold War, often directing the cultural consumption of Soviet society and shaping perceptions of the U.S. To shed light on this important academic community, Sergei Zhuk explores the personal histories of prominent Soviet Americanists, looking at the myriad cultural influences that shaped their identities, careers, and academic interests. Zhuk's compelling account, Nikolai Bolkhovitinov and American Studies in the USSR, takes the reader from the post-war origins of American studies, via the extremes of the Cold War, thaw and perestroika, to Putin's Russia.