Daily Life in the Soviet Union

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Greenwood Publishing Group, 2004 - 320 pages
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Details what ordinary life was like during the extraordinary years of the reign of Soviet Union. Thirty-six illustrations, thematic chapters, a glossary, timeline, annotated multimedia bibliography, and detailed index make it a sound starting point for looking at this powerful nation's immediate past.

What was ordinary life like in the Soviet police state? The phrase daily life implies an orderly routine in a stable environment. However, many millions of Soviet citizens experienced repeated upheavals in their everyday lives. Soviet citizens were forced to endure revolution, civil war, two World Wars, forced collectivization, famine, massive deportations, mass terror campaigns perpetrated against them by their own leaders, and chronic material deprivations. Even the perpetrators often became victims. Many millions, of all ages, nationalities, and walks of life, did not survive these experiences. At the same time, millions managed to live tranquilly, work in factories, farm the fields, serve in the military, and even find joy in their existence.

Structured topically, this volume begins with an historical introduction to the Soviet period (1917-1991) and a timeline. Chapters that follow are devoted to such core topics as: government and law, the economy, the military, rural life, education, health care, housing, ethnic groups, religion, the media, leisure, popular culture, and the arts. The volume also has two maps, including a map of ethnic groups and languages, and over thirty photographs of people going about their lives in good times and bad. A glossary, a list of student-friendly books and multimedia sources for classroom and/or individual use, and an index round out the work, making it a valuable resource for high school as well as undergraduate courses on modern Russian and Soviet history. Copious chapter endnotes provide numerous starting points for students and teachers who want to delve more deeply.

 

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Table des matières

The Soviet Union 19171991
1
Ethnic Groups and Nationalities
37
Government and Law
55
The Military
79
Economy Class Structure Food Clothing and Shopping
107
Rural Life
131
Housing
153
Health Care and Health Problems
175
Education
209
The Arts
235
Mass Media Leisure and Popular Culture
257
Religion
281
Glossary
303
For Further Reading
313
Index
317
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Page 97 - A whole volume could be written on women in the Red Army. The squadrons go into battle, dust, din, bared sabers, furious cursing, and they gallop forward with their skirts tucked up, covered in dust, with their big breasts, all whores, but comrades, whores because they're comrades, that's what matters, they're there to serve everybody, in any way they can, heroines, and at the same time despised, they water the horses, tote hay, mend harness, steal from the churches and from the civilian...
Page 60 - The land, its mineral wealth, waters, forests, mills, factories, mines, rail, water, and air transport, banks, communications, large state-organized agricultural enterprises (state farms, machine and tractor stations, and the like), as well as municipal enterprises and the bulk of the dwelling houses in the cities and industrial localities, are state property, that is, belong to the whole people.
Page 150 - Norton D. Dodge and Murray Feshbach, "The Role of Women in Soviet Agriculture,
Page 77 - Robert Conquest, The Great Terror: A Reassessment (New York: Oxford University Press, 1990). 37. Ukraine contains 10.5 million Russians, 21 percent of its total population. Calculated from Scherer, USSR Facts and Figures Annual, p. 49. vism's crimes, and they would view others' demands that they accept blame as a malicious outrage.
Page 227 - ... is one of the landmarks of Moscow, an absurd thirty-two-story wedding cake of gray and red granite, set above the city in the Lenin Hills. This titanic building, the main dormitory of Moscow State University, is a monument of the pompous and energetic style of architecture nicknamed "Stalin Gothic." Seen from a distance, it suggests a Disney version of a ziggurat; its central spire, like the Kremlin towers, holds a blinking red star. Inside, as in a medieval fortress, there is everything necessary...
Page 104 - Steven L. Solnick, Stealing the State: Control and Collapse in Soviet Institutions, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1998.
Page 144 - riot" also broke out in Okhochaya. A crowd of women stormed the kolkhoz stables and barns. They cried, screamed, wailed, demanding their cows and seed back. The men stood a way off, in clusters, sullenly silent. Some of the lads had pitchforks, stakes, axes tucked in their sashes. The terrified granary man ran away; the women tore off the bolts and together with the men began dragging out the bags of seed.

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À propos de l'auteur (2004)

KATHERINE B. EATON was for many years professor of English at Tarrant County College in Forth Worth, Texas. She has twice been a Fulbright Lecturer in Iasi, Romania. She is the author of The Theater of Meyerhold and Brecht and the editor of Enemies of the People: The Destruction of Soviet Literary, Theater, and Film Arts in the 1930s. Dr. Eaton has also written journal and encyclopedia articles and book reviews on the subject of Soviet theater.

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