Inheriting and re-imagining rights: assessing references to a Soviet past among young women in neoliberal and neoconservative Russia

Turbine, V. (2018) Inheriting and re-imagining rights: assessing references to a Soviet past among young women in neoliberal and neoconservative Russia. In: Mitroiu, S. (ed.) Women's Narratives and the Postmemory of Displacement in Central and Eastern Europe. Series: Palgrave studies in life writing. Palgrave Macmillan: Cham, pp. 245-267. ISBN 9783319968322 (doi: 10.1007/978-3-319-96833-9_11)

Abstract

An abundance of research examines the resonance and relevance of the Soviet past in con-temporary Russia, engaging with the frames of nostalgia and collective memory. There is also a vibrant field of youth studies that explores how collective memory projects and inheritances of this past shape young people’s current and imagined futures (Krupets et al, 2016). Howev-er, there is less research asking why younger, non-activist, women – coming of age, or born, in the 1990s – continue to make references to a Soviet ‘past’. This chapter bridges and con-tributes to these research fields by analysing when discussions of a Soviet past featured in in-terviews with young women about their rights and political engagements. Focusing largely on ‘naturally occurring’ passing references to Soviet past/s across a range of projects, this chap-ter provides greater insights into which aspects of pasts are being inherited and reimagined on a daily basis and how they are then used in young women’s own citizenship ideals and future imaginaries. The interviews cited in this chapter were conducted in a provincial Russian city between 2005 and 2014. This time span captures an evolving Russian social, economic and political context that is particularly vexing for young women variously situated within ongo-ing economic difficulties, deepening neo-conservativism, and global narratives of neoliberal personhood. The chapter shows how inherited memories of Soviet rights and citizenship are being transmitted, but also disrupted, in daily intergenerational interactions in the family. The ambiguities and ambivalences apparent in young women’s inherited memories of a Soviet past reveals a re-imagined and idealised Soviet social citizenship, that is seen as both emanci-patory and restrictive in its expectations of, and effects on, women.

• Item Type: Book Sections
• Keywords: Inherited memories, collective memory, imagined futures, gender, intimate, Russia, Soviet.
• Status: Published
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Turbine, Dr Vikki
• Authors: Turbine, V.
• Subjects: D History General and Old World > DK Russia. Soviet Union. Former Soviet Republics; H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General)
• College/School: College of Social Sciences > School of Social and Political Sciences > Politics
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• ISBN: 9783319968322
• Published Online: 16 October 2018
• Copyright Holders: Copyright © 2018 The Author
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced in accordance with the copyright policy of the publisher