The Unmaking of Soviet Life

The Unmaking of Soviet Life
Author: Caroline Humphrey
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Total Pages: 300
Release: 2002
Genre: Mongolia
ISBN: 9780801487736

The Unmaking of Soviet Life brings together ten essays from award-winning author Caroline Humphrey. Humphrey explores such topics as the mafia, barter, bribery, and the new shamanism, locating them in the experiences of a wide range of subjects.

Secondhand Time

Secondhand Time
Author: Svetlana Alexievich
Publisher: Random House
Total Pages: 518
Release: 2016-05-24
Genre: History
ISBN: 0399588817

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A symphonic oral history about the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the emergence of a new Russia, from Svetlana Alexievich, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE WASHINGTON POST AND PUBLISHERS WEEKLY • LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE WINNER One of the New York Times’s 100 Best Books of the 21st Century When the Swedish Academy awarded Svetlana Alexievich the Nobel Prize, it cited her for inventing “a new kind of literary genre,” describing her work as “a history of emotions—a history of the soul.” Alexievich’s distinctive documentary style, combining extended individual monologues with a collage of voices, records the stories of ordinary women and men who are rarely given the opportunity to speak, whose experiences are often lost in the official histories of the nation. In Secondhand Time, Alexievich chronicles the demise of communism. Everyday Russian citizens recount the past thirty years, showing us what life was like during the fall of the Soviet Union and what it’s like to live in the new Russia left in its wake. Through interviews spanning 1991 to 2012, Alexievich takes us behind the propaganda and contrived media accounts, giving us a panoramic portrait of contemporary Russia and Russians who still carry memories of oppression, terror, famine, massacres—but also of pride in their country, hope for the future, and a belief that everyone was working and fighting together to bring about a utopia. Here is an account of life in the aftermath of an idea so powerful it once dominated a third of the world. A magnificent tapestry of the sorrows and triumphs of the human spirit woven by a master, Secondhand Time tells the stories that together make up the true history of a nation. “Through the voices of those who confided in her,” The Nation writes, “Alexievich tells us about human nature, about our dreams, our choices, about good and evil—in a word, about ourselves.” A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: The New York Times, The Boston Globe, The Wall Street Journal, NPR, Financial Times, Kirkus Reviews

Black on Red

Black on Red
Author: Robert Robinson
Publisher: Acropolis Books (NY)
Total Pages: 448
Release: 1988
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN:

"Robert Robinson (1907?-1994) was a Jamaican-born toolmaker who worked in the auto industry in the United States. At the age of 23, he was recruited to work in the Soviet Union, where he spent 44 years after the government refused to give him an exit visa for return. Starting with a one-year contract by Russians to work in the Soviet Union, he twice renewed his contract. He became trapped by the German invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II and the government's refusal to give him an exit visa. He earned a degree in mechanical engineering during the war. He finally left the Soviet Union in 1974 on an approved trip to Uganda, where he asked for and was given asylum. He married an African-American professor working there. He finally gained re-entry to the United States in 1976, and gained attention for his accounts of his 44 years in the Soviet Union."--Wikipedia.

Quality Of Life In The Soviet Union

Quality Of Life In The Soviet Union
Author: Horst Herlemann
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 167
Release: 2019-07-11
Genre: History
ISBN: 1000308812

"Quality of life" is a difficult concept to define, and particularly so when referring to the Soviet Union because Westerners have many preconceptions about Soviet living conditions. This volume goes a long way toward illuminating the realities of daily Soviet life and stands as an important contribution to our understanding of the Soviet Union. Contributors focus primarily on the relation of quality of life to living conditions but also discuss the quality and availability of state-provided services such as education, health care, and housing. Of special interest is their coverage of problems in Soviet society, including working conditions in factories, living conditions in rural areas, alcohol abuse, and the status of the elderly. Together these essays show that although the Soviet government has made great strides in improving the living conditions of its citizens, Soviet living standards and services are relatively poor by Western standards and several important social problems continue to burden the Soviet people.

Disability in Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union

Disability in Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union
Author: Michael Rasell
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 293
Release: 2013-11-26
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1317962206

There are over thirty million disabled people in Russia and Eastern Europe, yet their voices are rarely heard in scholarly studies of life and well-being in the region. This book brings together new research by internationally recognised local and non-native scholars in a range of countries in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. It covers, historically, the origins of legacies that continue to affect well-being and policy in the region today. Discussions of disability in culture and society highlight the broader conditions in which disabled people must build their identities and well-being whilst in-depth biographical profiles outline what living with disabilities in the region is like. Chapters on policy interventions, including international influences, examine recent reforms and the difficulties of implementing inclusive, community-based care. The book will be of interest both to regional specialists, for whom well-being, equality and human rights are crucial concerns, and to scholars of disability and social policy internationally.

Everyday Stalinism

Everyday Stalinism
Author: Sheila Fitzpatrick
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 312
Release: 1999-03-04
Genre: History
ISBN: 0195050002

Focusing on urban areas in the 1930s, this college professor illuminates the ways that Soviet city-dwellers coped with this world, examining such diverse activities as shopping, landing a job, and other acts.

Life After the Soviet Union

Life After the Soviet Union
Author: Nozar Alaolmolki
Publisher: SUNY Press
Total Pages: 204
Release: 2001-10-18
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9780791451380

Examines the political, social, and economic issues confronted by each of the newly independent republics in the Transcaucasus and Central Asian regions.

Daily Life in the Soviet Union

Daily Life in the Soviet Union
Author: Katherine Eaton
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Total Pages: 342
Release: 2004-08-30
Genre: History
ISBN: 0313061106

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.

The Strange World of Ivan Ivanov

The Strange World of Ivan Ivanov
Author: G. Warren Nutter
Publisher: American Institute for Economic Research
Total Pages: 134
Release: 2019-12-27
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1630691917

“It is the bitter lesson of history that society cannot rely on the scruples of a powerful ruler to restrain him from exercising his power over the lives of his subjects. The only safeguard of liberty is the restraint of power itself.”~G. Warren Nutter Economist G. Warren Nutter provided one of the lone dissenting voices to challenge what had become a matter of conventional wisdom among Sovietologists. Whereas others perceived vibrancy and vitality in the socialist society’s industrial growth, Nutter recognized its long-term economic decline concealed behind a politically crafted veneer of propaganda about socialist industrial prowess. From 1956 until its first publication in 1969, he labored on providing a statistical corrective that painted a picture of a society gradually succumbing to the weight of its own central planning in The Strange World of Ivan Ivanov. Though generally well-received in the Cold War environment of its publication, Ivan Ivanov, drifted from memory along with its own Soviet subject matter. In this new edition, the text is accessible again—both as a record of the daily personal hardships experienced under an actual Marxian-socialist state and a warning for a time when socialism’s reputation has become detached from its own track record. The poverty, fear, and coerced subordination of Ivan Ivanov’s life were not aberrations of a socialist revolution gone astray—they were the entirely predictable results of that same socialist system. And as its human toll stretches from the Eastern Bloc to China to Cuba to Venezuela, they continue to repeat with alarming certainty whenever and wherever socialism is attempted. The American Institute for Economic Research in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, was founded in 1933 as the first independent voice for sound economics in the United States. Today it publishes ongoing research, hosts educational programs, publishes books, sponsors interns and scholars, and is home to the world-renowned Bastiat Society and the highly respected Sound Money Project. The American Institute for Economic Research is a 501c3 public charity.