«Back to Arkhangelsk!» Review of the book: Khatanzeyskaya E.V. Soviet city in the extreme everyday life: Arkhangelsk in the epoch of industrialization and the World War II, 1929–1945. Moscow: Politicheskaya entsiklopediya, 2021, 311 p. (Ser. «History of Stalinism»)

Abstract

The reviewed monograph by Elizaveta Khatanzeyskaya is dedicated to the extreme everyday life and survival strategies of the population of Soviet Arkhangelsk in the period of industrialization and the Great Patriotic (the Second World) War. The book continues the semantic series of those scientific works that explore the phenomenon of Soviet city in its historical formation and development. The author sets the task to find out how the formation of a new model of society influenced the economic, social, and cultural development of the northern port city, how the social appearance and everyday life of the townspeople changed at historical turning points, and what strategies and social practices they used to solve the most pressing problems of their everyday existence. The classical approach to the study of urban society is combined in the study with approaches characteristic of historical anthropology. The study of survival strategies transmitted from one generation to another is important not only in scientific terms, but also for public self-awareness and historical reflection.

Keywords

• everyday life history
• extreme everyday life
• arkhangelsk
• industrialization
• great patriotic war (world war ii).