Gathering in the nutrition system of rural Russian population of the South of Western Siberia: adaptation everyday practices as a factor of winning the Great Patriotic War

Abstract

The article assesses the significance of foraging in life sustaining of rural Russian population in the war rear areas during the years of the Great Patriotic War. It is proved that a family’s domestic resources in the periods of adversity were presented by prac-tices alternative to the homestead property, which were assuming by their nature for being based on natural resources of the vicinity. In everyday nutrition system it mani-fested itself in the changes of nutrition patterns accompanied by its restructuring con-sisting in replacement of the basic ingredients of traditional cuisine by the secondary ones, including introduction of eatable wild harvest and berries instead of national crops. The author analyzes the reasons and mechanisms, describes season procedures of gathering, the types of wild harvest and berries, their natural geographical condition-ing, the ways of introducing them into the nutrition system, and methods of harvesting for preservation. The conclusion is made about the effectiveness of using oral history methods in stu¬dying under-investigated scientific issues of the Great Patriotic war relat-ed to the anthropological content on the basis of social memory.

Keywords

• rear area
• rural russian population
• foraging
• nutrition
• oral history
• social memory