Ukrainian SSR Local Press of the early 1930s as a Source for Everyday Life History

Abstract

The article examines district newspapers of different regions of the Ukrainian Socialist Soviet Republic as a source for studying certain aspects of everyday life in the Ukrainian village of the early 1930s, such as economic and political campaigns (in particular, sowing and grain harvesting campaigns, as well as dekurkulization and collectivization), anti-religious propaganda, the state of the spheres of culture, education, medicine, etc. Despite its heavily propagandistic content and censorship restrictions, the local press contains valuable messages that reflect the realities of its time, such as the deficit of the most necessary things, including food and clothing, inaccessible healthcare system, spread of epidemics, searches and confiscations during the Holodomor, unsuc cessful attempts of the government to plant new cultural phenomena, farmers’ indifference to propaganda and even acts of resistance to the policies of the communist regime. Most of these valuable insights can be found in the publications by so-called “robsilkors” (“workers ’and farmers’ correspondents”) the majority of whom were local and, therefore, carefully collected the information on the grounds. However, almost all the everyday life realities mentioned in the newspapers are shown through the lens of economic and political campaigns, which underlines the ideological role of the press. Finally, because of the lack of archival documents, local newspapers of the Ukrainian SSR, when assessed critically, become a truly valuable and unique source of information about everyday life practices and local history of specific cities and villages in the early 1930s.

Keywords

• propaganda, local press of ukrainian ssr, early 1930s, holodomor, workers’ and farmers’ correspondents’, everyday life, grain procurements, collectivization.