The Worlds of Russian Village Women: Tradition, Transgression, Compromise

The University of Wisconsin Press is pleased to announce the publication of:

 

Laura J. Olson and Svetlana Adonyeva. The Worlds of Russian Village Women: Tradition, Transgression, Compromise

ISBN 978-0-299-29034-4, $39.95, 382 pp., 12 b/w photos e-book, ISBN 978-0-299-29033-7, $29.95

http://uwpress.wisc.edu/books/5075.htm

 

Table of Contents:

 

Introduction: Tradition, Transgression, Compromise

1 Traditions of Patriarchy and the Missing Female Voice in Russian Folklore Scholarship

2 Age and Gender Status and Identity: Structure and History

3 Subjectivity and the Relational Self in Russian Village Women's Stories of Courtship and Marriage

4 The Pleasure, Power, and Nostalgia of Melodrama: Twentieth-Century Singing Traditions and Women's Identity Construction

5 Transgression as Communicative Act: Rural Women's Chastushki

6 Magical Forces and the Symbolic Resources of Motherhood

7 Magic, Control, and Social Roles

8 Constructing Identity in Stories of the Other World

9 Death, the Dead, and Memory-Keepers

Conclusion

 

A groundbreaking folkloric study of generations of Russian village women

 

Russian rural women have been depicted as victims of oppressive patriarchy, celebrated as symbols of inherent female strength, and extolled as the original source of a great world culture. Throughout the years of collectivization, industrialization, and World  War II, women played major roles in the evolution of the Russian village. But how do they see themselves? What do their stories, songs, and customs reveal about their values, desires, and motivations?

 

Based upon nearly three decades of fieldwork, from 1983 to 2010, The Worlds of Russian Village Women follows three generations of Russian women and shows how they alternately preserve, discard, and rework the cultural traditions of their forebears to suit changing needs and self-conceptions.  In a major contribution  to the study of folklore, Laura J. Olson and Svetlana Adonyeva document the ways that women¹s tales of traditional practices associated with marriage, childbirth, and death reflect both upholding and transgression of social norms. Their romance songs, satirical  ditties, and healing and harmful magic reveal the complexity of power relations in the Russian villages.

 

"Olson and Adonyeva skillfully interweave fieldwork data with historical background, theoretical connections, and interpretation. In-depth and balanced, the book covers a number of important topics: the village life cycle, magic and healing, gossip and consumption  of mass media, and women¹s relationship to both traditional and popular music." Sibelan E. S. Forrester, Swarthmore College

 

 

Laura J. Olson is associate professor in the Department of Germanic and Slavic Languages and Literatures at the University of Colorado, Boulder.

Svetlana Adonyeva is professor of folklore and theory of literature at St. Petersburg State University in Russia.

 

Publication of this volume has been made possible, in part, through support from the Eugene M. Kayden Endowment at the University of Colorado.