“We Will Forget the Old Traditions...”: Holidays, Recreation, Everyday Practices and Upbringing of a New Student in the 1920s.

Abstract

Introduction. In the early Soviet period, the “proletarization” of students became one of the most important components of the Soviet government’s policy toward higher education. To achieve this goal, a whole set of measures was applied, among which a certain role was given to building a qualitative and effective cultural and educational work (kultprosvet). Within the framework of this study, an attempt has been made to identify its main forms aimed at combating traditions, habitual practices of spending free time, and educating a “new” Soviet student. Methods and materials. The achievements of new social history and historical anthropology were applied, which made it possible to conduct a comprehensive analysis of the phenomenon of attempts to Sovietize students through the transformation of their everyday lives. The most informative sources for studying the problem were materials from the archival collections of Soviet universities and their party committees, where, in particular, minutes of meetings of propaganda commissions, boards of educational institutions, and reports on cultural work carried out among students are stored. Analysis. It was found that the authorities sought to quickly replace the customs, rituals, and practices familiar to the student environment. To do this, a whole range of alternative traditions was imposed on young people in parallel with the discrediting of those that were associated with “bourgeois remnants.” We are talking about new holidays, the approval of such forms of leisure as political education, the celebration of the days of the “red” calendar, sports, etc. In general, they were identical to those promoted in the work environment. These efforts did not always achieve their goal, and even the proletarian students sometimes willingly adopted pre-revolutionary values and behaviors. Results. According to the author, one of the main objectives of the state policy in the field of students was the desire to level its special position, which was fixed in the previous era. From an independent and free citizen, the student had to turn into a “staple of the proletarian regime,” which dealt a strong blow to the uniqueness of this social stratum of the population and led to the devaluation of its status.