"Living on a volcano": The lived experience of social change in contemporary Russia.

Format:

Book

Thesis/Dissertation

Author/Creator:

Shevchenko, Olga, 1974-

Contributor:

Morawska, Ewa T., advisor.

University of Pennsylvania.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Social structure.

0700.

Penn dissertations--Sociology.

Sociology--Penn dissertations.

Local Subjects:

Penn dissertations--Sociology.

Sociology--Penn dissertations.

0700.

Physical Description:

320 pages

Contained In:

Dissertation Abstracts International 63-11A.

System Details:

Mode of access: World Wide Web.

text file

Summary:

This dissertation looks into the micro-social dimension of macro-social change by addressing the ways in which the structures of everyday life in contemporary Russia are influenced by, and respond to, the political and economic transformations of the late 1990s. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork and in-depth interviews, conducted longitudinally with a sample of 33 Muscovites, I explore the subtle transformations that occur to the discourses and practices of my informants under the influence of such events as the August 1998 dramatic economic breakdown. Equally importantly, I raise a second question: what are the domains in which the individuals' lives do not change, and what are the arrangements they have to implement in order to buffer social change from their lives? I look at leisure, consumption, health behaviors, and daily political talk as sites in which contemporary Muscovites domesticate the uncertainty of the post-socialist condition, and explore the ways in which temporary arrangements (adaptation to a supposedly finite "crisis") are solidified and institutionalized through repeated action. I argue that, in a society where the instability has become endemic, the social organization of life revolves around the project of routinizing the crisis and developing alternatives to the failing institutions and structures of the state. This process, to which I refer as the process of autonomization, allows the post-socialist actors not only to adapt, but also to resist and exclude change from their daily life through maximally insulating their everyday lives from all interaction with the state. However, instrumental as it is, this process has the unintended consequence of perpetuating the very conditions that have prompted it into existence. By tailoring their daily routine to the conditions of unpredictability and crisis, the actors develop skills and schemas that are only valuable in extreme situations, so in applying this cultural capital to newly arising situations, they often reproduce the hostile context in which they are accustomed to function. Such responses, however, are not understandable as simple extensions of socialist mentality into post-socialist times, but have to be comprehended as part and parcel of the post-socialist change.

Notes:

Thesis (Ph.D. in Sociology) -- University of Pennsylvania, 2002.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 63-11, Section: A, page: 4116.

Supervisor: Ewa Morawska.

Local Notes:

School code: 0175.

ISBN:

9780493929422

Access Restriction:

Restricted for use by site license.