Woman's View at Men’s Work: The Revolution and the Civil War through the Eyes of Women and Through Their Fates

Abstract

The article continues the series of publications built on them emories of participants of the Russian Civil War (1917– 1920), which complemented by synchronous documents of Soviet institutions and units of the Red Army. Psycholinguistic analysis of women’s memoirs from the collections of «party archives», was conducted and it showed that for the majority of the authors was characterized by the traditional model of behavior, which, paradoxically, facilitated their involvement in political events. The women came to the Red Army, if there was already the male part of the family, in order not to fall into the hands of enemies and do not become a victim of their revenge. Among these women were few ideological; mainly «ideological» were those who participated in the revolutionary movement before 1917. Women rarely occupied combatant positions in the Red Army. They were commonly used in the services providing the front and rear (typists and other lower positions in the headquarters, cultural workers, medical personnel). The authors analyzed on the basis of archival documents underpinnings common myths about women’s participation in the making and the enforcement of sentences. The authors analyzed on the basis of archival documents underlying reason widespread myths about women’s participation in the making and the enforcement of sentences. On the other hand, marked, that women from the lower strata of the towns and villages were often the instigators, provokers. This behavior is explained by the fact that in the legal representation of the lower strata of society the women do not be fully responsible for their actions.