Civil population of the USSR during the Second World War: life under occupation (based on the materials of Harvard Interview Project on the Soviet Social System)

Student: Polkovnikova Natal`ya

Educational Programme: Bachelor

Year of Graduation: 2014

The majority of publications about the history of the Second World War are devoted to examination of such issues as the history of specific battles, the Nazi regime, the Holocaust, the partisan movement and the others. Less consideration has been given to everyday life both of soldiers and citizens. Harvard Interview Project is a research conducted from 1950 to 1953 by Russian Research Center (Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies) at Harvard University. The main purpose of the research was to examine Soviet social system and to verify whether Soviet citizens support current regime. It is a set of more than 700 transcripts of interviews in English language of former Soviet citizens which were asked about their experience of life in the Soviet Union before the start of the Second World War. Drawing on the materials of this project this paper investigates everyday life of Soviet citizens on the territory of the USSR occupied by the Nazis in 1941-1944. This study examines such questions as the attitude of Soviet citizens to the Nazis in the beginning of the war, civil collaborationism, administration and the enforcement of law on the occupied territories, the difference of everyday life in the occupied city and village, agricultural and religious policy of the Nazis, education and cultural life on the occupied territories. Moreover, through the comparison of Harvard Interview Project materials withthe publications of Russian emigrants, archival materials, newspapers published on occupied territories and memoirs of people who lived on the occupied territories of the USSR this study attempts to demonstrate the probability of use of HPSSS as a primary source about the social history of the Second World War.<div> </div>

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