Memory about Repressions and GULAG: Comparison of Private and Public Discourses (the Example of Media and Personal Stories)

The research is devoted to the comparative analysis of two types of discources about political repressions in USSR and the GULAG: public discource, based on the media materials and private discourse, based on interview with repressed people. The problem of the study consists in the lack of knowledge about relation between individual and collective memory about GULAG and repressions. The study raises the following questions: what is the relation between individual and collective memory about political repressions in the USSR? What are the components of private and public memory? What is the image of repressions constructed in every type of discources? How does every discourse create the representation of the memory? The theoretical object of the research is the representation of repressions and GULAG. Empirical base is media materials and interview with repressed people. The complex method of discource- and content-analysis is applied in the research. In the results of the research main differences between «constructions of memory” in different discources about repressions were revealed. Moreover, the relation between representations of individual and collective memory about repressions in terms of traumatic experience, memorial policy, memorial culture and national identity is illustrated.