Michael David-Fox's presentation "Beyond Subjectivity: Mints Commission Interviews on Occupied Smolensk"

In much of the literature since the 1990s, Soviet ego-documents have been associated with studies of “subjectivity” oriented around claims about the Soviet self. This talk, using the extensive corpus of interviews from Smolensk oblast in the archive of the Academy of Sciences Commission for the History of the Great Fatherland War (the so-called Mints Commission), proposes and explores different ways of reading and integrating autobiographical sources into larger, multi-archival studies of World War II, and by extension the Soviet period in general.

In particular, the talk explores the Mints Commission materials on the German occupation of Smolensk in 1941-1943 as quite different from other parts of this rich archive, which has only become available in recent years and has thus far been mined especially for what it says about the Red Army. When it came to the occupied territories, unlike the Red Army, the interviewees were not primarily commanders, “heroes,” or those involved in political and ideological work. Instead, they were local notables such as teachers and agronomists, and many of them were female. The Smolensk interviews with partisans, moreover, derive from as early as mid-1942 and can be probed in tandem with substantial collections of other relevant archival documents. Importantly, the motivations of both interviewees and historians in the Commission’s occupation otdel can be seen as different from those speaking in the Red Army context: the provincial interviewees had been cut off from Soviet power, sometimes for years, and the overarching goal in this context of occupation was not to reveal heroic feats but to describe German rule and their lives under it.

Recent discussions have revolved around whether the Mints Commission interviews were either highly accurate or ideologically biased. But in many ways this stark dichotomy, it will be argued, distracts from some of the most interesting angles of investigation the documents afford. The interviews on occupation can be read to uncover underlying assumptions or attitudes about both the German occupation and the Soviet system. For example, these documents are especially valuable for what they reveal about locals’ often extensive interactions with ordinary German soldiers.

The seminar will take place on March 2 at 5 pm at Staraya Basmannaya 21/4, building L, room L-401.

We kindly ask our guests to order a pass to the building in advance at worldwar2@hse.ru

HSE students and staff should present their ID to enter the building.

The seminar will be held in English.