Doświadczenia wojenne w narracjach żołnierek Armii Czerwonej a trudności z rozwiązywaniem kryzysów rozwojowych
War Experiences in the Narratives of the Red Army Female Soldiers and Their Difficulties in Overcoming Developmental Crises

Summary/Abstract: This paper is a psychological analysis of the experiences of former Red Army femalesoldiers fighting in the World War II. The empirical material includes the narratives of 150 fe-male soldiers collected by Svetlana Alexievich in her book “War’s Unwomanly Face” (2015).The book contains the interviews conducted 40 years after the World War II by the author, whotalked to the female soldiers from different former Soviet Republics. The analysis of the narra-tives was based on the developmental psychology life span paradigm and applying the concept ofexperience structuring and restructuring by Maria Tyszkowa (1988), as well as the psychosocialdevelopment theory by Eric Erikson (1997). The most important war and post-war experienceswere listed and defined with reference to the narratives analysed and subsequently each expe-rience was evaluated in cognitive, emotional and evaluational terms according to the theory ofM. Tyszkowa. The criteria listed above showed to what extent the war and post-war experiencesof the female soldiers enriched them in cognitive terms, what was their emotional impact andhow they can be evaluated as useful in terms of values that are of greatest importance for thesewomen. The analysis allowed to compare the war and post-war experiences and to find which ofthem and to what extent influenced the developmental changes taking place in the course of theirlife. It was concluded that the experience of being a soldier had greater impact on these changesthan finding the path in the post-war reality. The impact of the war experiences was very strong,it extended their self-knowledge and influenced the way in which these female soldiers perceivedthe world. It speeded up significantly their process of growing-up and becoming mature. Thepost-war experiences of these women, such as the criticism for being soldiers or excluding themfrom the celebrations of the Red Army’s victory, had a destructive impact on their developmentand resulted in feeling guilty for being forced to kill during the war. Social rejection was a factorthat hindered these women in successfully overcoming their developmental crises. They showedcourage and bravery during the war, but in the post-war reality became insecure, withdrawn andlacked confidence, as they lost their sense of agency.

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