Mikrohistoria i tożsamość lokalna wobec dyskursu wielkiej historii (Guzel Jachina – Dzieci Wołgi)
Microhistory and Local Identity in the Face of Big History Discourse (Guzel Jachina – Children of the Volga)

Summary/Abstract: This article focuses on Guzel Jakhina’s novel Children of the Volga. Based on literary fiction, historical knowledge and the experience of her own biography, Jakhina presents a microhistory embedded in the history of an imperial and totalitarian state. Reflections on local identity are linked to Volga Germany. The novel’s action, spanning the years 1916-1948, shows the fate of a small nation, its folklore, tradition and religion. Soviet Germans experience the tragedy of the First World War, the October Revolution, the Great Terror and, finally, the Second World War. The writer presented how, along the Volga, collectivisation, depopulation and the forced creation of kolkhozes took place. Much space was devoted to the causes and results of the Great Famine in the Volga. The article’s final conclusions emphasise the importance of writing about small ethos in a period of globalisation and large-scale population migrations.

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