Constructing (post)Memory of Traumatic Past: Teenager’s Ideas about the Era of Political Repression of the 1930-1950

Abstract

The Museum of Yekaterinburg History, with the support of the Presidential Grants Fund, launched an educational project “You Can’t Keep Silence: Practices in Memory of the Era of Political Repression” in 2019. It aimed at finding ways to form a balanced perception of the topic of political repression among contemporary schoolchildren and first-year students (14-19 years old).

The idea of the authors of the project was to find ways to translate dry numbers and facts of documents into a “human” dimension, to emotionally involve the participants and encourage them not only to learn more about the topic, but also to feel it, to shift the perception of the topic from detached to “personal” and “not indifferent”.

The organizers asked participants to go through a number of stages to achieve this result. The measurement of the effectiveness of the selected memorization practices and general work on the project was carried out using a specially designed monitoring program. It included filling out “entry” and “exit” questionnaires at the beginning and at the end of the project, as well as questionnaires and short group interviews after participating in an immersive performance and acquaintance with the real archival investigation.

The results of the project allows us to assert that the work of adolescents in the project contributed to a deeper assimilation of humanistic values. This led to a rethinking of the relationship between the state, power and citizen, the strengthening of the separation of the state and power and the formation of reflective patriotism as the most important conditions for successful work with the traumatic, uncomfortable past of our country.