A Cultural History of the Russian Home

FAIN: HR-50279-06

Rebecca Friedman
Florida International University Board of Trustees (Miami, FL 33199-2516)

Over the past decade or so, there has been an explosion of scholarly interest in the intimate sphere of life in Russian history. This scholarship on the private realm not only reflects a borrowing of frameworks from the West, but also allows for, and indeed forces, an interrogation of these very frameworks. "Domestic Interiors" fits squarely in this new body of scholarship. This book will explore the physical realities and the ideological imaginings of the interior space of the Russian home from the second half of the nineteenth century through the first third of the twentieth. In doing so, this project will highlight how Russia’s struggle toward modernity was manifest in changing notions about the domestic hearth.