THE SOVIET FEMALE WORKER AS AN OBJECT OF LEISURE POLICY IN THE 1920s

Abstract

The politicization of leisure was one of the components of agitation, propaganda, cultural and educational work, actively implemented by government in the early Soviet period. Among the objects of leisure policy, the work with which close attention was paid, it is possible to point out female workers. This led both to the imposition and artificial integration of a number of leisure practices into their lives, and to the real consideration of requests. The model of the new Soviet woman being created was in many ways similar to what could be observed in Western countries — athletic, strong, educated, energetic and far from prejudice. There were similar tendencies towards the masculinization of leisure, a clear evidence of which was the spread of physical culture and sports, including their paramilitary forms. The main difference was the active limitation of the women’s freedom degree, which did not allow them to realize their right to leisure. Paternalism in leisure policy led to the struggle with those types of it that were considered “bourgeois” or decadent, although they were an integral and very important component of female independence. It is also need to mention the modest financial capabilities of most women and the limitations of the leisure industry, when the charming aesthetics of wealth and pleasure were forced to remain only a picture from a foreign film.