“Red neckties”: a pioneer movement in the everyday life of Soviet children of the 1920s and early 1930s (on materials of Kurgan and Shadrinsk districts)

The purpose of the submitted article is to trace the correlation of the ideas about the pioneers created by the Soviet authorities and the real children who joined the children's communist movement; to assess the place of pioneer in the children's everyday life of Soviet Russia in the 1920s and early 1930s and its role in creating a new Soviet person. For achievement of a goal the solution of the following tasks is provided: taking into account the importance attached by the authorities and the Communist Party to the pioneer movement, to analyze the attitude of children and adults towards it; to determine the tasks assigned to the pioneers and the methods for their solution, proposed by counselors and teachers and actually applied by children; to reveal the peculiarities of children's self-awareness as pioneers on the basis of oral sources and archival documents; to trace the influence of anti-religious outreach and communist education on the views of children and their parents; to note the problems faced by leaders and members of the pioneer squads, as well as the difficulties and benefits resulting from the pioneer status. The author of the article was guided by the principles of historicism and scientific objectivity and used descriptive, historical and comparative, historical and system and hermeneutical methods. Documents of funds of Kurgan and Shadrinsk district and city committees of the Young Communist League of the RSFSR and the Communist Party, district and city bureaus of Young Pioneers, deposited in the State Archive of Public Political Documentation of the Kurgan Region, educational institutions from the State archive of the Kurgan region and memories of the pioneers of 1920-1930-ies, recorded by the author with the words of respondents, became a research base. During the conducted research the author has come to the following conclusions: the pioneer movement played an important role in the everyday life of the Soviet child, however, despite the establishment of power, most children, especially at an early age, did not perceive it as a political component. They were attracted by the opportunity to feel themselves independent and necessary, as well as bright attributes, collectivity, attention and respect from teachers and other important adults, the prospects for a successful future. Nevertheless, in the 1920s and early 1930s, the pioneers were active participants in state cultural construction, even if they themselves did not fully understand the political aspect of their actions and perceived them as a game. Pioneer influenced all the components of children's life, forcing to rethink relations with parents and peers, their behavior, everyday conditions, dreams of the future. Almost every child was put in a condition of a choice between two systems of values - pioneer and offered in the family. In our opinion, the future of the communist regime and the country as a whole depended on the mass result of this choice.

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