The changing mentality of Siberians on the eve of the revolution. Review: Lityagina A.V. The mentality of the townspeople of Western Siberia in the second half of the 19th – early 20th centuries: monograph. Biysk: AGGPU named V.M. Shukshin, 2024. 252 p.

Everyday life of the provincial cities of pre-revolutionary Russia is interesting from the point of view of the microhistorical analysis of the socio-cultural processes that took place at that time. The publication is dedicated to the recently published monograph by Biysk historian A.V. Lityagina “The mentality of the townspeople of Western Siberia in the second half of the 19th - early 20th centuries.” The book by the historian Alla Lityagina is devoted to the mentality of the townspeople of Western Siberia in the second half of the 19th - early 20th centuries. The territory taken for research in the late 19th - early 20th centuries is a zone of special social border conditions that reveal the importance of the region within Russia. The development of Siberia by the Russian Empire with elements of colonization entered its final phase. During this period, there was a transformation of the mentality of local residents and, mainly, city dwellers. The development of this region led to the meeting of traditional and modernization flows, their mutual influence and mutual penetration. When studying mentality in the historical aspect, it is most difficult to outline the range of problems under consideration. A.V. Lityagina, well aware of this, limits her study to the consideration of the traditional components of mentality associated with class and religion, the professionalization of consciousness and its further secularization. The author, relying on a wide range of sources (reference and statistical materials, police reports and church registers, records management of public organizations, diaries and memoirs), conducts a scrupulous analysis of changes in class consciousness. A.V. Lityagina's conclusions about the preservation of the communal way of life corresponding to the type of traditional society are consistent with the opinion of other historians. At the same time, she did not escape the new personal qualities that appeared among the philistines: individualism, pragmatism, rationality. The review describes the structure and content of the monograph, analyzes the work done, the sources used, methodology and research techniques. Some inaccuracies and omissions are noted, and a number of conclusions are criticized. The conclusion is substantiated that this monograph significantly fills the gaps in knowledge about the mentality of the Siberians of the period taken for study. The author declares no conflicts of interests.

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