Midwives of the Revolution
Female Bolsheviks and women workers in 1917
McDermid, Jane & Hillyar, Anna
Publisher: Ohio University Press
Year Published: 1999
ISBN: 0-8214-1290-6
Dewey: 947.084'1
Resource Type: Book
Cx Number: CX25289
Midwives of the Revolution examines the powerful contribution made by women to the overthrow of Tsarism in 1917 and their importance in the formative years of communism in Russia.
Abstract:
The Bolshevik seizure of power in 1917 and the ensuing communist regime has often been portrayed as a man's revolution, with women as bystanders, or even victims. Midwives of the Revolution examines the powerful contribution made by women to the overthrow of Tsarism in 1917 and their importance in the formative years of communism in Russia.
Focusing on the masses as well as the high-ranking intelligentsia, Midwives of the Revolution is the first sustained analysis of female involvement in the revolutionary era of Russian history. The authors investigate the role of Bolshevik women and the various forms their participation took. By drawing on the experiences of representative individuals, the authors discuss the important relationship between Bolshevik women and the workers in the momentous months of 1917.
Midwives of the Revolution demonstrates that what are too often categorized, and dismissed, as women's domestic concerns can be issues of political importance in certain circumstances. Few women in 1917 challenged the traditional female role, but they nevertheless asserted women's rights politically. This book wil be valuable to students and teachers of women's history, gender history and politics.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Preface
1. Introduction
2. The woman question before 1917: what was to be done?
3. The making of a female revolutionary
4. The lives of working women on the eve of the First World War
5. From World War to the eve of Revolution
6. Women and the 1917 Revolution in Petrograd
7. Conclusion
Notes
Select Bibliography
Index
Subject Headings
