The babushka, a Russian term for “grandmother” but also informally applied to any elderly woman, has held a special cultural value in Russia throughout history. However, there has been little research on the subject so far, and hardly any drawing on narratives of grandmothers themselves. My study fills this gap with an initial, exploratory ethnographic journey into the lives of contemporary grandmothers, drawing on multi-sited fieldwork in Russian Karelia and Finland. My primary objective is to analyze the personal histories of mobility, experiences and self-understandings of grandmothers of different ages and ethno-cultural backgrounds (Karelian, Ingrian Finnish, Russian) as well as their roles in family-making in the midst of postsocialist changes in Russian Karelia and increasingly transnational lives in Finland.
The research shows that the babushka has retained her importance both in child care and family-making in both Russian Karelia and the transnational context between Finland and Russia, though with some changes. While the babushka remains vital in family care in Russian Karelia, many means such as telecommunication technologies, frequent visits, narration of family histories, and religion and magic are applied to maintain grandmothering and transnational families across national borders. Alongside grandmothering, work and active participation in public life, once nourished by the Soviet gender culture, hold great prominence in women’s current lives, particularly in Finland with its culture of associations and free-time activity. While the roles and understandings of the babushka often revolve around the values of Russian and Soviet family culture, grandmothers’ varying ethno-cultural backgrounds, histories of mobility and unique life trajectories define the differences in their transnational subjectivities and grandmothering messages. For instance, women with an Ingrian background now living in Finland often recollect their Finnish Ingrian identity, in which their memories of evacuation to Finland during World War II or deportation to Siberia are re-activated to meet the life projects of today.
The dissertation analyzes these findings to suggest that the way family is talked of, imagined and maintained by most grandmothers in the study exceeds the boundaries of state borders as well as the nuclear family, encompassing relatives “here” and “there”, those alive and even those who passed away. The findings illustrate that both Soviet experiences and multiple senses of contemporary belonging fold into transnational subjectivities of grandmothers. The negotiation of transnational subjectivities is a complex process in which the past and the present - as experienced
The babushka, a Russian term for “grandmother” but also informally applied to any elderly woman, has held a special cultural value in Russia throughout history. However, there has been little research on the subject so far, and hardly any drawing on narratives of grandmothers themselves. My study fills this gap with an initial, exploratory ethnographic journey into the lives of contemporary grandmothers, drawing on multi-sited fieldwork in Russian Karelia and Finland. My primary objective is to analyze the personal histories of mobility, experiences and self-understandings of grandmothers of different ages and ethno-cultural backgrounds (Karelian, Ingrian Finnish, Russian) as well as their roles in family-making in the midst of postsocialist changes in Russian Karelia and increasingly transnational lives in Finland.
The research shows that the babushka has retained her importance both in child care and family-making in both Russian Karelia and the transnational context between Finland and Russia, though with some changes. While the babushka remains vital in family care in Russian Karelia, many means such as telecommunication technologies, frequent visits, narration of family histories, and religion and magic are applied to maintain grandmothering and transnational families across national borders. Alongside grandmothering, work and active participation in public life, once nourished by the Soviet gender culture, hold great prominence in women’s current lives, particularly in Finland with its culture of associations and free-time activity. While the roles and understandings of the babushka often revolve around the values of Russian and Soviet family culture, grandmothers’ varying ethno-cultural backgrounds, histories of mobility and unique life trajectories define the differences in their transnational subjectivities and grandmothering messages. For instance, women with an Ingrian background now living in Finland often recollect their Finnish Ingrian identity, in which their memories of evacuation to Finland during World War II or deportation to Siberia are re-activated to meet the life projects of today.
The dissertation analyzes these findings to suggest that the way family is talked of, imagined and maintained by most grandmothers in the study exceeds the boundaries of state borders as well as the nuclear family, encompassing relatives “here” and “there”, those alive and even those who passed away. The findings illustrate that both Soviet experiences and multiple senses of contemporary belonging fold into transnational subjectivities of grandmothers. The negotiation of transnational subjectivities is a complex process in which the past and the present - as experienced
