The Influence of Religious Norms and Communal Traditions on the Social Image of the Soviet Family in the 1920s

Abstract

The article, based on archival and other documentary and sociological material, explores the influence of religious norms of life and communal traditions on the evolution of the Soviet family in the 1920s. A certain institutional stabilization of the family was the result of a turn of policies in support of traditional foundations, including the Church and communal norms of life. The attitudes of large groups of population towards these norms were ambiguous. Church's role was preserved in everyday life of the Soviet people: in baptisms, weddings, celebrating religious holidays, etc. The manifestations of the patriarchal forms of family were combined with new Soviet realities - the growth of women's employment, the emergence of new social institutions during the New Economic Policy (NEP). The period was thus the initial stage in the transformation of Russian classical patriarchal family into a Soviet patriarchal family.