Soviet witches and women heroes

[Lisa Mayr]

Dear SEELANGers,

I am presently working on my thesis, which deals with Soviet woman pilots in
the Stalin era. Particulary, I am focusing on three woman pioneers who set new
world records in long-distance flights at the end of the thirties - Polina
Denisova Osipenko, Valentina Stepanova Grizodubova and Marina Rashkova. In
1942 Rashkova set up the first three woman air defense regiments in the
Soviet Union. Osipenko and Rashkova were both announced Heroes of the USSR.

Recently there has been made an excellent documentary film, named "Night
witches" (a retranslation of the German title "Die Nachthexen") on this
subject. At the moment I am trying to get in touch with the two directors
Sissi Hueetlin and Elisabeth McKay. The film deals with WW II woman pilots
from a historical point of view.

The primary concern of my work is to show, how images of heroes are created
and which functions they serve in a (totalitarian) society. According to
Hans Guenther's definiton of the four basic models of Soviet heroes, "flying
heroes"  form a subgroup of the "culture hero". This model has a very long
tradition and (as far as I know)  was exclusively applied to men until the
20th century.

In my thesis, I want to find out about the variants on this model in
connection with the appearance of female flying heroes. Therefore, I will
have to examine
the "production" of particular myths in Soviet mass media.

In July I am going to Moscow for two months in order to search for primary
sources on my subject. I'd like to know, if there is anybody on that list
who works in this field or knows about relevant publications. I would be
grateful
for any kind of information. Particularly, I'd like to know, if there are
projects or university courses concerning my subject.

Regards,

Lisa Mayr

Institute of Slavic languages
University of Graz, Austria