The kitchen maid as revolutionary symbol: Paid domestic labour and the emancipation of soviet women, 1917-1941

Abstract

This chapter examines the functions, meanings and experiences of paid domestic labour in the Soviet Union within the larger framework of the Bolshevik project of women’s emancipation and its evolution between 1917 and 1941. It argues that domestic service as a social practice could legitimately function in the Soviet Union because communist ideology was built around the image of a kitchen maid that would rule the state-an image that promised empowerment and self-transformation for citizens of the lower classes as well as for women. The chapter also suggests that the spectrum of models of Soviet womanhood was a sign of an intensified conflict between the emancipatory thrust of the revolution and the traditional view on gender roles in the Soviet Union.