From the Trauma of Stalinism to the Triumph of Stalingrad: The Toponymic Dispute Over Volgograd

Abstract

This chapter examines the Putin-era debates over the name of Volgograd/Stalingrad, the site of the historic Battle of Stalingrad. The case of the symbolic politics around the name of this city offers rich material for studying the dynamics of triumph and trauma in Russia. While the theme of Stalingrad continues to represent the core symbol of national triumph, it also inescapably refers to the most acute trauma of the state’s past: the Stalin era. The chapter shows how the debate over the name of Stalingrad reveals a twofold, and somewhat paradoxical, dynamic between the state’s bid for hegemony, on the one hand, and the inexorable pluralization of commemorations of the national past in today’s Russia, on the other.