Local identity and historical memory: comparative research of applied cases in small towns of Leningrad region

Abstract

The article delves into material gathered as part of applied research for urban planning. The sample includes 7 small towns in the Leningrad region: border towns (Ivangorod and Svetogorsk), a satellite town of St. Petersburg (Kommunar of Gatchina district), and towns of Ladoga Lake and the river Svir’ (Novaya Ladoga, Volkhov, Syasstroy, and Podporozhye). Through necessarily brief fieldwork and specialized open-ended questions in questionnaires aimed at filling gaps in field data short due to lockdown 2020, the following aspects were identified: themes of local history present in the current discourse of residents, personalities known to the townsfolk, semantic clusters of local identity for internal use and for external representation, mental map of local objects important for representation of the town. The meta-analysis uncovered that for the examined towns, the preservation of specific historical narratives is tied to two main factors — the incorporation of these narratives into the core of urban identity and their manifestation in the physical environment (in objects and toponyms). Historical memory correlates with the length of time families have lived in the city: the later the last mass influx of new residents occurred, the less widespread and varied historical narratives are. The preservation of historical memory demonstrates an inverse correlation with the demographic prosperity of the city: population growth, in the cases examined, is only observable in satellite towns and only due to migration, which further “washes out” local narratives. The most common and important of the latest for the residents of these towns were stories about the Second World War; tales of the industrial glory of the early Soviet Union; lamentations over the “lost paradise” of the Soviet era and the “ruin” that followed it; residents’ reflection on the urban status of their settlement.