Women and the Family Under Khrushchev

Question 1

What was re-emphasised in the years following Stalin’s death?

Answer 1

Women’s rights

Question 2

Khrushchev focused on women’s rights. In what context?

Answer 2

In the context of traditional families

Khrushchev wanted women to continue to perform their traditional roles as wives and mothers - but he wanted to make these roles easier

Question 3

How did the status of women change/transform under Khrushchev?

Answer 3

There were more workforce opportunities for women

Question 4

How did the status of women not change/transform under Khrushchev?

Answer 4

The double burden: 49 per cent of women in workforce whilst having to maintain family responsibilities

Question 5

When was abortion re-legalised?

Answer 5

1955

Question 6

When was state paid maternity leave increased?

Answer 6

1956

Question 7

How much did state paid maternity leave increase from?

Answer 7

77 days to 112 days

Question 8

What did the Sixth Five-Year Plan (1956) state in relation to women workers?

Answer 8

It contained a commitment to “improve in every way the working and living conditions of women workers”

Question 9

What were some of the national women’s magazines that were created by 1956?

Answer 9

• Women Worker
• Peasant Woman
• Women of the World
• Soviet Woman

Question 10

Where was education widely available for women?

Answer 10

In cities

Question 11

Education was widely available to women in cities. Provide evidence to support this claim.

Answer 11

By the 1960s women made up half of the Soviet Union’s graduates

Question 12

By 1960 what per cent of the workforce were women?

Answer 12

49 per cent

Question 13

Who was the first women in space? When?

Answer 13

Valentina Tereshkova (1963)

Question 14

What is the Soviet propaganda poster featuring women called?

Answer 14

The Motherland is Calling (1967)

Question 15

How did the Motherland is Calling present women?

Answer 15

It presented women as the symbol of the Russian nation and celebrated the vital work of women during the war

Question 16

What were the Virgin Lands schemes?

Answer 16

Khrushchev’s plan to boost the Soviet Union’s agricultural production in order to alleviate the food shortages plaguing the Soviet populace

Question 17

Why were women specifically targeted in the Virgin Lands Campaign?

Answer 17

To recruit volunteers to work in the Virgin Lands. They believed young women would entice men to move to the Virgin Lands

Question 18

What were women required to do in the Virgin Lands?

Answer 18

Act as milkmaids, gardeners and to start families

Question 19

Virgin Lands Campaign slogans

Answer 19

“Your caring hands are needed everywhere”
“Join us, girls, in the Virgin Lands”

Question 20

Who was turned down for the Virgin Lands Campaign?

Answer 20

Single women over the age of 26 were turned down for the scheme, as were single mothers

Question 21

What were female farm workers in the Virgin Lands often subjected to?

Answer 21

Sexual abuse and rape

Question 22

What did the Seven-Year Plan aim to eliminate?

Answer 22

The double burden

Question 23

How did the Seven-Year Plan aim to eliminate the double burden?

Answer 23

Through introducing convenience foods and mass-produced clothing - ending the need for women to cook and sew

Question 24

Problems remained in spite of the changes Khrushchev introduced - outline these problems

Answer 24

• Contraception remained hard to acquire
• Letters to women-targeted magazines indicate that creches opened late and closed early so that women were still unable to work full days
• Some employers refused to recognise the new legal entitlements regarding maternity leave and maternity pay