Local ethnographers criticize attempts to return Stalin's image to Volgograd

The Volgograd initiatives to restore the image of Joseph Stalin serve to promote a certain policy, but fail to find mass support in the society, the local ethnographers interviewed by the "Caucasian Knot" have pointed out.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that Volgograd authorities had offered to return the profile of Joseph Stalin to the facade of the building of the Volgograd Medical University located in the Square of Fallen Warriors, and to the facade of the Volgograd planetarium.

Valery Kotelnikov, the Chairman of the Council of the Regional Branch of the All-Russian Society for the Preservation of Historical and Cultural Monuments, treats the above initiatives as "highly politicized." He said that he was against the renaming of Volgograd (back to Stalingrad), calling this idea "a political stirring of public opinion by certain individuals."

Roman Shkoda, a local ethnographer-urbanist, also believes that the initiatives to restore the image of Stalin in Volgograd are politically motivated. "Sometimes the name of the city is treated as an object of sale and advertising, which is unacceptable," he has stated.

Victor Kogan-Yasny, a political analyst, has called the return of Stalin's images in Volgograd "a manifestation of the dense ignorant settings of a part of the society and views of a significant part of the bureaucracy." However, he has added that the population of the Volgograd Region is generally not supporting such initiatives.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on September 2, 2022 at 11:50 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.