Vynnytska, I. (Ed.). (2013). Nezvychaini doli zvychainyh zhinok. Usna istoriia XX stolittia [Extraordinary lives of ordinary women: An oral history of the twentieth century] (Biblioteka “Ukrainy Modernoi,” seriia “Shchodennyky, spohady, interviu,” chyslo 1). Vydavnytstvo Lvivskoi politekhniky.
Annotation: This volume presents twenty-one interviews with women from different regions of Ukraine, who share their personal recollections of life across the twentieth century. The volume includes supplementary materials: an annotated summary of each interview, brief biographical notes on the narrators, a glossary of rarely used words, and a name index. A particular strength of the collection is the accompanying disc with audio recordings of the published interviews. The preface was written by Yaroslav Hrytsak.
These women’s reminiscences will serve as a valuable source for historians, anthropologists, sociologists, linguists, and all those interested in the human dimensions of Ukraine’s recent past.
The volume is the outcome of a long-term collaborative project initiated by the Ukrainian Canadian Research and Documentation Centre in Toronto, Canada, and subsequently supported by the Institute of Historical Research at Franko University of Lviv. Publication was made possible with the support of the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada.
The book launch took place on September 14, 2013, as part of the 20th Publishers’ Forum in Lviv.
One of the memoirs published in the volume is available to read on the Ukraina Moderna website.
Oksana Kis’s review of the collection, “The History of Ukraine in the Mirror of Women’s Lives,” is also available: