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    Dying Unneeded

    The Cultural Context of the Russian Mortality Crisis

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    Author(s)
    Parsons, Michelle A.
    Collection
    Knowledge Unlatched (KU)
    Language
    English
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    Abstract
    In the early 1990s, Russia experienced one of the most extreme increases in mortality in modern history. Men's life expectancy dropped by six years; women's life expectancy dropped by three. Middle-aged men living in Moscow were particularly at risk of dying early deaths. While the early 1990s represent the apex of mortality, the crisis continues. Drawing on fieldwork in the capital city during 2006 and 2007, this account brings ethnography to bear on a topic that has until recently been the province of epidemiology and demography.<br><br>Middle-aged Muscovites talk about being unneeded (<em>ne nuzhny</em>), or having little to give others. Considering this concept of "being unneeded" reveals how political economic transformation undermined the logic of social relations whereby individuals used their position within the Soviet state to give things to other people. Being unneeded is also gendered—while women are still needed by their families, men are often unneeded by state or family. Western literature on the mortality crisis focuses on a lack of social capital, often assuming that what individuals receive is most important, but being needed is more about what individuals give. Social connections—and their influence on health—are culturally specific.<br><br>In Soviet times, needed people helped friends and acquaintances push against the limits of the state, crafting a sense of space and freedom. When the state collapsed, this sense of bounded freedom was compromised, and another freedom became deadly.
    URI
    https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/46330
    Keywords
    Social Science; LGBTQ+ Studies; Gay Studies; Social Science; Gender Studies
    ISBN
    9780826519740
    Publisher
    Vanderbilt University Press
    Publisher website
    https://www.vanderbilt.edu/university-press/
    Publication date and place
    2014
    Imprint
    Vanderbilt University Press
    Classification
    LGBTQ+ Studies / topics
    Gender studies, gender groups
    Rights
    https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/legalcode
    • Harvested from KU

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    License

    • If not noted otherwise all contents are available under Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

    Credits

    • logo EU
    • This project received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 683680, 810640, 871069 and 964352.

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