Paper short abstract:

This paper explores how Russian dachas (summer cottages) are spaces of civic engagement that foster among Russian citizens the visceral, sensory expression and experience of political values such as freedom, democracy, choice, and resistance to the institutions and forces that structure their everyday lives.

Paper long abstract:

During the twentieth century, Russian dachas (i.e., summer cottages) and the natural settings in which they are located acquired value as spaces that enable and foster a strong civic life, most notably citizens' engagement with ideals of freedom and populist politics. It is in these rustic and natural settings where Russians claim to experience freedom, comfort, and choice in deeply sensual, visceral ways, and where they feel most capable of expressing their opinions and reorienting their bodily responses to the institutions and forces that otherwise structure and regulate their everyday lives. Russian cottagers (dachniki) contend that the place-world of the dacha encourages a fuller and healthier expression of behaviors and sensory responses than is possible in other realms, such as the confining and desensitizing spaces of cities, workplaces, or apartments. From claims about lowered blood pressure and more restful sleep to affirmations of heightened sensory awareness of time, plants, sociality, and political critique, Russians assert that a multi-dimensional, more authentically physiological human existence is best accessed at their dachas in the countryside. This paper takes up these themes by examining how Russian dachniki feel both "at home" and politically engaged in the countryside. By drawing on research among Russian dachniki, I investigate the processes of "interanimation" that exist at the dacha to understand how Russians' visceral, sensory experiences of political engagement are shaped by, and in turn shape, the natural settings in which they are situated.