Process Paper
In the fall of 2012, my brother first stepped foot into Ukraine, marking the beginning of his gap year, and a new chapter of his life. His crackling voice over the telephone recounted a series of adventures… he would speak of babushkas, old buildings and prints… he would tell of the present Russian influence in Ukraine. Upon his return, he even brought back a propaganda poster from the time of Stalin. When the time came for History Fair, I struggled to find the perfect topic. I then realized the answer had been hanging in my brother’s bedroom wall all along - I chose to focus on Stalin’s use of propaganda in the Soviet Union as my research topic.
First traveling to my school library to use the available databases, I was able to build a basic understanding of my topic and its context. It was then I decided that I needed to narrow down my research focus, so I began looking for books that strictly spoke of propaganda during the time of Stalin. I used countless search engines to find a number of valuable websites. Throughout all stages of research, I made sure to site and annotate sources right after using them in order to prevent a future of scrambling-to-look-through-every-image-used-and-citing-it-the-night-before. After researching the Soviet Union during Stalin, I began to wonder if and how Russian propaganda had evolved today under Putin. I then emailed Dr. Boris Burke, head of the Modern Russia organization, who directed me to several links that would help me better grasp the long-term impact of the Stalin’s Soviet Union and its influences today.
It wasn’t hard to chose website as my form of presentation - I needed a presentation category that allowed for range of media so the viewer would grasp how propaganda spanned across not just images, but music, newspapers, food, and everyday life…websites were the presentation category that best allowed me to express this. To create my website, first I took the notes I had taken and condensed them chronologically into a document. I found the key points I was trying to convey, and after crazed cycles of editing, I finally finished, creating the content of my website. I then began to focus on multimedia options to increase the engagement between the viewer and project.
My topic “Rights and Responsibilities: the Story of Stalin’s Soviet Union and the Tool of Propaganda” directly correlates to the National History Day theme of Rights and Responsibilities. The government of the Soviet Union believed it had the responsibility to ensure a Communist Utopia, but that goal ignored the basic rights of its citizens, such as a free press. Using propaganda as a tool, the government controlled the minds of its people, leaving little room for individual freedoms. The example of Stalin’s’ Soviet Union shows a world where the rights and responsibilities are completely off balance- the responsibility of the government to ensure a fully communist society outweighed individual rights of the people.
First traveling to my school library to use the available databases, I was able to build a basic understanding of my topic and its context. It was then I decided that I needed to narrow down my research focus, so I began looking for books that strictly spoke of propaganda during the time of Stalin. I used countless search engines to find a number of valuable websites. Throughout all stages of research, I made sure to site and annotate sources right after using them in order to prevent a future of scrambling-to-look-through-every-image-used-and-citing-it-the-night-before. After researching the Soviet Union during Stalin, I began to wonder if and how Russian propaganda had evolved today under Putin. I then emailed Dr. Boris Burke, head of the Modern Russia organization, who directed me to several links that would help me better grasp the long-term impact of the Stalin’s Soviet Union and its influences today.
It wasn’t hard to chose website as my form of presentation - I needed a presentation category that allowed for range of media so the viewer would grasp how propaganda spanned across not just images, but music, newspapers, food, and everyday life…websites were the presentation category that best allowed me to express this. To create my website, first I took the notes I had taken and condensed them chronologically into a document. I found the key points I was trying to convey, and after crazed cycles of editing, I finally finished, creating the content of my website. I then began to focus on multimedia options to increase the engagement between the viewer and project.
My topic “Rights and Responsibilities: the Story of Stalin’s Soviet Union and the Tool of Propaganda” directly correlates to the National History Day theme of Rights and Responsibilities. The government of the Soviet Union believed it had the responsibility to ensure a Communist Utopia, but that goal ignored the basic rights of its citizens, such as a free press. Using propaganda as a tool, the government controlled the minds of its people, leaving little room for individual freedoms. The example of Stalin’s’ Soviet Union shows a world where the rights and responsibilities are completely off balance- the responsibility of the government to ensure a fully communist society outweighed individual rights of the people.