Abstract

Based on a series of interviews with 38 British and Dutch cradle communists who participated in an oral history project about communist family life, this chapter explores communist home life and focuses on participants’ political and cultural upbringing. It shows the more practical ways in which family time was structured, before discussing parental prescriptions and aspirations. What kind of parents did Communist Party members want to be and were they inspired by Soviet ideology? Were their aspirations fundamentally different from those of non-communist working-class parents? Searching for answers to these questions, this chapter maps the theory and practice of a communist upbringing and examines the considerable contrast between the two. It specifically looks at gender roles, sexuality, pedagogical values, and morality.

Keywords: Dutch communist children, British communist children, Cold War, parental aspirations, Soviet pedagogy

My mother always read a [mainstream] women's magazine, something like Libelle or Margriet. My sister had a subscription to Donald Duck [weekly Disney comic]. We read absolutely everything and I would go to the library on a regular basis. We were also subscribed to Pegagus books [books published by the communist publishing house Pegasus]. I remember that my mum and dad had the book A Communist Upbringing, which I really wanted to read. I didn't understand a word! My parents probably got the book as part of a series, because I don't think they were especially interested in a communist upbringing (Anna b. 1945, Rotterdam).

I was a Brownie, a girl guide, for a while, which was quite an experience. I would call it a very deep contradiction. My brother and I were encouraged to do all the things kids do. I had horse riding lessons, went ice skating, and had swimming lessons. My parents wanted us to make friends with all the people locally and invite them over for tea. But at the same time, there was this contradictory view that what they [these friends] thought was rubbish. This was the most powerful thing I grew up with, a schizo approach to life really (Lucy b. 1949, London).