engleski

Female Materiality of Socialism in Yugoslavia.Case Study of “Borovo” Vukovar

Unlike Andrey Platonov’s (Happy) Moscow Chestnova, the ‘builder of socialism’ in the focus of this paper is neither famous nor engaged in metaphysics of new socialist order /world. She is ordinary industrial worker in one of the biggest Yugoslav rubber and footwear factory Borovo. Her primary concerns are work, family and house and then, and if possible, the social and political work. Albeit in the late socialist period she would become the main protagonist. Namely during the strike in 1988 Borovo workers broke into the Central Assembly Hall which was a precedent since no one had ever entered the ‘holy ground” of the Federal Government of SFRY in that manner before. As such she - the female industrial worker of Borovo (along with her male co-workers) will become the subject of scholarly investigation in the discourse on the rise of nationalism and dissolution of SFRY and thus enter the public space. Focused on the female industrial worker, this paper also examines the materiality of her work namely the consumer goods produced in Borovo. Borovo (previously Bat’a) situated in Vukovar, Croatia was founded in 1931 and is still operating in smaller scale. In the interwar as well in the socialist era it was a synonym for footwear, especially work, leisure and free time footwear. Today, Borovo’s Startas and Borosana are the favorite brands particularly among young people. One of the scopes of this paper is therefore to discuss materiality of mass consumption and industrial production in socialist era and the afterlife of socialist commodities in contemporaneity.

female industrial worker, Borovo, female materiality, female commodities

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