THERUSSIAN-SPEAKING HOMEAND MIGRATION

Habitation is the intersection of spatial and material, storage of memory, continuation of personal space, realisation of oneself in culture, relation of private and public, epoch and individuality, financial possibilities and aesthetic principles. Recently, linguists and anthropologists have become more and more engaged in understanding the importance of the house in the construction of discourse. Folklore tradition assumes strict continuity in the maintenance of the house, passed down from generation to generation and associated with the mythological reading of small and large spaces (Adon’eva 2011). As a stronghold of the family, as protection and as place of self-reflection, the home becomes an anthropological centre for the formation and maintenance of identity (Dushakova 2005). The idea of the house as a starting point of existence, continuity, and spiritual and physical strength grows in the language consciousness through a variety of associations and phraseological units (Fedorova 2016). Each nation has its own persistent stereotypes about the significance of the house, its parts and its furnish-ings (Filippova and Archakova 2013). Despite many real losses, people constantly re-examine and reimagine things that they have ceased to own (Gramatchikova 2018).

In Soviet times, the boundaries between the external and internal world of housing became blurred, traditional values were destroyed, symbols of housebuilding changed, and a new housing culture was formed, which, in turn, broke down during the transition from a disciplinary society to a society of achievements, where less attention was paid to the home and more to work (Kim Joon Seok 2018). In the aftermath of the Soviet Union, different generations formed diverse cultures of living, from refurbished old apartments in city centres to cheap dwellings in the suburbs, from giant mansions in the countryside to small family dachas or village izbas (log houses) inherited from grandparents. Different waves of Russian speakers have moved abroad with their own ideals of a proper or decent lifestyle. In general, in the philosophy of culture of the twentieth century, the idea of home appears as a place of peace and tranquillity, protection and reliability; however, in parallel, thoughts about permanent or temporary homelessness or about the entire universe as a home are actively discussed (Rymarovich 2013).

In traditional Russian culture, as in many others, the space of the house symbolically reflected the structure of the world; the home was a living being and the embodiment of the universe (Baiburin 1983; Boal 2000).