The Russian Revolution and Animal Farm



PBS People’s Century: The Red Flag Series

Communism Under Lenin and Stalin



BEFORE YOU WATCH:

1. Define socialism and communism in your own words:

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2. Are the terms interchangeable? What are the goals of each? What images do you associate with each?

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|Tatiana Fedorova | |

|(laborer, Russia) | |

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|"Remember, this is a country where people were | |

|illiterate, lived in virtual darkness, wore | |

|birch-bark shoes. Even now, I think it's | |

|[achievements under Stalin] like something out of a | |

|fairy tale." | |

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3. What does Tatiana Fedorova's quotation imply about how citizens were affected by communism? Why might the Russian people have supported a Communist Revolution?

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WHILE YOU WATCH:

1. What were working conditions in Russia like with Tsar Nicholas II as a leader?

2. Who replaced Tsar Nicholas II? What party did he represent?

3. Lenin pledged that "the oppressed masses will ______________________ form the government."

4. How did Soviet leaders change the story of the Bolshevik attack on the Tsar's Winter Palace? How did the changes reflect the Soviet leaders' goals?

5. Give examples of how the stories of other historical events and figures have been changed. What is gained or lost by such revisions?

6. How did the establishment of a Communist government impact the people?

7. How did each of the four speakers help build communism in the Soviet Union? How did their actions reflect the values of socialism and the goals of Soviet leaders?

Mikhail Mindlin

Anastasia Denisova

Ella Shistyer

Tatiana Fedorova

8. Based on the speakers' stories, how would you describe the mood of the period? How did propaganda posters, slogans, and events promote that mood?

9. Who was Lenin’s successor? How was his rule different from Lenin’s agenda?

10. Describe the difficulties the Soviet people faced under Stalin’s rule.

11. How did Stalin control and treat the Soviet people? How did he eventually treat his supporters?

12. How does the mood in the second segment compare to the mood in the first segment?

13. What were the speakers' responses to Stalin's policies and actions? Whose stories did you find most powerful and why?

14. Why was it easy for Boris Yefimov to believe Nicholai Bukharin's confession? Why was it difficult for Ella Shistyer to question Stalin's actions? How did their perceptions reflect what Stalin represented for them?

15. How many people were executed under Stalin’s control? How many were sent to prison camps?

16. Do you think the Communist Revolution fulfilled the hopes of its supporters? Explain.

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Examine American society from a communist perspective.

"I became a communist . . . because of what I saw around me here in the United States of America. There was misery, there were children going to bed hungry, there was poverty, and there was no reason for it. We were the richest country in the world." - Charlie Nusser

List solutions communists might propose to end poverty, hunger, and homelessness in the United States today, and the negative and positive consequences of those solutions.

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