The Dnipropetrovsk “Vsesvitnyks” of the Later Soviet Time in the Memoirs of Serhii Plohii

Abstract

The development of national historical science attracts the attention of modern researchers as the study of “roots” allows to understand the current state of affairs in historical science. The study of individual corporations of historians in the areas of their research gives the opportunity to trace the internal state of things in national and world historical science. These studies can be carried due to the involvement and synthesis of a wide range of sources. The study of the corporation of Ukrainian Soviet historians opens additional perspectives to the researcher in expanding the source base. Namely, to promote the creation of new sources - memories. This publication presents the memoirs of the workshop of Dnipropetrovsk vsesvitnyks of the Ukrainian-American historian Serhii Plohii. In the Dnipropetrovsk period of life, the historian was part of it and headed it for some time. Memoirs that are introduced to the scientific circulation are written by the author from several perspectives: the student and the employee, and the third, the autobiographical, which goes through these two perspectives. Serhii Plokhii explains, from the perspective of the student, why he had chosen the department of world history to specialize in, characterizes the relations with his research supervisor Yuriy Mytsyk, and defines how his scientific carrier was influenced by Yakiv Rubin, the head of the department of world history in 1940-1950s. S. Plokhii characterizes the lecturers of the department, particularly the professor Vasyl` Syrotenko. From the perspective of the colleague, Plokhii describes the relations within the scientific community of the department, especially between different generations of lecturers. He characterizes his scientific interests and experience of being lecturer and administrator. Plokhii describes how the new research trend of the department of world history – history of the German Diaspora – emerged, and speaks about the start of PhD research in this field. Plokhii also defined the reasons why he had to abandon the Dnipropetrovsk University and started the academic career abroad.