BOYS' AND GIRLS' SOCIETIES AS A WAY OF SOCIALIZATION OF UKRAINIAN RURAL YOUTH (XIX – FIRST QUARTER OF XX CENTURY)
Authors:   Volodymyr Vynnychenko Central Ukrainian State Pedagogical University, Оkolnycha Tetiana , Bosyi Oleksandr ,   Volodymyr Vynnychenko Central Ukrainian State Pedagogical University
Published: May 2023

The article reveals the process of socialization of Ukrainian rural youth in boys` and girls` communities in the 19th and the first quarter of the 20th centuries. Youth communities are considered as associations that were organized on the basis of sex and age and acted on the basis of ethical and legal customs and norms of public life and consisted of boys and girls who had reached marriageable age or were about to reach it. It is emphasized that the category of rural youth of girls and boys of the 19th - the first quarter of the 20th century. was heterogeneous in its composition, since two subgroups were united within its borders - "male and female teenagers" (younger subgroup), who did not yet have the right to marry, and "maidens`" and "boyfriend`s" (the older group), who had already reached marriageable age. The publication highlights the peculiarities of the ritual change of social age status of boys and girls; changes in gender identity manifested in changes in clothing and hairstyle, socio-age terminology; initial procedures that ritually formalized the transition from one socio-age group to another and were evidence of the growth of the social status of young people in the hierarchical social-age system that existed in traditional society: recognition of the rights of young men and women to create a family, participation in family councils, under certain conditions - in village steps, etc. It was highlighted that the formation and activity of youth communities was based on the principles of customary law. Male and female communities had established internal organization, rules of conduct, rights, duties and occupations. It was revealed that youth communities performed a number of important pedagogical functions, in particular, their social and everyday orientation included the following main areas: regulating the relations of rural youth with the parish, the headman, and the landlord (the serfdom in this regard was a kind of executive body); establishment of normal life in the village, settlement of all conflicts that arose between boys and girls and between young people and other residents of the village; participation in the organization of celebrations in the village: church processions, celebration of the temple day and other traditional for the village holidays, etc. Youth communities also had certain labor duties before the village community. Youth communities were mediators between the family and the rural community, which ensured the integrity of the community and the continuity of the transfer of folk-pedagogical experience. Young women and girls acquired personal freedom, rights and status opportunities. The authors come to the conclusion that the existence of youth associations was particularly important from the point of view of the formation of a person as a full-fledged member of the peasant community in accordance with popular ideas about the gender-age principle of organizing social space and the need to prepare for family life, mastering the status roles of married men and women.