Libraries of the Sverdlovsk Region: The Practice of Preserving the Heritage of SVO Heroes and Fostering Patriotic Values

The purpose of this article is to present activities supporting participants and veterans of the Special Military Operation (SVO) and their families, as well as patriotic education for young people, using the best practices of libraries engaged in patriotic work in the Sverdlovsk Region as examples. Libraries, particularly regional ones, are now not mere book repositories but also social institutions and regional centers with their own structures and missions, working to ensure public well-being and preserve the legacy of heroes. Adolescents and young adults are actively interested in patriotic sociocultural initiatives, as evidenced by statistics on attendance at public events. In 2025, the total attendance at events dedicated to the SVO in the Sverdlovsk Region was over 46,000 people. This article presents the results of the activities of the Sverdlovsk Region’s libraries within the framework of the All-Russian library movement “Stronger Together”. The article describes the experience of the All-Russian patriotic event “Literary and Historical Halt ‘Frontline Poetry. Parallels’” at the Verkhnyaya Sinyachikha Central Library, the “Spark of Goodness” and “Peace” projects in the libraries of the Pyshminsky Municipal District, the “Book of Memory” project in the Berezovsky Municipal District, and the literary and poetry marathon “Our Heroic Strength!” in Nizhny Tagil. The measures proposed by the Sverdlovsk Regional Universal Scientific Library named after V.G. Belinsky (SRUSL) to strengthen social ties, foster morale, and ensure the subsequent reintegration of SVO participants into society include a variety of volunteer and legal assistance, among other things. The creation of an Interregional Expert and Methodological Council on Literature of the SVO, with the participation of professional writers and critics, is of great importance. The SRUSL presented a book about the Donbass resistance by Bulat Arsal (A.A. Salakhov), “War Under the Slag Heaps”, and a poetry collection by writers from the Urals, Western Siberia, and the Volga region dedicated to SVO participants, entitled “Behind the Ribbon...”, prepared by the Ural Writers’ Association and the regional headquarters of the Cultural Front of Russia in the Sverdlovsk Region. Bibliographic research is actively underway to identify fiction and critical literature on the SVO. Library staff in the Sverdlovsk Region are committed to applying their professional skills and human qualities to the patriotic education of the younger generation.