CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2014
| Author | Halavach, Dzmitry |
|---|---|
| Title | Samizdat and the Ambiguities of Resistance in the Post-Stalin USSR |
| Summary | The thesis examines the Soviet samizdat – printed materials originating outside of the official system of publishing in the USSR – as a case of resistance to an oppressive regime. Motivated by an interest in the degree of intellectual freedom possible under a dictatorship and in the modern state’s ability to construct subjectivity of its citizens, the thesis explores discourses, rhetorical strategies, and subject matter of Soviet samizdat. While the Soviet samizdat can be seen as a case of an emergence of an alternative public sphere and the resistance to the encroachment of the system on the individual life-world, the dependence of the dissident on the official Soviet discourse testifies to the uncanny ability of the state power to form the way its subjects think. Despite the unrelenting pressure, the Soviet regime did not manage to suppress samizdat and dissent generally as a means of resistance, but the ideological distance of the Soviet dissidents from the regime they chose to criticize was often very small. The subversive power of their acts lied in the illocutionary dimension of their utterances, i.e. not simply in what the Soviet dissidents said, but in what they did by saying this: holding the Soviet power accountable, albeit to its own standards. The implications of the research suggest caution in the casual ascription of liberal subjectivity to the opponents of authoritarian regimes elsewhere. |
| Supervisor | Bozóki, András |
| Department | Political Science MA |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2014/halavach_dzmitry.pdf |
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