Syllabus
Syllabus:
1. Introduction.
2. Methodology. What is a cultural history?
3. Socialist distribution system: a society of (in)equality?
4. Informal practices: shortages and a shadow network of mutual favors and connections (“blat”)
5. Socialist luxury, fashion and VIP shops (Tuzex and others)
6. Style Hunters: a bright subculture of the Khrushchev Thaw. “Bad bourgeois” taste vs. the “proper socialist” style.
7. Culture of socialist underground: protest or fashion?
8. Denunciation as a social and a personal strategy
9. Religious and church: from elimination to mocking
10. Mass gymnastics: Faster, Higher, Stronger
11. Ideology, changing women’s role and some gender stereotypes
12. Final discussion. Presentations.
Annotation
Annotation and Course Description: The course is intended to broaden understanding of personal strategies, motivations, practices, everyday life and routine under the socialism. These aspects (i.e. grey network of “blat”, inequality of a Socialist distribution system and others) were common for all countries of the Socialist bloc such as Czechoslovakia, Soviet Union, Poland etc. This fact gives a universal dimension to the course and provides a shared platform for studying of the Central- and East European societies under the Socialism.
Schedule: Tuesday, 9:10 - 10:45 teacher's email: alena.markova@fhs.cuni.cz