Abstract
ABSTRACTOne of the less researched aspects of postcolonial India’s “progressive” culture is its Soviet connection. Starting in the 1950s and consolidating in the 1960s, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics invested in building up “committed” networks amongst writers, directors, actors, and other theater- and film-practitioners across India. Thus, an entire generation of cultural professionals was initiated into the anticolonial solidarity of emerging Afro-Asian nations that were seen, and portrayed, by the Soviets as being victims of “Western” imperialism. The aspirational figure of the New Soviet Man was celebrated through the rise of a new form of “transactional sociality” (Westlund 2003). This paper looks at selected cases of cultural diplomacy—through the lens of cultural history—between the USSR and India for two decades after India’s Independence, exploring the possibility of theorizing it from the perspective of an anticolonial cultural solidarity that allowed agency to Indian interlocutors.
Highlights
From Moscow with Love: Soviet Cultural Politics across India in the Cold War Post-Independence India was one of the key sites where the “cultural Cold War” was fought, more often than not with as much gusto and ruthlessness as its ideological and military counterparts.1 Starting already in the 1950s and consolidating in the ’60s, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) invested time, financial resources and organizational energy in building up “committed” networks amongst writers, filmmakers, theater-directors and other theater-personnel, stage- and screen-actors, musicians, dancers and other cultural professionals in various Indian cities
An entire generation of theater-professionals and -activists was initiated into the anti-colonial solidarity of emerging Afro-Asian nations that were seen, and portrayed, by the Soviets as being victims of “Western” imperialism
Bennewitzian contribution to interculturalism, because most other theater-directors who [...] did interculturalism at that point of time either ignored the language completely [...] or completely relied on other people to deal with the language.”10 It stands to reason that this may have reflected a core concern of Eastern Bloc cultural politics: the need to take a more solidarity-oriented approach to Afro-Asian societal-cultural specificities
Summary
From Moscow with Love: Soviet Cultural Politics across India in the Cold War Post-Independence India was one of the key sites where the “cultural Cold War” was fought, more often than not with as much gusto and ruthlessness as its ideological and military counterparts.1 Starting already in the 1950s and consolidating in the ’60s, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) invested time, financial resources and organizational energy in building up “committed” networks amongst writers, filmmakers, theater-directors and other theater-personnel, stage- and screen-actors, musicians, dancers and other cultural professionals in various Indian cities.
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