Soviet Sport Research Articles

Советский спор(т): попытки гальванизации эйдосов в нововременных кинокартинах о выдающихся советских спортсменах

The author believes that the so-called cinematic speaking on the Soviet, that is, an array of texts, formulated within the contours of fi lm, television, and other screen arts, is one of the representative sources shaping the domestic discourse of the reception of the Soviet. Within the framework of this work, research attention is focused on the consideration of modern Russian films about the legends of Soviet sports, which, in the area of the abovementioned cinematic speaking, appeal to a number of phrase themes, such as sports, personality, heroism, asceticism, service, and moral values. According to the author, the repetitive nature of references to Soviet sports mythology is associated with the dire need of having some kind of incredible task fulfilled; but, unlike, for example, S. Toymentsev, the author considers this task to be cultural, educational and didactic rather than politically predetermined. The author sees Soviet sports biopics as a good opportunity for a large-scale conversation at the level of everyday consciousness, designed to ensure the galvanization of eidos, re-launch of values and remastering of meanings. However, despite the self-evidently noble nature of such intentions, modern sports dramas are unable to fully realize their mission for a number of reasons. The first reason why biographical films about Soviet athletes do not turn into a guide to action, and their protagonists do not become sought-after role models, is the dramatic discrepancy between the glorified personal qualities of the heroes and the main plots of current popular psychology, which consistently inculcates the cult of hedonism and the so-called ‘positive mindset’. The second reason that determines the emergence of the viewer’s “cognitive lag” is associated with the unanimous silencing in such films of the ideological component of Soviet social relations as a factor that necessarily shapes personality (or the reduction of this factor to requisite and decorative markers): a complex of behavioral patterns, choices and motives thus turn out to be impenetrable to the viewer in the absence of interpretative model. As the third reason, the author names the formal, ‘dotted’ manner of depicting Soviet temporality in “champion fi lm sagas” and comes to the conclusion that unpacking and appropriating the didactic, instructive potential of legendary sports stories is impossible without a thoughtful depiction of Soviet social time.

Discovering a Young State: Foreign Sports Delegations in the USSR during the 1920s

In the 1920s, visits by foreign delegations to the USSR served as a crucial yet challenging avenue for showcasing the achievements of the nascent Soviet state. Drawing on previously unexplored materials from the Russian State Archive of Socio-Political History (F. 537, inv. 2), this article examines the strategies employed in hosting these guests. It explores the planning of their itineraries and leisure activities, aiming to understand how Soviet sports leaders, during the early stages of state formation, skillfully concealed various shortcomings (especially economic and infrastructural) and highlighted sports and cultural triumphs to craft a positive global image of the USSR through what was ostensibly a non-political institution.Soviet physical education leaders did not shy away from inviting foreign teams to the country; instead, they actively welcomed all interested parties who could manage the journey. An ideally orchestrated visit seamlessly integrated four key elements: sports (the competitions), culture (theater, cinema, sightseeing), daily life (direct interaction with Soviet workers), and team recreation. When executed well, these visits garnered positive international feedback, thereby enhancing the USSR's global prestige as the inaugural socialist state. This became the primary objective of Soviet sports diplomacy in the late 1920s, marking a significant stride in breaking through international isolation.However, these visits were not without limitations and challenges. The level of indoctrination varied significantly among delegations: while European proletarians often visited sites significant to the October Revolution, guests from the East were predominantly exposed to the country's cultural facets. Despite the Red Sports International's encouragement, delegations rarely ventured beyond major urban centers like Moscow, Leningrad, Kharkov, and Odessa, as provincial visits were not feasible. Furthermore, even in these key cities, visitors encountered organizational challenges such as transportation difficulties, inadequate economic support, and issues with food provision, which diminished the effectiveness of propaganda efforts. These shortcomings were largely attributable to the absence of a standardized protocol for receiving foreign guests during the first decade of Soviet sports diplomacy and the general uneven infrastructural development of the country.

СОВЕТСКАЯ ПОЛИТИКА В ОБЛАСТИ "СПОРТА ВЫСОКИХ ДОСТИЖЕНИЙ" В 1920-1930-Х ГГ.

The article affects an issue of the place and role of high-performance sports in the socio-political life of the USSR of the 1920s – 1930s. Creating the concept of sports development in the country, the Soviet leadership focused primarily on the issues of physical culture, which did not imply the presence of a competitive element in it. However, the development of Soviet sports in the period under review was extremely heterogeneous, and therefore the role of sports competitions was changing. The author analyzes those transformations using documents published by organizations that managed Soviet sports in the 1920s – 1930s and materials of the periodical press. Special attention is paid to the regulations of 1933–1934, which finally established the highperformance sports in Soviet society, their prerequisites, causes and results. The author comes to the conclusion that a sharp turn towards the development of high-achievement sports in the USSR in 1933–1934 led to the legitimization of sport as a profession and was associated with the implementation of certain foreign policy strategies, in particular, with the need to develop international relations with both proletarian and bourgeois forces in Europe against the background of the nazi threat. Keywords: history of sports, sports in the USSR, high-performance sports, physical culture, ACPC (VSFC), sports periodicals

Lost Multipolarity: the Genesis of the Olympic World Order

In the second half of the 20th century, the alliance between the International Olympic Committee and Soviet sports led to the modern monopoly of the Olympic Games and the IOC’s hegemony over the sports world order. The expulsion of Russia as the legal successor of the USSR from the existing system calls into question the terms of that unspoken deal.

Olympic debut of soviet sports

Based on archival documents, the article traces the key moments of the long-term process of preparing Soviet athletes for the 1952 Olympic Games. Thanks to the course of the party and state leadership of the country to use the possibilities of cultural diplomacy after the end of the Second World War, Soviet sports come out of isolation, actively use bilateral sports contacts and participate in some World and European Championships. The entry of the Soviet Union into the Olympic movement was hampered by the atychiphobia of Soviet leaders and top sports functionaries, when a defeat in any international competition was seen as damage to the prestige of the USSR. Only in December 1951, the authorities, convinced of the ability of the Soviet Union to compete with the United States for Olympic leadership, agreed to participate in the Olympic Games in Helsinki.

Formation of soviet sports diplomacy: structures and practices

The article is devoted to the formation of a new foreign policy practice - sports diplomacy - in the USSR in the 1920s. The key documents that established the order of interaction of sections within the Red Sports International, as well as Soviet athletes with the external environment, are analyzed. These resolutions clearly reflected the contradictions in the accents of the activities of the RSI and the SCPC: the aspiration for mainly propaganda work and the consolidation of the labor movement collided with the desire to raise the competitive level of Soviet sports. Despite these contradictions, in the 1920s it was possible to unify the practice of international work-sports interaction, to make it systematic. The evolution of working methods has been studied: both competitive forms of interaction and non-competitive practices - patronage and socialist competition. It is shown that the tools of sports diplomacy of the USSR in the first decade of its existence were not static, it changed in accordance with new tasks and challenges - from overcoming foreign policy isolation to strengthening the internal structure of the movement and the formation of self-defense squads by foreign sports clubs. The circle of interaction of the RSI and the SCPC with supranational organizations and Soviet institutions of power is defined. Intensive ties with the CEC, the PCFA and the Soviet embassies, which provided financial support, accelerated visa issuance, as well as advisory assistance, indicate a great attention to foreign policy sports contacts of the highest state bodies of the USSR. The conclusion is made about the formation of a systematic and regular practice of sports diplomacy of the Soviet state since the early 1920s.

Putting Russia's Ban in Historical Perspective: A Curated Interview

Putting Russia's Ban in Historical Perspective: A Curated Interview

Who Is to Blame and What Is to Be Done? The Rise and Fall of Russian Authority in the Olympics

Who Is to Blame and What Is to Be Done? The Rise and Fall of Russian Authority in the Olympics

Sports Events in the USSR as a Tool for Promoting Soviet Social Values (on the Example of the 1st Spartakiad of the Peoples of the USSR)

The author made an attempt to consider sports events in the system of propaganda of Soviet values as a research task. The 1st Spartakiad of the Peoples of the USSR in 1956 was used as an example, designed to demonstrate the sporting achievements of the Soviet society and to involve the broad masses of the population in sports. We made a review of legal documents of all-Union and regional significance aimed at preparing for the upcoming competitions. The stages and structure of the regional competitions within the framework of the Spartakiad are analyzed. Particular attention is paid to agitation and propaganda work in the region dedicated to the 1st Spartakiad of the peoples of the USSR. The role of holding sports and mass events, star relay races and the “Relay Race of Youth” in the promotion of sports in remote areas of the region is revealed. The importance of the regional councils of voluntary sports societies and the regional committee of the All-Union Leninist Young Communist League in organizing these events was emphasized. The results of the performance of national teams and individual athletes of the Irkutsk region at different stages of the Spartakiad of the Peoples of the USSR are analyzed in detail. The article summarizes already published sources on the topic under study and also it introduces into scientific circulation new data obtained on the basis of documents from the State Archives of the Irkutsk Region. A statistical analysis of the dynamics of the development of physical culture in the Angara region in the course of preparation for the 1st Spartakiad of the peoples of the USSR is given. The author substantiates the hypothesis that, thanks to the preparations for the Spartakiad in the Irkutsk region, it was possible to expand the propaganda of Soviet sports, update the material and technical base, improve the quality of personnel and increase the number of people involved in physical culture. Thus, sport became a significant element in the system of Soviet social values.

Degrees of Difficulty: How Women's Gymnastics Rose to Prominence and Fell from Grace by Georgia Cervin

<i>Degrees of Difficulty: How Women's Gymnastics Rose to Prominence and Fell from Grace</i> by Georgia Cervin

SEMANTICS OF THE INEXPRESSIBLE AND ITS REPRESENTATION IN THE RUSSIAN LANGUAGE NATIONAL CORPUS (NEWSPAPER SUBCASE)

This article analyzes the use of one-word constituents of the field of the inexpressible in modern newspaper texts presented in the National Corpus of the Russian language. The analysis has shown that the newspaper discourse presents multi-level means of conveying the meaning of the inexpressible, contributing to the expression of expressive and evaluative functions. Factors such as the socially significant level of the media, the peculiarities of the linguistic personality of the author of the text, his position, the subject of articles have an impact on the choice and use of lexemes with the semantics of the inexpressible. The semantics of the inexpressible is most often used in such mass publications as Komsomolskaya Pravda, Trud, and Soviet Sport. Newspaper texts covering issues of public life, culture, and sports are identified as priority topics in terms of the frequency of use of tokens.

СОВЕТСКИЙ СПОРТ В ПОСЛЕВОЕННЫЕ ГОДЫ: ВЫХОД НА МИРОВУЮ АРЕНУ

The paper analyses the processes of development of Soviet sports in the post-war years. It shows that despite huge losses, the revival of the sports economy, management structures and the system of competitive events were successfully carried out with the most active support of the Party and state bodies. Based on the given statistical data, it is proved that consequences of the war had been eliminated by the end of 1947. However, the process of strengthening and expanding the material and technical base of Soviet sports continued until the end of the 1950s, ensuring its threefold expansion compared to 1940. The paper demonstrates measures aimed at increasing the number of sports specialists, improving programs for physical education of the population and increasing the popularity of sports. An analysis of the post-war physical culture movement showed that the successes enabled the authorities to set an ambitious task not only to bring Soviet sports to the international arena, but also to train outstanding professional athletes capable of establishing the sports leadership of the USSR. At the same time, the author examines in detail the forms and methods used by the Soviet top leadership both to stimulate victories and to prevent defeats that could have harmed the image of the “first country of socialism”. A conclusion is drawn that successful entry of Soviet athletes into the international arena, despite their political motivation, contributed to strengthening of the USSR in the world and raising the overall level of world sports.

Soviet sport in porcelain sculpture: heroes, history, aesthetics

Soviet sport in porcelain sculpture: heroes, history, aesthetics

The role of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU(b) in the development of Soviet sports in the second half of the 1930s - 1940s

The role of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU(b) in the development of Soviet sports in the second half of the 1930s - 1940s

Sport in Central Asia under Gorbachev: Uzbekistan from 1985 to 1991

This paper assesses the modern and traditional sports during the last six years of the Soviet Union before its collapse in 1991. The case study is the Central Asian republic of Uzbekistan under the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU, established 1917). Central Asia is a crucial historical case because it was a Muslim-majority region that Moscow wished to transform. The study is interdisciplinary and contains primary and secondary sources from the Cold War era. The research question asks: What did the implementation and impact of Soviet sport look like in Uzbekistan under Mikhail Gorbachev (CPSU leader from March 1985 to December 1991). Uzbekistan’s sportspeople, facilities, Spartakiad ranking of 1983, Olympic athletes, and traditional sports are the topics examined.

한-소 스포츠 교류에 나타난 소비에트 한인 스포츠인들의 초국가적 정체성 연구-넬리 김과 유리 채를 중심으로-

This study investigated the progress and achievements of Korea-USSR sports exchanges until the dissolution of the USSR in 1991 after the Korean sports delegation first visited Moscow to participate in the Universiade in 1973 and found out the meaning in Korean sports history. In addition, it examined the role of Soviet Korean sportsmen and the emergence of transnational identity in this process. As a research method, a content analysis was used to analyze the articles of the monthly Physical Education published by the Korean Sports & Olympic Committee since 1966 as the main text and the daily newspapers’ articles as the subtext. Before the dissolution of the USSR, Korea-USSR sports exchanges showed different aspects before and after the 24th Seoul Olympics and were divided into three periods: Embryonic Period (1973~1984), Growth Period (1985~1988.8.), Mature Period (1988.9.~1991). The Korea-USSR Sports exchange was one of the representative success stories of sports diplomacy that played a leading role in the re-establishment of the Korean-Soviet diplomatic relations on September 30, 1990. In this process, Among the Soviet Korean sportsmen, Nellie Kim and Yuriy Tskhay contributed to the development of sports in Korea through the Koreanization of Soviet sports techniques and were able to experience the emergence of transnational identity by serving as a bridge between Korea-USSR sports exchanges.

El problema del amateurismo y el profesionalismo deportivo en la URSS: 1941-1991

El propósito de este trabajo es continuar con la indagación acerca del deporte soviético. Apoyándome en la bibliografía historiográfica pertinente, abordaré el problema del amateurismo y el profesionalismo en el período que abarca la segunda guerra mundial hasta la caída de la URSS, en referencia al modelo deportivo de dicho Estado. De este modo, me propongo completar lo comenzado en un trabajo previo, que abarcaba los primeros años del deporte soviético, para así aportar una perspectiva que permita observar el desenvolvimiento de aquellos aspectos del deporte que se desarrollaban de forma potencial en aquellos tiempos.&#x0D;

Facing the Involvement of Youths in Competitions: Soviet Visions and Adaptations to the Rejuvenation of Elite Sports (Second Half of the 20th Century).

This article focuses on Soviet sports authorities' adaptations to youth involvement in elite sports during the second half of the 20th century during the Cold War. It demonstrates that the quest for performance and success in world competitions meant that sportsmen needed to start training at younger ages. This trend led to the development of a biopolitical expertise on youth sports, that mixed scientific research, artistic and intellectual stances and public policy making. It contributed to determining age requirements and a specific system to intensify preparation while protecting the sportsmen involved. Since the mid-1970's, this system was not well-received within the Soviet Union as well as by the wider world. These youth systems embodied the poor Soviet management of childhood.

Professionalization of Soviet Sports during the Cold War (1946-1959)

Professionalization of Soviet Sports during the Cold War (1946-1959)

Struggling against the caste system, the patronage and unhealthy payments: attempts at regulation of football players’ remunerations from the 1950s to the 1970s in the Soviet Union

ABSTRACT In the Soviet Union, the orientation to spectator sports in the mid-thirties and the rising concurrence between sports societies led to the rewarding of sportsmen for their performance and their victories. This article aims at examining how the Soviet authorities (party, sports administration) dealt with the problem of high wages and illegal remuneration of sportsmen from the 1950s to the end of the 1970s. This article shows the different attempts of regulation that occurred in the realm of Soviet football and the agents implicated in it. Doing so, it helps understanding the tensions and the relations between Soviet sports administration and the sports voluntary societies. The article is based on Russian archives.