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Ukraine's window to the West : identity and cultural nonconformity in L'viv, 1953-75
| Title: | Ukraine's window to the West : identity and cultural nonconformity in L'viv, 1953-75 |
| Author: | Risch, William Jay |
| Description: | This dissertation addresses identity and cultural nonconformity in the western Ukrainian city of L'viv from 1953, after the death of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, to 1975, when a human rights movement critical of the Soviet state had emerged throughout the Soviet Union. It examines the way in which intellectuals, students, and young people, while maintaining loyalty to the Soviet state, failed to conform to its expectations. Recent scholarship has suggested that the Soviet state did much to promote the formation of national identities and the values of those who became opponents of the regime by the mid-1970s. Building on this rich field of studies on national identity and dissent in the Soviet Union, as well as on methodologies from other disciplines and fields of history, this dissertation takes the issues of national identity and dissent in the Soviet Union in a new direction. It examines the evolution of national identity in tandem with other identities, such as a multinational Soviet identity, a regional identity, a Central European identity, and a postwar youth identity. It suggests that Ukrainians in L'viv made use of previous colonial legacies, such as those of Poland and Austria-Hungary, to resist the hegemony of official Soviet culture. This dissertation also considers the role of state cultural institutions, such as the artists' and writers' unions, in generating values that at times conflicted with the regime's expectations. Drawing on theories of modernity and tradition, it seeks to understand intellectuals' responses to the modern industrialized society that emerged in western Ukraine after 1945. Research for this dissertation is mainly based on materials from state and former Party archives in L'viv and Kyiv, as well as on literary and artistic sources and a number of oral interviews. Such sources have shown that the Soviet state, in addition to dealing with political opponents by the mid-1970s, confronted conflicting values and forms of behavior that also proved difficult to accommodate, contributing to the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. In L'viv, Polish-language media, contacts with Poles, and contacts with Ukrainians living in the capitalist West undermined official Soviet culture and provided more insight into cultural and social developments taking part in the rest of the world. Ukrainians from L'viv, particularly in the early 1960s, provided others in the republic with sources of a national identity that official Soviet culture did not welcome. Students and other young people in the city formed subcultures that adopted the values of American mass culture and in some cases began to question the status of Ukrainians' language and culture in the Soviet Union and challenged gender roles. Intellectuals in artistic unions, while loyal Soviet citizens, were in serious disagreement over accepted standards in art and literature and also criticized neglect of the Ukrainian language in public life. Social scientists and writers represented a useable past for the region that conflicted with official perceptions on Ukrainian history and also fueled personal vendettas among establishment intellectuals. In art and literature, intellectuals of various political persuasions sought to come to terms with modernity in its Soviet context, seeking to represent in tradition and in abstract art forms a sense of meaning in a world where traditional village life not long ago had been disrupted. |
| Permanent Link: |
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1235577805
http://hdl.handle.net/2374.OX/106368 |
| Date: | 2001 |
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