Apolitical stiliagi

Mark Edele makes the remark that stiliagi were “decidedly apolitical” (58), echoing the KGB report he quotes earlier in the text that states the stiliagi held an “unpoliticalness” (40). I was taken by the idea that a subversive youth culture could be “apolitical”. It is explained that their apolitical nature was a product of their elite status (lack of financial/ labor concerns, lesser surveillance). However while stiliagi were apparently able to formulate “self-understandings which had little to do with politics” (61) they also politicized color and fashion (choices of grey vs. colorfulness / western vs. outlandish) and built a sexual identity based on the exclusion of women (and thus worked within politicized notions of gender and sex). And are the embracing of “hedonistic lifestyles”, engaging in a black market, and fondness for (banned) American jazz and rock n roll musics not political acts? Would it not be more apolitical to be a conforming, unquestioning party member? Did stiliagi consider themselves as apolitical?

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One Response to Apolitical stiliagi

  1. altiliow says:

    In Alexeyeva’s piece, I think her perspective showed that many of them knew what they were doing had political intent. She actively referred to her colleagues as “talking like convicts” (Alexeyeva, 84) when they called the military “trash”, “vermin”, and “ravagers” (Alexeyeva, 84). Also, by pursuing American lifestyles and perspectives actively banned by censors (yet Biermann’s song about the death of a white-american civil right’s activist, surprisingly was left uncensored [Ryback, 42]) I do think they knew at least some of their own implications.

    I was really interested in the dilution of American culture in the Soviet Union. As Edele explained, the rich youth would be the first to extrapolate Americanism to the SU. Then the poor, without the same resources, would then try and re-create what they experienced from the representations they saw. What eventually occurred was non-American, American-esque symbols. Specific colors and pant-shapes were enough to denote deviancy from Soviet culture. I think it’s really interesting to think about the chain reaction that was occurring, in that representations of representations were creating a distinctly Soviet concept of cultural deviancy and counter-culture.

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