{"id":1036,"date":"2020-04-22T02:17:25","date_gmt":"2020-04-22T02:17:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/russian-2240-spring-2020\/?p=1036"},"modified":"2020-04-22T02:17:25","modified_gmt":"2020-04-22T02:17:25","slug":"a-different-kind-of-propaganda","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/russian-2240-spring-2020\/gbatista\/a-different-kind-of-propaganda\/","title":{"rendered":"A different kind of propaganda"},"content":{"rendered":"

Coming fresh off the heels of the discussion about the transformation of Soviet Propaganda, the harsh criticisms of Stalin and the regime that was abducting and dispatching political prisoners left and right stood in stark contrast to the glorification of that same regime we observed in the posters. While writing may not seem to be propagandistic at first glance, the vivid imagery used in Mandelstam’s\u00a0We Live Without Feeling<\/em> evokes a negative impression of the forces in power.<\/p>\n

We Live Without Feeling<\/em> is a devastating poem that highlights the terrors that were enacted in order to maintain a political status quo, eliminating anyone who spoke out and disagreed with the party. The purpose was to cut at the notion of a morally superior leader, which Stalin relied on in order to maintain the admiration and respect of his people. By portraying the Stalin and his hitmen in an explicitly negative light, Mandelstam thus delegitimized Stalin’s position as a morally sound leader.<\/p>\n

The explicit criticism of the party and thus Stalin were the depictions of him as a worm-fingered, cockroach-eyed jackbooted despot. This was meant as a counter to the standard imagery that was usually shown of Stalin, like that one picture of him with the girl whose parents he sent to the gulags that we spoke about in class. Another explicit criticism of Stalin and his regime was the line “every execution is a feast for him,” which was meant to expose and denounce his penchant for the execution of his political prisoners, as well as cast doubts on his portrayal as a loving, caring figurehead of the party. Again, this portrayal as a bloodthirsty maniac was meant to run counter to the state media’s portrayal of Stalin as a father-like figure that everybody should look up to.<\/p>\n

Finally, Mandelstam’s use of the phrase “semi-humans” was meant as criticism of the guards who carried out Stalin’s actions, but it also reflected poorly on Stalin, for how could a man of the people associate himself with semi-humans and acts that were so violent and cruel.<\/p>\n

Overall,\u00a0We Live Without Feeling<\/em> was a strong, piercing piece of propaganda that opposed the positive portrayals of Stalin and his regime, instead hitting on the cruelty and hypocrisy of appearance that was rampant under Stalin<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Coming fresh off the heels of the discussion about the transformation of Soviet Propaganda, the harsh criticisms of Stalin and the regime that was abducting and dispatching political prisoners left and right stood in stark contrast to the glorification of that same regime we observed in the posters. While writing may not seem to be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1018,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1036","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-unit-11-stalinism-thaw-and-stagnation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/russian-2240-spring-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1036","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/russian-2240-spring-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/russian-2240-spring-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/russian-2240-spring-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1018"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/russian-2240-spring-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1036"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/russian-2240-spring-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1036\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/russian-2240-spring-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1036"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/russian-2240-spring-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1036"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/russian-2240-spring-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1036"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}