Propaganda in the Soviet Union
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
"Agitprop is propaganda disseminated through art, literature, drama, etc., especially Communist propaganda."--Sholem Stein |
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Communist propaganda in the Soviet Union was extensively based on the Marxism-Leninism ideology to promote the Communist Party line. Largely in the Stalinist era, it penetrated even social and natural sciences giving rise to various pseudo-scientific theories like Lysenkoism, whereas fields of real knowledge, as genetics, cybernetics, and comparative linguistics were condemned and forbidden as "bourgeois pseudoscience".
The main Soviet censorship body, Glavlit, was employed not only to eliminate any undesirable printed materials, but also "to ensure that the correct ideological spin was put on every published item". In the Stalin Era, deviation from the dictates of official propaganda was punished by execution and labor camps. In the post-Stalin era, these punitive measures were replaced by punitive psychiatry, prison, denial of work, and loss of citizenship. "Today a man only talks freely to his wife – at night, with the blankets pulled over his head", said writer Isaac Babel privately to a trusted friend.
See also
- Banderivtsi
- Censorship in the Soviet Union
- Cold War
- Communist propaganda
- Kukryniksy
- Nazi propaganda
- Propaganda in North Korea
- Propaganda in the People's Republic of China
- Propaganda in the Polish People's Republic
- Propaganda in the United States