Communism as an island. The Soviet Union, Hollywood and Cultural Appropriations during Cold War
Abstract
This article addresses the way in which a mythologised view of the communist experience has exerted an enormous influence not only on popular culture but also on the academic field. In particular, it critically reviews the widespread idea that the communist world in general and the Soviet Union in particular were for much of their existence enclosed behind an ‘iron curtain’, to use perhaps the most famous but not the only metaphor. This idea took for granted the territory's iron isolation from the rest of the world and characterised the Soviet Union as a closed, autarkic and monotonous space. Thanks to access to declassified Soviet archives and the incorporation of new theoretical perspectives within specialised historiography, this image has been significantly modified. However, its impact has not been strongly manifested in specialised studies in our region. In this sense, the text sets out to analyse a series of cases linked to cinema art in order to revise the myth of communism as an island, based on a review of the links between the Soviet Union and Hollywood during Cold War.
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