S/T-amizdat

This article critiques the received definition of samizdat. It argues, first of all, that the difficulty in conceptualizing the unofficial culture of late Communism stems from its extreme context-sensitivity. In each socialist country samizdat had distinctly unique flavor and reflected local conditions. Not only do the multiplicity of socio-historical and cultural milieus fragmentize the notion of samizdat, but equally misleading is its political interpretation that casts it in Cold War terms as the purveyor of truth and morality in contrast to an official literature as a mere mouthpiece of Party propaganda. This demarcation is wrong for a number of reasons: not only did samizdat have its own economics but the relationship of official literatures to the political powers was much more nuanced than a bojary view can allow for. The third factor which makes suspect the traditional understanding of samizdat, is the logocentrism that treats the word as a transparent vehicle of disembodied meaning. This paper argues that such a narrowing of the scope excludes from the purview other important domains of the unofficial culture exploiting language: authorial songs of the bards circulating en masse as tape recordings (magnitizdat) as well as paintings incorporating into visual compositions ubiquitous Party propaganda slogans.