Soviet-era Communism was a project of emergence that failed to realise its Utopian ambition. Nevertheless, it created an unprecedented simulacrum whose visual language was appropriated by a number of artists as a readymade. This artistic response to everyday reality shaped an unofficial narrative of the Communist epoch. Operating beyond the official realm these artists were subject to varying degrees of censorship, and their activities led to what became known as ‘non-official’ art. Non-official artists suffered from inferior materials, lack of exposure, and were forced to radicalize their methods of production. Without official support the everyday domestic realm and a diverse range of outdoor sites became sites of production. The primary arena, however, and the one that would become the most politicized, was the artist's body that often acted as one or both material and surface. On the one hand the thesis takes the Communist context as a common platform from which to discuss time-based art practices in Eastern Europe while, on the other, it proposes that such a general view is worthless since it does not pay sufficient attention to the particular conditions within each bloc country. While the former serves as a reference for artistic response in a wide view, the latter provokes a deeper, more contextualised, understanding of the social, political, and cultural conditions that ultimately shaped non-official art. To understand fully the effect of the Communist past also involves analysing it through the lens of the present day. A number of works produced pre- and post-1989 are analysed that offer insights into the past, its disintegration, and the transition period. The theoretical and critical thrust is shaped from primary research material gathered from artists, intellectuals, and critics throughout the region, so as to most clearly reflect its own contemporaneous and unfolding discourse. It builds on these key sources and underscores the difficulties faced when trying to locate the works within existing art history canons. Together with this written element, a further two curatorial strands complete the form of the thesis. A website has been created that reflects the thesis enquiry, three re-enactments of historical works are undertaken as a strategy that allows for a more experiential understanding of context, and three new performances devised by the author in response to the contexts researched complete the work. The thesis was written throughout Eastern Europe, and primarily in Poland where the author lives and works.

This thesis presents a theoretical and historical account of how artists have responded to politics of democracy since the late-1980s. Three questions guide the direction of this analysis. Firstly: why, during its apparent apotheosis in recent years, have numerous artists critiqued democracy as the political, critical and aesthetic frame within which to identify their work? Secondly: how have artists undertaken this critique? Thirdly, and most importantly: what aesthetic and political discourses have artists proposed in lieu of the democracy that they critique? Particular case studies of art from Europe help us to address these questions, for Europe has been an important crucible for vociferous, and often fraught, arguments about democracy in recent aesthetic, philosophical and political discourses. The first chapter of this thesis rigorously contextualises these discourses in relation to historical mobilisations of democracy since the Iron Curtain??s collapse. Relying on writings by Pat Simpson, Slavoj ??i??ek, Alain Badiou and Mario Tronti, I chart the significant imbrications of political ideology, philosophy and what I call ??aesthetics of democratisation?? from the end of European communism, through the democratisations of postcommunism to the militarised democratisations of Iraq and Afghanistan after 2001. Notions of democracy shift and change during this period, becoming what ??i??ek calls a problematic ??transcendental guarantee?? of assumed values and self-legitimation. These shifting values in turn propel the concurrent critiques of democracy that are the subjects of the five subsequent chapters: Ilya Kabakov??s ??total?? installations; Neue Slowenische Kunst??s mimicry of the nation-state during the 1990s; Thomas Hirschhorn??s large-scale works from the late-1990s onwards; Christoph B??chel and Gianni Motti??s collaborative ventures; and the co-operative practices of Dan and Lia Perjovschi. Through examination of the artists?? installations and voluminous writings, and based primarily on archival research and interviews, this thesis examines how their aesthetic politics emerge from the remobilisation of nonconformist art histories, through self-instituted contexts and alternative models for art production, exhibition and interpretation. These models, I argue, counter our usual understandings of art practice and its politics in Europe. They cumulatively assert ??postsocialist aesthetics?? as an impertinent, yet urgent, prism through which to analyse contemporary art.

This thesis analyses linguistic policies in Bulgaria, during the Ottoman, monarchical, communist and post-communist periods and its effects on the Turkish minority in Bulgaria. The linguistic policies in Bulgaria did not follow consistent policies / on the contrary, it followed different policies in different periods. The aim of this thesis is to analyse how the Turkish minority experiences and perceives linguistic rights in the post-communist period, such as study of and in Turkish language, Turkish minority media, use of minority personal names, naming of topographical places and the status of Turkish language in official and administrative institutions. For this purpose, in-depth interviews were carried out in ISiklar (Samuil) municipality in Bulgaria, where Turks constitute the absolute majority of the population. As a result of the analyses of the experiences of the Turkish minority, it was observed that (Turkish) linguistic rights and language were experienced by the Turkish minority in terms of ethnolinguistic identity. It is concluded that symbolic power and diglossia relationships between Turkish and Bulgarian languages affected the ways of perception of (Turkish) linguistic rights by the Turkish minority in Bulgaria.

Following the breakup of the Soviet Union, many predicted there would be economic policy convergence, where it was assumed that the post-Soviet states would all transition into liberal-capitalist economies. Over twenty years later, these forecasts have been confounded by the wide divergence in the political-economic policy practices of the post-Soviet states, which has been particularly apparent between Latvia and Belarus. In terms of policy, Latvia made comprehensive liberal reforms to become a market economy and orient its policies close to Europe and away from Russia. Conversely, Belarus has taken a completely divergent path from Latvia, and has followed a consistent and clear pattern of behavior in regards to political-economic affairs, which could be described as being anti-liberal, anti-reform, and pro-Russian in orientation. Comparing Latvia and Belarus provides an excellent case study to build on International Relations, International Political Economy and Comparative Politics literature, because traditional theories have difficulty in explaining these states divergent policies. This dissertation uses political-cultural theoretical arguments to explain the divergent patterns of political-economic development between both countries, and builds on the rich body of multidisciplinary literature on cultural studies found within Social Constructivism to help understand the political-cultural context in which Latvia’s and Belarus’s policies were chosen. Specifically, this dissertation highlights that the predominant political-cultural worldviews in Latvia and Belarus, were shaped by the historic religious-cultural environment in which these states were situated, which have had a central influence on the patterns of domestic political-economic development chosen by each country since 1991. Additionally, this dissertation also shows that such worldviews had important implications for international relations, in that Latvia being historically situated in the sphere of Western Christian culture gravitated towards the West and away from the Russia, while Belarus being historically situated predominantly in the cultural sphere of Russian Orthodox Christianity was more naturally prone to gravitate towards closer relations with Russia, and away from Western Europe. This is important in pointing to the prime influence of religious-cultural worldviews in shaping political-economic behavior. In doing so my work addresses many gaps left by previous theoretical explanations on post-Soviet transformation. In terms of policy implications, the findings will have a wider applicability in helping to understand the types of political-economic development policies that are chosen by other states in post-Communist, post-authoritarian, and post-colonial contexts, which are experiencing extensive transformation and integration into the global economy.

After the change of their country’s political and international statuses, post-colonial and respectively post-communist individuals and collectives develop feelings of alienation and estrangement that do not involve physical dislocation. Eventually, they start imagining their national community as a collective of individuals who share this state. Paraphrasing Benedict Anderson’s definition of the nation as an “imagined community,” this study identifies this process as “imagined exile,” an act that temporarily compensates for the absence of a metanarrative of the nation during the post-colonial and post-communist transitions. This dissertation analyzes and compares ten English Canadian and Romanian plays, written between 1976 and 2004, and argues that they function as expressions and agents of post-colonial and respectively post-communist imagined exile, helping their readers and audiences overcome the identity crisis and regain the feeling of belonging to a national community. Chapter 1 explores the development of major theoretical concepts, such as nation, national identity, national identity crisis, post-colonialism, and post-communism. Chapter 2 and Chapter 3 analyze dramatic rewritings of historical events, in “1837: The Farmers’ Revolt” by the theatre Passe Muraille with Rick Salutin as dramaturge, and “A Cold” by Marin Sorescu, and of past political leaders, in “Sir John, Eh!” by Jim Garrard and “A Day from the Life of Nicolae Ceausescu” by Denis Dinulescu. Chapter 4 examines the expression of the individual and collective identity crises in “Sled” by Judith Thompson and “The Future Is Rubbish” by Vlad Zografi. Chapter 5 explores the treatment of physical and cultural borders and borderlands in Kelly Rebar’s “Bordertown Café”, Guillermo Verdecchia’s “Fronteras Americanas”, Petre Barbu’s “God Bless America”, and Saviana Stanescu’s “Waxing West”. The concluding chapter briefly discusses the concept of imagined exile in relation to other investigations of post-colonial and post-communist dramas and reviews some of the latest perspectives of national identity, reassessing this study from a diachronic perspective.

This thesis presents a theoretical and historical account of how artists have responded to politics of democracy since the late-1980s. Three questions guide the direction of this analysis. Firstly: why, during its apparent apotheosis in recent years, have numerous artists critiqued democracy as the political, critical and aesthetic frame within which to identify their work? Secondly: how have artists undertaken this critique? Thirdly, and most importantly: what aesthetic and political discourses have artists proposed in lieu of the democracy that they critique? Particular case studies of art from Europe help us to address these questions, for Europe has been an important crucible for vociferous, and often fraught, arguments about democracy in recent aesthetic, philosophical and political discourses. The first chapter of this thesis rigorously contextualises these discourses in relation to historical mobilisations of democracy since the Iron Curtain??s collapse. Relying on writings by Pat Simpson, Slavoj ??i??ek, Alain Badiou and Mario Tronti, I chart the significant imbrications of political ideology, philosophy and what I call ??aesthetics of democratisation?? from the end of European communism, through the democratisations of postcommunism to the militarised democratisations of Iraq and Afghanistan after 2001. Notions of democracy shift and change during this period, becoming what ??i??ek calls a problematic ??transcendental guarantee?? of assumed values and self-legitimation. These shifting values in turn propel the concurrent critiques of democracy that are the subjects of the five subsequent chapters: Ilya Kabakov??s ??total?? installations; Neue Slowenische Kunst??s mimicry of the nation-state during the 1990s; Thomas Hirschhorn??s large-scale works from the late-1990s onwards; Christoph B??chel and Gianni Motti??s collaborative ventures; and the co-operative practices of Dan and Lia Perjovschi. Through examination of the artists?? installations and voluminous writings, and based primarily on archival research and interviews, this thesis examines how their aesthetic politics emerge from the remobilisation of nonconformist art histories, through self-instituted contexts and alternative models for art production, exhibition and interpretation. These models, I argue, counter our usual understandings of art practice and its politics in Europe. They cumulatively assert ??postsocialist aesthetics?? as an impertinent, yet urgent, prism through which to analyse contemporary art.

Diss. Göteborg : Univ., 2002.

Contemporary Romanian cinema, particularly in its internationally successful instances, displays formal characteristics that have often led to its being seen in terms of the so-called Slow Cinema trend in contemporary cinema. This thesis proposes that there is something distinctive about slowness in contemporary Romanian films, similar to and yet different from Slow Cinema. Through a detailed analysis of films made by Cristi Puiu and Cristian Mungiu, two of the most representative contemporary Romanian filmmakers, Romanian slow films emerge as a less stringent form of slowness characterised by tension. This thesis first looks at some of the ways in which slowness can be developed in film - through the use of the long take and the trope of waiting along with the use of stillness and silence. Within this slowness an attitude of contemplation emerges, a characteristic that is key to Slow Cinema. Through close textual analysis of a number of films with a reputation for slowness, both classic and more recent examples, this thesis looks at how the techniques used to develop slowness in film allow for variation and how they can be used not only to create this attitude of contemplation but also to create tension. While this aspect has been less discussed with the more prevalent focus on Slow Cinema and its themes of contemplation, tension can be identified in a variety of films, both those considered part of Slow Cinema and those considered slow films. The distinctiveness of slowness in contemporary Romanian cinema is partly to do with its being rooted in Romanian culture. This study looks at Romanian cinematic and cultural inheritance, specifically at how slowness figures in this history. This thesis contributes to the existing body of research on contemporary Romanian cinema addressing its most salient characteristic, its sense of slowness, by placing it in relation to wider discussions about slowness and Slow Cinema as well as by linking its distinctiveness to wider cultural notions and practices of temporal organisation as well as the social history of the nation.

The thesis of Dissent after 1989. The use of Pierre Bourdieu's theory of habitus change on the example of selected post-dissent organizations deals with the topic of dissent after 1989 and his subsequent life and influence in the Czech society after 1989. The theme of the post-dissent is conceived through a qualitative the research of organizations whose activity is based on the legacy of dissent or refers to its activities. With the help of the research design of instrumental case studies, the following organizations are organized: Charter 77 Foundation, Václav Havel Library, Babylon, Libri prohibiti. The monitored themes are the development of the organization's relationship towards disentanglement, the dissent reflection in the current activities of the organization, and how the organization communicates these themes towards the public. The theoretical part of the thesis outlines the issues of dissent and post-dissent, which are further embedded in the post-communist transition and presentation of the methodology of qualitative studies. In the second part of the case studies of the above mentioned organizations. I outline their focus and development towards dissent. The last part is an analysis of this development through the theoretical concepts of habitus change of Pierre Bourdieu. The aim is...

The problematic of Romanian transition to democracy after the year 1989 was by its major part determined by the form of previous regime. Because of the extreme pressure and control exercised on the opposition and personal dictatorship of the regime of Nicolae Ceaușescu, no major dissent groups or centers existed, bearing the potential to take part in the overthrow of the regime. In the swift and still unclear events of December 1989, National Salvation Front rose to hold the power, being directed by Ion Iliescu. As a formerly top positioned communist apparatchik, who had been swept out from status and power after several conflicts with Ceausescu, he transferred almost complete communist structure to the newly formed regime, including Securitate, the secret service. Deconstruction of the former regime was actually performed by the execution of the former president and his wife and by trials of several Securitate generals. Iliescu concentrated most of the power around NSF and in contradiction with the original proclamation postponed transition to democracy. The new regime, which was led by Ion Iliescu demonstrated in its ideological presentation and exercise of power apparent similarities with the era of communist rule, nevertheless, it worked under formal democratic framework. Because of this fact,...