Making the Soviet Body: Health, Gender,

It is widely known that in the Soviet Union, from the first years after the Revolution of 1917, the image of a "New Person," with not only a new morality but also a new physical body, was enthusiastically constructed on both verbal and visual levels and then thoroughly developed and widely propagandized. Literature and visual arts played a significant role in creating and disseminating these images. The same media were also often used to transmit normative ideas about health, illness, hygiene, sexuality, etc. Lived reality, however, frequently contradicted the propaganda and the iconic images it produced, and some works of art registered that tension, sometimes deliberately, sometimes without meaning to. This course will discuss Soviet attitudes and practices towards the body, disciplining the body, and the role of sport and exercise in human life. We will also focus on the work of healthcare institutions, discuss issues of medical ethics, and address models of relationships between patients and doctors that significantly differ from those we know from 20th-century Western Europe and the USA. Throughout, we will look at the normative images, at the practices, and at the ways in which their divergence was reflected upon.

This course is addressed to students interested in Soviet culture and history. It may be of particular interest to those who have not learned a lot about Soviet culture, but who plan to specialize in medicine and healthcare. The literary and visual works suggested for discussion will help us understand the specific traits in Soviet perceptions of health, illness, and death that have carried over into the post-Soviet period.