Call for Papers: "Sots-Speak: Regimes of Language under Socialism"

[Petre Petrov]

The attempt to build communism in Eastern Europe was accompanied by the
development of a distinctive language paradigm, first in the Soviet Union,
then—by a process of cultural translation and local adaptation—in the
satellite states of the Socialist Bloc. The official discourse possessed
its own “speech genres” (tied to specific communicative contexts,
social roles, and political tasks), easily recognizable rhetorical
patterns and lexical peculiarities. It is intuitively obvious that this
discourse, which we provisionally label _sots-speak_, was instrumental in
legitimizing and perpetuating the political system, in shaping individual
psychologies and cultural expressions. However, our knowledge of its exact
nature and practical existence remains sketchy, as the topic still awaits
systematic research. The aim of this conference is to bring together
scholars whose work helps shed light on the politico-ideological idiom(s)
of state socialism, so that we can begin to develop a sophisticated,
multi-layered picture of this special universe of discourse. A deeper
understanding of its constitutive linguistic features and the tendencies
that define its evolution represents a major desideratum on its own; yet
we see this understanding as prerequisite for engaging in questions of
broader cultural significance and soliciting a range of
(inter)disciplinary inquiries (sociolinguistics, social psychology,
anthropology, philosophy, cultural and literary studies, political
science, etc.). The following questions merely suggest a few general ways
in which to frame our investigation; each of the areas can be illuminated
through analysis of specific topics. 

  

 	* What is the relation between the linguistic theories and utopias of
the cultural avant-garde and the linguistic regimes of state socialism?
 	* Can we isolate and analyze expressive features uniquely native to
these regimes? What are the stable rhetorical patterns and lexical
inventories of _sots-speak_? What communicative functions do they serve?
 	* What was the social reception of the ideological “tongues” of
socialism in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe? How can we study the
dynamic between inherited mentalities and the novel linguistic
paradigms?  
 	* What is the relationship between language and political power? What
powers are invested or (assumed to reside) in language? How effective was
official language in fulfilling the functions with which it was charged?
How do we know? What determines this efficacy?
 	* What is the relationship between signified and signifier in
_sots-speak_, between ideological meaning and its material carrier? How
does it change over time (the fading of meaning, the public’s
de-sensitization toward the appeal of ideologically charged language,
etc.)?
 	* How are social roles and identities concretely played and claimed in
the use of official idiom (the performance Stephen Kotkin has called
“speaking Bolshevik”)?
 	* Does _sots-speak_ presuppose a distinctive kind of relay between
speaker/author and recipient/audience? What is the dynamic of stated and
implied meaning in this discourse? How are unstated meanings coded and
deciphered in specific discursive genres and situations?
 	* What values (representational, stylistic, semantic) does _sots-speak
_assume when it is taken up into artistic discourse? 
 	* What constitutes linguistic dissidence under state socialism? What are
the subversive appropriations of the official idiom in everyday life,
unofficial folklore, and artistic texts?
 	* What has been the “posthumous” fate of _sots-speak_? With what new
value(s) has it been invested after the end of state socialism in Russia
and Eastern Europe? 

We invite abstracts of no more than 300 words, accompanied by a short CV,
to be submitted by  to  

Inquiries regarding the conference’s topic, organization, or submission
process should be directed to  

Those selected to give presentations will be contacted at the beginning of
March, 2011.  

All participants must submit a full version of their paper by ; the papers
will be posted on the conference's website and remain available for the
duration of the event.  

We expect to be able to offer a limited number of travel subsidies to
participants from abroad.  

Program committee:  

Petre Petrov (Princeton) 

Mirjam Fried (Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague) 

Eliot Borenstein (NYU) 

Serguei Oushakine (Princeton) 

Kevin Platt (University of Pennsylvania) 

  

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