Soviet world: conformism and conformists

Abstract

The interdisciplinary project devoted to the analysis of a phenomenon of conformism in art is presented in the paper. The review of a problem field of the theoretical workshops organized inUralFederalUniversityin 2012–2015, where literary critics, art critics, linguists, historians, sociologists, philosophers, anthropologists, practicians of literature and cinema took part, is given. The conformism is considered as a cultural and historical phenomenon of the Soviet culture, a form of a specific «culture of consent». Resources of methods of various Humanities capable to explain a phenomenon of the Soviet conformism are analyzed: Bourdieu’s field theory, pragmatic version of sociology of culture, institutional studies, and sociolinguistics. As a result, “conformism” was used at the workshops as the ‘working’ name for the practice of adaptation: artists in the process of interaction with agents of influence assuming dependence on the power, audience, colleagues, etc., are compelled to resort to them. If we proceed from the idea that process of modernization generates conformism and the corresponding psychological type, conformism can be considered as a typical manifestation of the practice of solidarity and cooperation of the subject combining self-sufficiency of the personality and readiness to live without breaking corporate interests. At the same time, conformism is a social orientation based on a mismatch of interests between the subject who feels himself as the owner of qualities unusual for him and the group pressure which is perceived by the subject as something negative, but inevitable.