Divided Dreamworlds?

Divided Dreamworlds?

The Cultural Cold War in East and West

While the divide between capitalism and communism, embodied in the image of the Iron Curtain, seemed to be as wide and definitive as any cultural rift, Giles Scott-Smith, Joes Segal, and Peter Romijn have compiled a selection of essays on how culture contributed to the blurring of ideological boundaries between the East and the West. This important and diverse volume presents fascinating insights into the tensions, rivalries, and occasional cooperation between the two blocs, with essays that represent the cutting edge of Cold War Studies and analyze aesthetic preferences and cultural phenomena as various as interior design in East and West Germany; the Soviet stance on genetics; US cultural diplomacy during and after the Cold War; and the role of popular music as the universal cultural ambassador.
An illuminating and wide-ranging survey of interrelated collective dreams from both sides of the Iron Curtain, Divided Dreamworlds? has a place on the bookshelf of any modern historian.
  • Divided Dreamworlds?
  • Contents
  • Preface
  • Introduction: Divided Dreamworlds? The Cultural Cold War in East and West / Giles Scott-Smith and Joes Segal
  • Part I. Arts and Sciences Between the Blocs
    • 1. An Unofficial Cultural Ambassador - Arthur Miller and the Cultural Cold War / Nathan Abrams
    • 2. Biological Utopias East and West - Trofim D. Lysenko and His Critics / William DeJong-Lambert
    • 3. Tadeusz Kantor’s Publics - Warsaw – New York / Jill Bugajski
    • 4. Co-Producing Cold War Culture - East-West Film-Making and Cultural Diplomacy / Marsha Siefert
  • Part II. Modernity East and West
    • 5. The Dreamworld of New Yugoslav Culture and the Logic of Cold War Binaries / Sabina Mihelj
    • 6. Sounds like America - Yugoslavia’s Soft Power in Eastern Europe / Dean Vuletic
    • 7. Moving Toward Utopia - Soviet Housing in the Atomic Age / Christine Varga-Harris
    • 8. Cold War Modernism and Post-War German Homes - An East-West Comparison / Natalie Scholz and Milena Veenis
    • 9. Flying Away - Civil Aviation and the Dream of Freedom in East and West / Annette Vowinckel
  • Part III. Post-1989 Perspectives on the Cultural Cold War
    • 10. Problematic Things - East German Materials after 1989 / Justinian Jampol
    • 11. (Dis)Connecting Cultures, Creating Dreamworlds - Musical ‘East-West’ Diplomacy in the Cold War and the War on Terror / Harm Langenkamp
  • About the Authors
  • Index