Youth Cultures in Contemporary Russia: Memory, Politics, Solidarities

Abstract

The studies of youth cultural practices in Russia, which we have been conducting since 2000, indicate that it is essential to understand the complexity of uniting global and local tendencies, the Soviet legacy and the impact of political discourses. We have been observing how these contexts define the shape of youth cultural scenes, while changing and sometimes breaking cultural boundaries and distorting authentic meanings.1 As a result, a unique Russian youth cultural space has emerged. The central thesis of this chapter is that the concept of solidarities is the most pertinent and productive means of describing modern Russian youth cultures. The use of this approach makes it possible to enter: (1) post-subcultural disputes about which social meanings youth cultural formations transmit and what material resources of their group identities exist today; (2) which social contexts influence youth cultural space and how they do it. In this chapter we focus on key aspects of the youth cultural scene, addressing: (1) the actualisation and meaning of the Soviet past; (2) the influence of political discourses and state youth ‘education’ policies, in particular, regarding patriotic education; (3) youth participation in global contexts and their Russian interpretation.