Influence of Western culture in the Soviet Union

This fascination was condemned by the Soviet authorities and was described as "idol worshiping the West" (идолопоклонство перед Западом / idolopoklonstvo pered Zapadom) and similar phrases.

[2] According to Maurice Hindus (writing in 1953), the word zagranitsa had always "exercised a spell" over ordinary Russians, due to the vastness of the country, the enforced isolationism of living in villages, and the restriction of movement under Soviet rule.

[3] For centuries, Russians had been granted glimpses of zagranitsa and the West through the "window" opened by Peter the Great, as well as the reports of the privileged few who were able to go abroad and the rare appearance of aliens who visited Russia.

The war brought an influx of Western goods into the Soviet Union due to foreign relief efforts and the Lend-Lease policy enacted in 1941, and the "traditional hunger for knowledge of the mysterious zagranitsa was sharpened".

As Yurchak notes, the desire to possess Western goods, and to keep and display empty packaging and bottles even after they were freed of content, reflected the fact that the link to "elsewhere" (represented by the materiality of these objects) mattered more than their tangible utility as "consumable commodities (the actual liquor, beer, or cigarettes)".

"[7] Zhdanov's campaigns against "rootless Cosmopolitanism" in the early years after the war persecuted progressive composers like Shostakovich and Prokofiev who were deemed too sympathetic to the bourgeois ideologies of the West.

Thus, although partially censored, shortwave radios, which were promoted by the government, provided "windows to the west" through which Soviet citizens were still able to listen to jazz and rock-and-roll, which were, on the other hand, deemed as "bad" Cosmopolitanism by officials.

[8] The distinction between "good" Internationalism and "bad" Cosmopolitanism and the line between acceptable and unacceptable practice were often ambiguous and determined on a case-by-case basis, so in general the verdicts on foreign cultural forms and influences were open to interpretation.

According to Vassily Aksyonov, the "combination of vague pro-American feelings and an all-out anti-American propaganda campaign caused a certain segment of Soviet society to start leaning unconsciously in the direction of America in matters aesthetic, emotional, and even to some extent ideological.

Although it was publicly criticized, denounced, and listening was made an illicit activity, jazz continued to exist officially in concerts held by state organizations, for example, by Komsomol committees, as long as it was "adapted to fit the Soviet context".

Even when imbued with Soviet melodies or with alternative lyrics, jazz (and rock-and-roll) elicited "overly excited" reactions from young people, engendered by their associations with zagranitsa.

Stilyagi listened to jazz and rock-and-roll, and frequented clubs like Hotel Evropeiskaia in Leningrad, which featured the Yosif Vainshtein orchestra and played American swing melodies.

Even during the Stalin years, the Soviet citizen had been encouraged to enjoy consumption of personal, 'bourgeois', pleasures such as dresses, wristwatches and lipstick as long as they were not used to elevate egoism or status, but as a reward for hard work.

Thus, only the splashiest aesthetic pursuits of zagranitsa were hindered, while the many Soviet citizens who continued to engage with Western culture in fashion, music, films, and literature in less ostentatious ways escaped criticism.

Beyond the stilyagi phenomenon, due to the neglect of popular demand by the Soviet-style planned economy, the country badly lacked fashionable and simply nice and convenient clothing.

[19] The zagranitsa of the late Soviet period was an imaginary place, constructed from pieces of Western culture from films, jazz and rock-and-roll vinyls, and the glossy pages of magazines, the imaginings of a distant "abroad".