Costume Tropology of Socialist Realism: Shifts in Vestimentary Semantics in the Texts of High and Late Stalinism

Abstract

The article examines major modes of costume as a trope in the cultural texts of high and late Stalinism, primarily in journalism and official literature. Successive changes in these modes can be traced through shifts in vestimentary semantics. As the analysis of the texts shows, each period in the history of Stalinism is characterized by one dominant costume trope. Schematically, the evolution of costume tropology in the second half of the 1930s — early 1950s. follows the trajectory: costume as a metaphor for achievements in the period of high Stalinism — costume as a metonymy of socialism in the period of late Stalinism. The thesis is argued that the history of the Stalinist discourse of fashion can and should be considered as a branch of cultural policy, since the evolution of the official rhetoric of fashion correlated with changes in the political agenda and formed a vestimentary projection of the power discourse. Despite the significant differences in costume semantics in different periods of Stalinism, a single axiological basis of the costume in Stalinist culture is revealed: a combination of the state pride and personal modesty. It is also concluded that in the years of high and late Stalinism, the costume and the institution of the official “Soviet fashion” functioned in culture according to the principles of socialist realism and were, in fact, one of its offshoots. In other words, the costume was not merely a cultural text, but a socialist realist text of Stalinist culture.