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«Диснеевский бум» в период перестройки: механизмы и проводники культурного трансфера
The results of a study on the Disney cultu- ral transfer (by Michel Espagne), which became possible in the perestroika-era USSR after a long period of silence and criticism that began in the 1950s, are gi- ven. It presents the societal changes that caused it, what were the conductors and mechanisms, and the reaction of Soviet citizens to them. The article is part of the re- search field of media and film development during pere- stroika and continues the problematics stated by Valerie Posner in “Disney in the Land of Soviets, 1930s”. How- ever, it uses a new methodological framework (the con- cept of cultural transfer) to study perestroika chang- es in the USSR media space. The study analyses three main “transfer points” that stand out against the back- ground of the general flow of Western (Disney) media in 1987—1991 by their intensity and scale of reaction: 1) the Disney film The Journey of Natty Gunn (directed by Jeremy Kagan, 1985) wins a prize in the children’s programme of the 15th Moscow International Film Fes- tival 1987; 2) the Walt Disney Film Festival in Mos- cow 1988; 3) the mass distribution of Disney products in the USSR 1989—1991. An analysis of archival festival documents and newspapers, interviews and LiveJournal entries revealed a number of mechanisms of cultural transfer, which this study refers to as the “Disney boom”: 1) the festival; 2) discourse in the media; 3) the dis- tribution of Disney “artefacts”. The conductors of cul- tural transfer were identified: cartoonists, film critics, film industry workers, as well as Goskino, Gostelera- diofond, Sovinterfest, Physical Culture and Sport pub- lishing house, and Walt Disney Pictures film studio. It is proved that the “Disney boom” of perestroika was not an introduction of something radically new into Soviet culture, but a reactualization of the transfer of the first half of the 20th century.