Natalia Valerievna Kazurova,
Candidate of Historical Sciences, Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography (Kunstkamera) of the Russian Academy of Sciences,, St. Petersburg, Russia, e-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
The Сlash of Soviet Propaganda and the Traditional Way of Life in Azerbaijani Cinema of the late 1920s – mid-1930s (Case of I. Orujova’s Roles in “Sevil” and “Almaz”)
DOI: 10.31518/2618-9100-2022-5-8
The article deals with the influence of Soviet propaganda on the Azerbaijani cinema in the late 1920’s – mid-1930’s. Two films “Sevil” (1929) A. Bek-Nazarian and “Almaz” (1936) A.-R. Kuliev and G. Braginsky based on the plays of J. Jabbarly selected for this research. Films as the most important tool of agitation of Soviet model of life called on the conservative-minded Azerbaijani society to fight the elements of the pre-revolutionary system, first of all, ignorance in matters of blind adherence to the precepts of Islam and physical violence against women were condemned, and problems of health, local literacy and elimination of feudal remnants were raised. The policy of the Soviet government to promote gender equality in the country is the central theme of both films. The transformation of the female image from a girl deprived of rights and dependent on the laws of adat to the type of a free Soviet Komsomol member is analyzed in the article through the context of sociocultural and ideological factors. As a result, it was revealed that by the end of the 1920’s – mid-1930’s two mythosemantic positions were combined in the image of female characters. On the one hand, a revolutionary “heroic” type of a girl opposing society and traditions was outlined, and, on the other hand, it merged with the image of an attractive and careful young woman, associated with the motive of motherhood and family. In addition, the study shows that Azerbaijani films fit into the canon of Stalin’s socialist realism, and at the same time these films are permeated with the local national specifics of the region, which contributed to their more effective impact on the audience.
Publishing: 28/10/2022
The article has been received by the editor on 28/07/2022
How to cite: Kazurova N.V. The Сlash of Soviet Propaganda and the Traditional Way of Life in Azerbaijani Cinema of the late 1920s – mid-1930s (Case of I. Orujova’s Roles in “Sevil” and “Almaz”) // Historical Courier, 2022, No. 5 (25), pp. 103–115. [Available online: http://istkurier.ru/data/2022/ISTKURIER-2022-5-08.pdf]
The research was carried out at the expense of the grant of the Russian Science Foundation (RNF) No. 21-18-00518 “Cinema Atlas of the USSR: The Experience of Positioning a Multinational state” (https://rscf.ru/project/21-18-00518/).
Links: Issue 5 2022
Keywords: film; cinema; Azerbaijan; islam; adat; sharia; gender; propaganda; USSR