Russian Literature At the Head of "Younger Brothers" (An Episode of Contemporary History of Russian School Education)

Today the expression "Soviet colonialism" is already relatively well-established; however, going forward, its use will run into an important counterargument: The national policy of the USSR in many cases had a character of "positive discrimination," that is, support of national minorities. Several components of Soviet cultural policy, however, were in fact reminiscent of classical colonialism, especially from the second half of the 1930s, when the most "authentic" representatives of the majority of the "peoples of the USSR" in the public space were artists from the folkloric genres singers, storytellers, dancers, etc. An archaization of the public images of the cultures of national minorities occurred. This policy was partially compensated for in 1960s, but in the 2010s, this arrangement of contemporary culture "older brother" vs. the folklore "little brothers" was unexpectedly reborn during the creation of the "list of 100 books" for Russian schools, compiled by philologists and staff of the Presidential Administration of the Russian Federation.