Resistance through culture (also calledcultural resistance,resistance through the aesthetic,[1] orintellectual resistance)[2] is a form ofnonconformism. It is notopen dissent, but a discreet stance.[3]
A revolt "so well hidden that it seems nonexistent",[4] it is a quest "to extend the boundaries of official tolerance, either by adopting a line considered by authorities to be ideologically suspect, or by highlighting certain contemporary social problems, or both."[3] Criticized for being "utopian, and thus inadequate to the realities of that age",[5] during the time of theCommunist regimes in Europe, it was also a surviving formula, a modality for writers and artists to cheat Communist censorship without going the whole way into open political opposition.[6][7]
One of the most sharply criticized phrases inpost-revolutionary Romania,[8] considered to be not much more than "blowing in the wind" by Romanian-born GermanNobel literature prize winnerHerta Müller,[9] and "not only resignation [...] but complicity with the terrorist communism" by Romanian exiled writerPaul Goma,[10] so-called "resistance through culture" has often been linked toConstantin Noica's so-called "Păltiniș School".[11]
In the fine arts,Corneliu Baba, among others, is sometimes considered to be an example of a painter who was nonconformist in this way.[12]
^abMcDermott, Kevin; Stibe, Matthew (eds.).Revolution and Resistance in Eastern Europe: Challenges to Communist Rule. Oxford, New York: Berg. pp. 90, 91.ISBN978-1-84520-258-3.
^Bradatan, Costica; Oushakine, Serguei Alex., eds. (2010).In Marx's Shadow: Knowledge, Power and Intellectuals in Eastern Europe and Russia. Plymouth, UK: Lexington Books. p. 54.ISBN978-0-7391-3624-9.
^Cesereanu, Ruxandra (2005)."Memorie si exil" (in Romanian). romaniaculturala.ro. Archived fromthe original on 2015-09-24. Retrieved10 Aug 2015.
^Copoeru, Ion; Sepp, Hans Rainer, eds. (2007).Phenomenology 2005: Selected Essays from the Euro-Mediterranean Area, Part 1. Zeta Books. p. 74.
^Behring, Eva; Brandt, Juliane; Dozsai, Monika; Kliems, Alfrun; Richter, Ludwig; Trepte, Hans-Christian (2004).Grundbegriffe und Autoren ostmitteleuropäischen Exilliteraturen 1945-1989 Ein Beitrag zur Systematisierung und Typologisierung (in German). Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag. p. 641.
