The essay traces the origins and development of Soviet area studies from their inception in the early 1940s to the present. The first part examines the institutional framework and the funding sources for Soviet and post-Soviet area studies. The second part concentrates on the connection between area studies and the disciplines. Next, the authors consider intellectual trends and map the major changes that have taken place in the conceptualization of Soviet area studies from the Second World War to the collapse of the USSR. The final section provides an overview of the formation of post-Soviet area studies. The focus of the inquiry is Soviet and post-Soviet area studies in the United States. The paper argues that the institutional context for the study of the region has not changed dramatically since the collapse of communism (despite some changes in nomenclature and the inclusion of "Eurasian" studies). By contrast, the intellectual agenda in both Soviet and post-Soviet studies and the disciplinary distribution of specialists have undergone significant modifications during the past decade.

The theater played an essential role in the making of the Soviet system. Its sociological interest not only lies in how it reflected contemporary society and politics: the theater was an integral part of society and politics. As a preeminent institution in the social and cultural life of Moscow, the theater was central to transforming public consciousness from the time of 1905 Revolution. The analysis of a selected set of theatrical premieres from the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917 to the end of Cultural Revolution in 1932 examines the values, beliefs, and attitudes that defined Soviet culture and the revolutionary ethos. The stage contributed to creating, reproducing, and transforming the institutions of Soviet power by bearing on contemporary experience.

The power of the dramatic theater issued from artistic conventions, the emotional impact of theatrical productions, and the extensive intertextuality between theatrical performances, the press, propaganda, politics, and social life. Reception studies of the theatrical premieres address the complex issue of the spectator's experience of meaning--and his role in the construction of meaning. The evolving historical context and the changing institutional foundations of theater altered the interpretive contexts of performance. The discussion of interpretive communities and audience tastes draws on reviews in the contemporary press and the data from theater surveys conducted during the 1920s.

The theaters continually sought to align their aesthetics with the demands of the regime and the preferences of theatergoing publics. In addition, ideology served as a form of currency in the polemics among theater directors and theater critics who were engaged in the contest for dominance in the theater world. The theater spectator became a central ideological figure invoked by warring interpretive communities in these ongoing dialogues of power. The theater became politicized under Soviet rule; under Stalin it became a deformed expression of mass politics.