ABSTRACT
Because the theoretical framework of cultural studies has developed in Western Europe and North America, it is perhaps natural that its primary focus has been advanced capitalist society. Additionally, because of the presence and impact of anthropology on this multidisciplinary inquiry into cultures and—not unrelated to this—the political pull of the so-called third world, cultural studies has had a lot to say about the dominated or colonized “Other” as well, focusing on the cultural interaction between capitalist and traditional societies. Yet those societies which until quite recently have been the site of “existing socialism” have been left virtually unexplored by cultural studies. I have wondered whether this apparent lack of interest might be due to Western leftists’ ambivalence towards these societies: are they perceived as sites of a compromised, abused, and now defeated Utopia? Could there have been a fear that a critical stance towards these political systems (while they were still socialist) would threaten the distinctive political edge of cultural studies and Western leftism vis-à-vis the dominant discourse on socialism in their own society? Whatever inhibitions have rendered the so-called second world as a virtually blank space, it is obvious that cultural studies research on this part of the world is important and that researchers in Eastern and Central Europe can make fundamental contributions. This essay is a beginning.
