ABSTRACT
This chapter examine how the Russian media environment of the 2010s constitutes a space of appearance: a site where the world becomes visible, Others appear in people's everyday, and politics of belonging is enacted. It examines the following structure: a historical contextualization of media developments in late-Soviet and post-Soviet Russia; an analysis of the Russian media environment of the 2010s as a site for politics of belonging, structured along the three dimensions of containment, amplification and contestation; a discussion which assesses the findings of the analysis in relation to the complex question of the audience. The chapter explores how Russian media in the 2010s constitute a space of appearance where politics of belonging is enacted. Russian politics has for decades been inhabited by flamboyant personalities deploying a grotesquely exaggerated and often hyperaggressive rhetoric. It also examines how visibility is regulated and contested in this empirical context.
