The Bolsheviks seized power in Russia with the October Revolution of 1917 and began the process of establishing a new society. Propaganda is used to influence the public in this process, and posters were an important tool in the propaganda toolbox. The archetypes of “otherness” in Soviet propaganda posters are the subject of this research. The goal of this research is to discover how otherness archetypes are used in the narrative structure of Soviet propaganda posters. To accomplish this goal, the study will conduct a review of pertinent literature and examine the characteristics and transformation of the Soviet Union's marginalizing images on posters. Additionally, the study will identify marginalizing elements and the manner in which they are used.
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Vladimir Ilyich Ulianov (Lenin) led the Bolshevik Revolution that overthrew the tsarist Russian regime in 1917. The Bolsheviks actively disseminated propaganda in order to gain control of this multicultural and multilingual geography, which was home to a diverse range of ethnic groups. In Russia, this system change resulted in significant changes. As a result, a new societal-building process began in Soviet geography. The locomotive of this process was propaganda.
From the Bolshevik revolution to 1991, posters were a vital part of the Soviet Union's mass media. The posters were successful in influencing and changing society. Posters mirrored the regime's philosophy as a political propaganda tool. Other ideas, on the other hand, were censored on the posters (Kall, 2003, p. 90). Posters have played an important role in the social, economic, political, and cultural structuring of society as ideological weapons. The public was educated about the images and ideas of the time period through posters. Political, social, and economic issues were depicted on posters with visual messages by the Soviet administration, and this effort contributed significantly to public awareness.
Artists who had previously worked in a variety of fields and styles of artistic expression began to create posters that were bright, professional, persuasive, and, most importantly, psychologically effective (Afonskij, 2016, p. 161). The effectiveness and accessibility of poster language are enhanced by a large number of hidden symbols that operate in a person's collective unconscious. The challenger elements are visually present on the posters in the posters. From an artistic standpoint, the Bolsheviks attempted to impose these inner and outer challenger elements on the public through their policies.
The Bolsheviks did not hesitate to create new values or reinterpret old ones in order to shape the new Soviet people. They have persuaded the public to adopt their values rather than the values of marginalized groups through propaganda posters. The people were asked to accept the system by seeing a happy and judicious state image on propaganda posters. Posters became an educational tool for the Soviet Union at this point. Education and propaganda were complementary wholes for the Bolsheviks as well (Barghorn, 1964, p. 3).
In politics, every word spoken is transformed into the truth without any critical filtering, and beliefs, convictions, and prejudices have taken precedence over reason. The concept of 'post-truth' is born in politics in this way. The truth is trivialized in politics and reflected back to the public as a deception (Karadağ, 2019, p. 4). During the Soviet era, poster artists' work expanded beyond the artistic works of gifted masters to become a tool for agitation and propaganda. This dramatic, satirical, joyful evocative (Afonskij, 2016: p. 160) was the marginalizing element in the narrative pages during the difficult trials of the Russian people in the twentieth century.
While some propaganda posters in the Soviet Union revealed the new system's values, others stigmatized the marginalized. In this regard, the focus of the research will be on these marginalizing elements in posters.