The Discourse on Humour in the Romanian Press Between 1948-1965
SLOVO, VOL. 31, NO. 2 (SUMMER 2018), 17-47 DOI: 10.14324/111.0954-6839.081 The Discourse on Humour in the Romanian Press between 1948-1965 EUGEN CONSTANTIN IGNAT University of Bucharest INTRODUCTION Once the official proclamation of the Romanian People’s Republic takes place, on the 30th of December 1947, the process of imposing new cultural values on society gradually permeates all areas of Romanian social life. Humour also becomes part of this process of transforming the social and cultural life, often regarded as a powerful weapon with which to attack ‘old’ bourgeois mentalities. According to Hans Speier, the official type of humour promoted by an authoritarian regime is political humour, which contributes to maintain the existent social order, or plays its part in changing it – all depending on those holding the reins over mass- media.1 Taking the Soviet Union as a model, the Romanian new regime imposes an official kind of humour, created through mass-media: the press, the radio, literature, cinematography, and television. This paper analyses the Romanian discourse on humour, reflected in the press, between 1948-1965,2 in cultural magazines3 such as Contemporanul (1948-1965), Probleme de 1 Hans Speier, ‘Wit and politics. An essay on laughter and power,’ American Journal of Sociology, 103 (1998), p.1353. 2 This period represents the first phase in the history of the communist regime in Romania. After a transitional period (1944-1947), the year 1948 marks the establishment of the communist regime in Romania. Through a series of political, economic, social, and cultural measures, such as the adoption of a new Constitution, banning of opposition parties, nationalization of the means of production, radical transformation of the education system or ‘Sovietisation’ of culture, the new regime radically transforms Romanian society.
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