Stereotypes and Archetypes in Situations of Precarity

• In Event: Borderlands and Cultural Boundaries in Imperial and Contemporary Russia

Abstract

This paper examines stereotypes and archetypes and explains that identifying these can be a method of learning and understanding many social phenomena, including cross-cultural relations. To illustrate, I analyze some examples of stereotypization about the “borderlands” and how they might be applied to propaganda, cultural diplomacy and other public discourses. For example, the statement, “Russia is the ‘successor’ of the U.S.S.R. and that is why it has a right to decide what to do in its former territories,” relies upon the stereotype of a successor/inheritor/descendant and the psychological association of similarity.

Author

• Aliona Ivanova, Peoples’ Friendship U of Russia (Russia)