Question (in thread form) about race and Orientalism in the USSR:

At the recent #aseees2019 conference, I was struck by the audience& #39;s laughter. For example, an art historian pointed out that Soviet illustrations of African-American children in modern settings included...

incongruous palm trees, and the audience laughed. Historians pointed out that, despite overtly anti-racist rhetoric, Soviet writers and artists employed racist tropes x, y, and z. Each time a racist image was displayed, many in the audience laughed.

I guessed that the laughter was a reflection of U.S. political correctness and discomfort upon seeing/hearing the tropes themselves. A friend and colleague tells me this laughter is particularly audible at Slavist conferences and argued that it was partly Cold War legacy:

Look! The USSR proclaimed liberation and ended up with the Gulag, the Bolsheviks proclaimed themselves anti-racist and drew racist cartoons.

I still am unsure about the laughter. Seems rather predictable that traditions of racist and Orientalist thought were difficult to break.

Oh, right. Happy Thanksgiving. Just got off a 14-hour flight, on which I was still stuck in thoughts about the conference. Back in Turkey now, not planning to have any turkey - hence the post on an old topic.