Article:
Modern and Folk Sports in Central Asia under Lenin and Stalin: Uzbekistan 1925 to 1952
Vakanuvis – International Journal of Historical Researches, 2019
Soviet physical culture was a soft power tool used to create healthy and patriotic citizen-soldiers and help modernise the urban Soviet Union: one key strand of this was modern sports. Josef Stalin (Communist Party leader from 1925 to 1953) imposed the physical culture and sports culture on society and had it institutionalised. Moreover, except for policy revisions, the institutions of his sports model continued until the mid-1980s. This paper will investigate the impact of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (established 1925, hereafter Communist Party) through sport in Uzbekistan Soviet Socialist Republic (hereafter Uzbekistan). Critically reading selected Cold War and contemporary studies, we explore the acculturation and integration role of the Soviet sports culture in multicultural Uzbekistan from1925 to1952. In this interdisciplinary paper, we ask: What was the impact of Soviet sports in Uzbekistan? How and why did Lenin and Stalin reposition folk sports in society? The themes examined include the concept of Soviet sports, folk sports, and the development and impact of modern sports culture.
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Sevket Hylton Akyildiz 