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This article examines the ways in which working class participants are shamed in Czech Reality TV programmes. Previous research demonstrates that everyday Reality TV is an exercise in neoliberal governmentality and respective technology of the self, which advances the idea of the entrepreneurial self as a capital investment project and a brand. The article seeks to illuminate the process of stigmatisation of those who do not comply with these norms in the cultural setting of post-socialist neoliberalism. It builds on the arguments contending that neoliberal capitalism was implemented in the post-socialist part of Europe with higher momentum and stronger hegemonic power than in the West. The research looks at the acts of shaming working classes in three different Reality TV programmes as the dynamics through which class positions are moulded in a culture with a yet emerging class structure. The qualitative analysis of shaming interactions reveals that a working class position in the post-socialist cultural setting is articulated predominantly to excessive preservation of habits dating back to the period of socialism or, however, insufficient employment of the innovations and opportunities brought about by capitalism. Qualitative clustering of the targets of shaming resulted in four different types of self – marketised self, depaternalised self, unclassed self and (desperately) inegalitarian self – which the analysed Reality TV programmes endorse as the ideal facets of post-socialist personhood. The master homology between the genre of makeover reality show and post-socialism is detected as both systems are entrenched in the values of a complete overhaul of an individual or society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores uses and modalities of the concept of post-socialist nostalgia in the still emerging field of cultural studies focused on the region of Central and Eastern Europe. It encapsulates both the cultural and socio-political forms of post-socialist nostalgia, defined as tinkering with the remnants of the socialist popular culture, television, fashion or design and reminiscing about social welfare under Communist Party rule. The main aim of this theoretical article is to demonstrate the anti-hegemonic dimension of post-socialist nostalgia, which disturbed the official memory politics that promoted discontinuity with the socialist past in the early post-transformation period of the 1990s. The dynamics in Czechoslovakia/Czech Republic in this period are presented to illuminate how discontinuity in memory politics was embedded in retroactive justice, legislation, the economy, etc. In contrast to these elitist discourses reducing the memory of socialism to its crimes, the pop-cultural post-socialist nostalgia (the lowbrow discourse less strictly policed for discontinuity) served as the venue through which continuity with socialism was redeemed. Reunion with one’s own past and reclaiming the right to remember the past fully is presented as a source of cultural pleasure, the backbone of both types of post-socialist nostalgia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this article is to map out and analyse how the viewers of the communist-governed Czechoslovak television understood the propagandist television serials during the so-called normalization, the last two decades of communist party rule after the Prague Spring. It strives to show peculiarities of the research on television viewers’ capabilities to remember the meanings and details of hermeneutic agency which took place in the past. The article argues that – in contrast to the mainstream historiography which claims full depoliticization of Czechoslovak people as a consequence of post-Prague Spring disillusionment – the uses of popular culture provided niches in which the political could be experienced. The role of reproductive memory in remembering the viewers’ experience buried under the grand socio-political switchover is also illuminated and used to coin the concept of ‘memory over dislocation’. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented which the authors discuss issues within the "Debates" section of the periodical such as different intensities of participation matter, online interaction and participation, and fan translation practices.

This theoretical essay explores the possibilities of applying the concept of "popular citizenship" to the study of enclaves of agency in the authoritarian socialist system in Czechoslovakia in its "norma!ization" period. It draws on the assumption that some part of the agency was potentially stimulated by the use of popular culture. First, the ways in which the discourse of cultural studies adopted the notion of citizenship (and how it transposed it to the cultural/popular citizenship) is reviewed. Popular citizenship is then defined as the process of becoming aware of the matters in dispute via contents of popular culture. The essay argues that polysemy and semiosis (important ingredients of popular citizenship) did not seize to exist after the authoritarian systems had been established. Popular citizenship is therefore introduced as a subtile but possible compensation for the classical tripartite citizenship in the authoritarian socialism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article seeks to identify and explain the rerunning and 're-watching' of socialist television serials in the Czech Republic. Using empirical data concerned with the continuity/discontinuity of viewing habits, as well as providing historical and cultural perspective on the shifting broadcasting context, it considers post-socialist nostalgia to be an overarching concept and emphasises its role in fostering a collective memory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Assesses the kind of support given to the film industry in Europe. Opportunity of watching inaccessible films in the Karlovy Vary Film Festival; Domination of Hollywood in the film industry; Problems of producing films from distribution.

Focuses on the tourist trade in Czech Republic. Behavior of Czechs in travelling abroad; Geographic distribution of foreign visitors; Characteristics of Czech traveler.

Focuses on the position of the European film industry and its culture. Resemblance of competition between Hollywood and European films to David and Goliath; Different definition of entertainment from filmmakers in Europe; Effect of culture adaptation on aspects like cultural film productions.

Focuses on efforts of politicians to hold up media funding in the Czech Republic. Awareness of Czech politicians on the necessity of amending law number 273/1993 Sb; Function of Czech AudioVisual Center (CAC) as media desk; Reality of funding from Czech film and television producers.