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Contact

• workRoom C41 Trent
  University Park
  Nottingham
  NG7 2RD
  UK
• work0115 95 15966
• polly.mcmichael@nottingham.ac.uk

Expertise Summary

• Soviet and post-Soviet popular music
• 20th and 21st century Russian culture

Teaching Summary

• Exploration in Liberal Arts (LIBA1003)
• Signature Project (LIBA3006)

Research Summary

My main project is a study of the phenomenon of rock stardom in the last decades of the Soviet Union. I examine rock music's creation of meaning in the Soviet context from different perspectives,… read more

Selected Publications

• MCMICHAEL, POLLY, 2013. KinoKultura.
• MCMICHAEL, POLLY, 2013. Digital Icons: Studies in Russian, Eurasian and Central European New Media. 9, 99-113
• MCMICHAEL, POLLY, 2010. Idäntutkimus: The Finnish Review of East European Studies. 3-16
• MCMICHAEL, POLLY, 2009. Popular Music and Society. 32(3), 331-350

• View all publications

Current Research

My main project is a study of the phenomenon of rock stardom in the last decades of the Soviet Union. I examine rock music's creation of meaning in the Soviet context from different perspectives, including the culture of magnitizdat and 'officially' released recordings, the significance and mythologies of live performance, the place of the verbal text in rock music, and the modes of individual and collective authorship that rock groups create. I also look at the ways in which rock music, traditionally thought of as a non-official or even oppositional form of expression, co-existed with the cultural institutions of the Soviet state.

In parallel with this research, I am working on aspects of the legacy of rock music of the Soviet era, including its incorporation into contemporary political discourse.

I welcome enquiries from research students interested in working on topics related to these, or on other aspects of cultural production under socialism or in post-socialist contexts.

Past Research

My PhD focused on the development of rock music culture in Leningrad before glasnost and on the texts, performances and personas of the singer-songwriters Boris Grebenshchikov (Akvarium) and Maik Naumenko (Zoopark). I have published articles and book chapters on rock music during the Soviet era, as well as on the representation of Soviet popular music in the Putin era and on other aspects of more recent music culture.

• POLLY MCMICHAEL, 2024. La Valle dell'Eden. 44, 17-35
• MCMICHAEL, POLLY, 2018. . In: STRUKOV, VLAD and HUDSPITH, SARAH, eds., Russian Culture in the Age of Globalization Routledge. 68-98
• MCMICHAEL, POLLY, 2017. . In: PRATO, PAOLO and HORN, DAVID, eds., Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of Popular Music of the World. Volumes VIII-XIV: Genres: Volume XI. Genres: Europe XI. Bloomsbury. 229-233
• MCMICHAEL, POLLY, 2015. ‘A room-sized ocean’: Apartments in the practice and mythology of Leningrad’s rock music. In: RISCH, WILLIAM JAY, ed., Youth and Rock in the Soviet Bloc: Youth Cultures, Music, and the State in Russia and Eastern Europe Lexington Books. 183-209
• MCMICHAEL, POLLY, 2013. Digital Icons: Studies in Russian, Eurasian and Central European New Media. 9, 99-113
• MCMICHAEL, POLLY, 2013. KinoKultura.
• MCMICHAEL, POLLY, 2010. Idäntutkimus: The Finnish Review of East European Studies. 3-16
• MCMICHAEL, POLLY, 2009. Popular Music and Society. 32(3), 331-350
• MCMICHAEL, POLLY, 2008. Imagining Soviet rock: Akvarium's 'Triangle'. In: KIVELSON, VALERIE A. and NEUBERGER, JOAN, eds., Picturing Russia: Explorations in Visual Culture Yale University Press. 239-242
• MCMICHAEL, POLLY, 2008. Translator: Studies in Intercultural Communication. 14(2), 201-228
• MCMICHAEL, POLLY, 2005. Slavonic and East European Review. 83(4), 664-684