During the Cold War, cultural diplomacy emerged as an important aspect of relations between states across the globe. Exhibitions, concerts, performances, book readings, and film screenings captured the ideological message of each side, as they showed conflicting “ways of life” in the global Cold War context. Based on Theodora Dragostinova’s recent book, The Cold War from the Margins: A Small Socialist State on the Global Cultural Scene, this talk interrogates the importance of Cold War culture in a global perspective, tracing the cultural contacts of small Bulgaria from the British Museum and NYC’s Metropolitan to New Lexington, Ohio, to Mexico City, New Delhi, and Lagos.

Panel:

Nicholas Breyfogle | Associate Professor, Department of History; Director, Goldberg Center

Theodora Dragostinova | Associate Professor, Department of History

A transcript of this podcast is available at https://origins.osu.edu/listen/history-talk/cultural-diplomacy-and-global-cold-war