Child Sacrifice in the Soviet Press
Sensationalism and the "Sectarian" in the Post-Stalin Era
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3285226 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Miriam Dobson (Senior Lecturer at the University of Sheffield, where she has worked since 2004., corresponding author) |
| Year | 2014 |
| Volume | 73 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 237-259 |
| Publication date | 2014-04-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The Russian Review (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0036-0341 • E-ISSN: 1467-9434 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1111/russ.10728 |
| OpenAlex | W2051274043 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 6 |
| References cited | 8 |
The blood libel is normally associated with anti-Semitic traditions, but in Soviet atheist propaganda of the 1950s and early 1960s it was evangelical Christians who were accused of ritually killing young children. In the existing scholarly literature, the anti-religious campaigns of the Khrushchev era tend to be explained in terms of a quest for scientific, rational modernity, but by focusing on the blood libel I uncover a rather more sensationalist dimension to them. The shocking and emotive stories and images found in the press and other published materials had a powerful impact on the popular imagination, and even when the Soviet government criticized such approaches after 1964, fears of a "sectarian" conspiracy remained. Drawing on two case-studies from the archives, I examine in detail the legal proceedings, the press coverage, and public reactions and I suggest that belief in the blood libel should be understood not only in terms of concerns over religious boundaries but also, and perhaps primarily, in relation to anxiety about the safety of children
Art · Emotive · Epistemology · Government (linguistics) · Literature · Media studies · Modernity · Political science · Psychoanalysis · Relation (database) · Sacrifice · Sensationalism · Sociology · Theology · History · Law · Philosophy · Psychology · Religious studies · Vietnamese History and Culture Studies
Fear and Childhood Victimisation in Atheistic Discourse during the Khrushchev Era
The “Lived Religion” of Evangelical Christian-Baptist Women in Soviet Siberia (1945–1991)
The Social Scientist Meets the “Believer
The prophet on trial
Protestant women in the late Soviet era
Between Repression, Chaos and Uncertainty
The Russian Press from Brezhnev to Yeltsin
Khrushchev's anti‐religious policy and the campaign of 1954
The Social Scientist Meets the “Believer
Power and the Sacred in Revolutionary Russia
Overcoming Peasant Backwardness
Antireligious Propaganda in the Soviet Union
Witchcraft Beliefs and Practices in Prerevolutionary Russian and Ukrainian Villages
Soviet Evangelicals Since World War II
| Unique citing works | 6 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0.55 |
| Citation span | 2015 - 2025 (11) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 6 |