Gender, culture and repression in Communist Romania: the feminine literary circles under the surveillance of the Securitate
Gender, culture and repression in Communist Romania: the feminine literary circles under the surveillance of the Securitate

Summary/Abstract: The present study aims to offer a social and cultural analysis of the feminine literary circles in communist Romania during the 1950s through two case studies: the German literary group from Sibiu and the literary circle from Baia Mare. The analysis aims to focus on the symbolic and cultural relations of the intellectual groups involved in the Securitate’s action of surveillance and control in order to offer a new perspective on the dynamics between the agents of the cultural field during the communist regime. The research hypothesis claims that interwar feminine intellectuals who were educated and socialized in the "old bourgeois regime", were repressed by the Securitate through the interpretation of informal meetings as "hostile actions" that presumably endangered the cultural line of the regime. The case studies showed that the gender element neither influenced nor changed the Securitate’s methods of convicting the surveilled female intellectuals compared to men. The preliminary conclusion states that literary circles became instruments for the narrative construction of the political trials filed against targeted writers between 1958-1961. The Securitate distorted the cultural character of these forms of association by signifying them with subversive political motivations, regardless of their gender composition. Future research may consider literary circles avatars of interpersonal socialization under the form of informal meetings that combined elements of everyday small talks with bursts of cultural activities.

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