Hippies in Ukraine in the 1960s–1980s as a manifestation of distinct identity (A Case Study of the Lviv Youth Milieu)

Abstract

Abstract. The aim of the article is to conceptualise the identification practices and forms of self-identification among representatives of youth hippie communities in the Ukrainian SSR during the 1960s–1980s within the triangle of interaction between Ukrainian, Soviet (communist), and global (Western, cosmopolitan) identities and their associated cultural codes. Special attention is paid to the hippie milieu of Lviv as a unique space of cultural mutual influence and the synthesis of a distinctive combined identity. The author reveals the historical and cultural factors that influenced the formation of the identity of representatives of the city’s informal communities, and deepens scientific knowledge regarding the factors affecting the self-identification and cultural life of the youth in the Ukrainian SSR in the 1960s–1980s. The scientific novelty of the work lies in the comprehensive analysis of the hybrid identity of hippie communities in the Ukrainian SSR through the prism of the interaction of its various dimensions. For the first time, an attempt has been made to systematically interpret Lviv hippies as bearers of a complex identity that emerged at the intersection of transnational cultural influences and the local socio-cultural context. An interpretation of hippie cultural practices as an independent space for constructing identity, rather than merely subcultural or protest phenomena, is proposed. Conclusions. The identity of young representatives of the hippie subculture in the Ukrainian SSR, particularly the hippie communities of Lviv, was neither monolithic nor one-dimensional. It constituted a complex, truly hybrid social construct. The undertaken research allows this identity to be viewed as the result of the mutual influence of several factors: the global countercultural metanarrative; the forced functioning within the Soviet totalitarian system, which prompted young people towards internal emigration and the search for alternatives; and the noticeable impact of the Ukrainian cultural field, which imparted specific national features to the local communities of a subculture that was cosmopolitan by nature.