Authors

Discussion

One of the crucial elements of the post-socialist transition was a reorganization of the social structure in line with the new capitalist order. Playing out mainly in the economic sphere, the realignment of class forces was also visible in the field of cultural production and discourse. Whereas in the early post socialist period one can observe a strict symbolic dominance of the middle classes and an almost total invisibility of the lower classes (the urban working class and rural popular class), since the early mid 2000’s one can observe a growing interest amongst cultural producers in portraying characters and communities which do not fall in line with the prevailing image of “middleclassness.” In this presentation, I will analyze a particular genre of contemporary television – the docusoap – and its ambivalent class politics. I will focus on the ways in which they represent class difference, in particular the fine line between the increasingly precarious Polish lower middle class and the popular classes. I will argue that one of the primary affective instincts of the middle classes addressed by the show is the fear of downward mobility and the desire for upward mobility. These emotions are addressed through complex narrative formulas.