title: Power flows to rap flows : power dynamics within the cultural sphere of Putin’s Russia
abstract: In the weeks after Novaya Gazeta published a petition retaliating against the Russian government’s annexation of Crimea in early 2014, cultural leaders who had signed this petition began to find themselves labelled across the majority of Russian media as “Nazi sympathizers” and “traitors.” As these slanders in the media worsened, venues all over Russia began to cancel these same artists’ public appearances. This phenomenon of apparent repression that swept throughout Russia following the publica