Dariusz Brzostek, ‘Collecting Vinyl Records Behind the Iron Curtain: Piracy, Technology and Social Network’

The collecting of vinyl records and music tapes in communist Poland was prohibitively expensive, not to mention that official releases of recordings by Western artists hardly existed in the 1970s and 1980s. As a result, informal social networks of listeners and collectors emerged in the spheres of economic collaboration (purchasing of expensive original releases), recording practices (coming together to copy music from original sources with high quality audiophile gear), distribution (sharing records and tapes) and social status (people who could not afford to assemble original releases and sought contact with other collectors). This lecture will examine the unique confluence of economic, technological and social factors that shaped the anthropology of communication through music in communist Poland.

Dariusz Brzostek is an associate professor of cultural studies at Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń, Poland.