The attitude of museums to socialism in the period of bulgarian transition to democracy

Abstract

The museum stands for a social and cultural testimonial deposit of history, which is greatly influenced by the State policy of the country. During communism, throughout many countries of Eastern Europe, museums played an ideological part, enforcing the Marxist-Leninist dogma and the socialist lifestyle into the people’s minds. Nowadays, Bulgaria does not possess a socialist-profiled museum; however, there are institutions, museums, and temporary exhibitions, both State-owned and private, that display communist artifacts. The article herein sets off to describe them both in a few words and resort to a few pictures. It also aims at emphasizing their role, which is to analytically and critically point to the past ideologies and events, to the past culture and civilization, in order to synthesize and build a glorious future.