Vlasta (magazine)

Last updated

Vlasta
CategoriesWomen's magazine
FrequencyWeekly
Founder Milada Horáková
Founded1947
CountryThe Czech Republic
Based in Prague
Language Czech
Website Vlasta
1954 issue Vlasta - front page (no. 1, 1954).png
1954 issue

Vlasta is a weekly women's magazine which has been in circulation since 1947. The magazine is headquartered in Prague, the Czech Republic. Its title is a reference to a female warrior from an Old Czech legend. [1] It was the most popular publication of the Communist era in the country. [2]

Contents

History and profile

Vlasta was established by Milada Horáková in 1947. [1] [3] Its establishment was supported by the Council of Czech Women which was a commission of experts. [4] The cover of its first issue featured Edvard Beneš and his wife Hana Beneš. [1] It is published on a weekly basis. [5]

During the Communist period Vlasta was under the state control via the Czechoslovak Women's Union (CSWU). [5] The CSWU was also its publisher. [6] From the late 1960s it became relatively less dependent on the CSWU. [5] During this period it covered articles on feminism, but this phase ended in 1969 when the magazine was subject to strict censorship. [7] Vlasta reinforced the goals of the state in regard to the increase of the birth rate and diminishing the women's burden of formal labor and domestic work. [5] In line with the former the magazine published anti-abortion articles in the 1950s and 1960s. [2] It published the memos of the CSWU functioning as its spokesman. [5] [8]

Vlasta had the second highest circulation in 1968 after the Rudé právo newspaper. [5] As a result, its page number was increased from 16 to 32 in February 1968. [5] The magazine enjoyed higher levels of circulation until 1989. [5] Then it began to be published by a private company. [5]

As of 2006 Vlasta was described as a conservative women's magazine focusing on topics related to the roles of women's as a mother and a spouse. [3]

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References

  1. 1 2 3 "O časopisu Vlasta". Vlasta (in Czech). Retrieved 3 April 2024.
  2. 1 2 Radka Dudová; Hana Hašková (2023). "Obedient mothers, healthy children: communication on the risks of reproduction in state-socialist Czechoslovakia". Medical Humanities . 49 (2): 227–228. doi:10.1136/medhum-2022-012498. PMID   36810308.
  3. 1 2 Jane Tune (2006). An investigation into the portrayal by the magazine Vlasta of the roles of Czech women within the public and private spheres, 1989-2000 (MA(R) thesis). Kingston University.
  4. Sharon L. Wolchik (1981). "Elite Strategy Toward Women in Czechoslovakia: Liberation or Mobilization?". Studies in Comparative Communism. 14 (2/3): 128. JSTOR   45367402.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Julia Mead; Kristen Ghodsee (2017). "Debating Gender in State Socialist Women's Magazines: The Cases of Bulgaria and Czechoslovakia". History of Communism in Europe. 8: 18–19. doi:10.5840/hce201782.
  6. Alena Heitlinger (1979). Women and State Socialism. Sex inequality in the Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia. London: Palgrave Macmillan. p. 68. doi:10.1007/978-1-349-04567-9. ISBN   978-1-349-04567-9.
  7. Jacqui True (2005). "Book review". Czech Sociological Review. 41 (6): 1122. JSTOR   41132247.
  8. Michaela Appeltova (2019). Did the Body Have a Cold War? Gendered Bodies and Embodied Experiences in Late Socialist Czechoslovakia (Ph.D. thesis). University of Chicago. p. 49.