homo sovieticus

Translingual

Alternative forms

Etymology

Coined in 1982 by the philosopher Alexander Zinoviev; Contemporary Latin for “Soviet man”, a calque of colloquial Russian сове́тский челове́к (sovétskij čelovék) modelled on taxonomic names like Homo sapiens.

Pronunciation
  • (Classical) IPA(key): [ˈhɔ.moː sɔ.wiˈɛ.t̪ɪ.kʊs]

Noun

homo sovieticus m (plural homines sovietici)

  1. (usually derogatory) A person molded by having lived in the Soviet Union or Eastern Bloc, variously characterized as passively conformist, apathetic, rootless, etc.
    • 2017 September 5, Michael Gentile, Dmytro Potekhin, “Beyond Homo Sovieticus: Soviet identity as a weapon of mass deconstruction”, in New Eastern Europe‎ (in English):
      Homines Sovietici represent, to put it differently, the human left-overs of socialism. An alternative non-ideological interpretation of homines sovietici is that they are individuals who responded in different ways to the rules and norms of the system which they were forced to navigate, just like in any other society. […]

Translations

See also
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