Shaping of the Images of the Future in the USSR through the Lense of Non-fiction Magazines during the Thaw Period

The images of the future during the Khrushchev Thaw in the USSR represent various forms in which people saw changes in various fields of life in their country both in the long run and the short run. One of the possible channels for spreading the images of the future were non-fiction magazines. This paper analyzes the way those magazines reflected the official rhetoric of the Soviet government in terms of the expectations of the future. The official discourse is studied through the documents of the Congresses of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and through «The Third Program of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union». «Nauka i Zhizn», «Tekhnika Molodezhi», and «Znanie Sila» were chosen, as they were the most popular non-fiction magazines at the time. The comparison of these two groups of sources led to the conclusion that the degree of influence of the authorities of the USSR on non-fiction magazines was quite high. However, that does not mean that there was no room for discrepancies representing slightly different images of the future.