SUMMARY:

Lipovetsky’s article “Knowing Lemons” discusses the cultural importance of the 1959 U.S. National Exhibit in Moscow. The article focuses on the details of the famous Khrushchev–Nixon “kitchen debate” as it is rendered in the memoirs of the two main participants. The main cultural impact of the exhibit as well as the main trigger for the debate is associated with the shift in the Cold War competition manifested by the exhibit. Instead of presenting the competition in the sphere of military power, the exhibit presented the magic of consumerism, and in this field the Soviet Union’s defeat was predestined.