What can be cooked from squid: fast and tasty

The word "culture" comes from the Latin word "colere", which means to cultivate, cultivate the soil. In the Middle Ages, the word came to mean a progressive method of cultivating cereals. Thus arose the term "agrikulture" or the art of agriculture.

In the XVIII - XIX centuries. it began to be used in relation to people. If a person was distinguished by elegance of manners, erudition, he was considered "cultured". Then this concept was applied mainly to aristocrats in order to separate them from the "uncivilized" common people.

In the future, the word "culture" received a generalized meaning and they began to call everything that was created by man.

With this approach, culture appears as a "second nature" created by man, built on top of the first, natural nature, as the entire world created by man. Culture includes the results of material and spiritual production.

This is a general philosophical approach to culture.

In sociology, in general terms, culture is understood as a system of values ​​and rules of behavior common to people associated with a certain way of life.

Culture is formed as an important mechanism of human interaction, which helps people to live in their own environment, to maintain the unity and integrity of the community when interacting with other communities.

In culture as a social phenomenon, one should distinguish: 1) culture itself, as a mobile and elusive "ether", spreading over all aspects of our life; 2) the process of incarnation of culture; 3) specific forms (products) of the embodiment of culture; 4) the process of familiarization with culture and its transmission from generation to generation.

Let's look briefly at each of these four aspects.

1. a) The possibility of creating a "second nature" is associated with consciousness. In work, in politics, in everyday life, in the perception of artistic values ​​- everywhere we are dealing with the knowledge, abilities, skills of people, their values, traditions, etc.

Culture as a phenomenon is woven from consciousness, its elements.

b) At the same time, culture is not consciousness in general, not its individual elements, but a way, a method of value-based assimilation of reality.

In search of satisfaction of his needs (material, spiritual, etc.), a person is faced with the need to evaluate phenomena, the means to achieve them in terms of benefit and harm, good and evil, permissible and forbidden. In other words, active, practically meaningful activity immediately puts a person in a position in which he must determine the value for himself that he needs. For people, these values ​​can be different (for some - money, for others - moral impeccability, for others - science, etc.). Each person, personality has a certain value hierarchy, which he evaluates to one degree or another. Without this there is no motive, no conscious social action. The way, the method of revealing values ​​is culture.

c) As a method of mastering reality, culture is not a set, a simple sum of individual assessments, norms, but a certain integrity, which manifests itself in the following.

First, when we talk about culture, we mean contingency, consistency of knowledge, values, norms, preferences. The internal conjugation of culture is manifested in the form of a stable certainty in the perception of the world, an assessment of real phenomena, values ​​- mentality. Such a certainty of perception of the world can be attributed both to the whole area (society) and to an individual.

Secondly, culture as an integrity has another aspect. Culture is not a dead baggage of unclaimed skills, knowledge, beliefs, but a process, an internal activity.

2. So, culture as a way of value development of the world is embodied in the activities of people: industrial, political, social, artistic, etc. In the activities of people, two of its sides interact: internal and external. In the course of internal activity, motives are formed, the meaning that people give to their actions, the goals of actions are selected, schemes, projects are developed. It is culture as a mentality that fills internal activity with a certain system of values, offers associated choices, preferences. This manifests another quality of culture - it is a sign that organizes, determines the content, direction of people's practical activities.

In the relationship between culture and activity, attention should be paid to the following points: a) culture and determination of activity;

b) activity as an indicator of culture; c) patterns of activity as indicators of culture.

The first point comes from the fact that culture is a complex system in which external information is digested, rethought, evaluated, which directly determines how a person reacts to the impulses of the external environment, how he acts.

This is precisely the key to why representatives of different ethnic groups and peoples act differently in similar situations.

In other words, the impulses coming from the outside world, passing through the "purgatory" of culture, are deciphered in their own way.

And vice versa, all the actions of people bear a powerful imprint of the culture of a given society, people, group of people. For example, high productivity in Japan is the result of a highly developed work culture.

The second point shows that the culture of people, society should be judged not by words, statements, but by actions.

Practical activity is both the real embodiment of culture and its indicator.

The third point involves the embodiment of culture in stable, repetitive patterns of activity. Behind this are stable motives, preferences, skills and abilities. Random, non-repeating should not be attributed to culture.

How a person behaves in certain situations, how he solves problems, conflicts, when his interests are affected - all this determines the patterns of behavior established within a particular culture. Simply put, patterns of behavior are certain patterns adapted to certain situations. For example, greeting occurs differently in different cultures. It is customary for us to shake hands, and on the island of Fiji - to rub our noses. A Muslim will be surprised if he sees alcoholic drinks at a Christian commemoration at the table. When the Japanese talk about a sad event, they smile so as not to upset the listener.

And there are many such examples of patterns of behavior. Some patterns of behavior are formalized and established by regulations (court etiquette, military regulations, traffic rules, etc.)

Such concepts as models and standards of behavior, objects, works of art, etc. are close in meaning to patterns of behavior.

A model is a desired scheme, a certain image of the desired state of affairs. Accepted models become, for example, a style in architecture, art (Baroque, Empire, etc.). Models in this sense are often called standards.

3. Culture is embodied, objectified in various products of activity. Objectification should be understood as the material embodiment of culture. Here it is important to pay attention to the following circumstance. For many years it was customary to divide culture into material (machine tools, buildings, cars) and spiritual (science, morality, art). But recently, sociologists have begun to doubt the legitimacy of such a division. The reasons for these doubts are as follows. Isn't the machine the embodiment of a scientific idea and artistic taste? Isn't its design evidence of certain aesthetic attitudes, but the quality of its details - the moral culture of those who produced it?

Therefore, it would be more accurate to divide the material products of culture into material-objective ones: machine tools, automobiles, buildings, etc., in which technical knowledge, artistic tastes, and moral standards are embodied; and symbolically - iconic. By them are meant those products of culture that convey their information through words, symbols, signs and images: literature, notes, frescoes, diagrams, drawings, etc.

4. Due to the fact that culture is objectified in material-objective and sign-symbolic forms, firstly, there is a certain fixation of the historical experience of the people, the community, and secondly, culture, its meaning, technology and skills can be transferred to other people, to another generation .

Thus, culture opens up another aspect of sociological understanding: as a method of forming, with the help of the past, the accumulated experience of our current ideas.

Moreover, emphasizing continuity, one cannot thus absolutize the stability and immutability of culture. Excessive conservatism hinders the development of culture. It is important that in the culture the traditions of supporting the new are combined with reasonable conservatism, with a commitment to stability and predictability.

The continuity of culture is carried out in the process of socialization of the individual, primarily its upbringing and education. Culture, as an extrabiological phenomenon, does not generally obey the laws of genetic heredity. It can be mastered only in the course of social inheritance. That is why the cultures of behavior of people living in the same country differ so much; but in different social environments. (For example, a permanent resident of Moscow and a permanent resident of Chukotka). The mechanisms of socialization ensure the self-renewal of society, the spiritual replacement of one generation by another.

After analyzing culture as a social phenomenon, its features, we can give a more complete definition of it.

Culture is a way of spiritual development of reality, which is an integral system of stable ideas, values, norms, techniques, embodied in patterns of activity, objectified in material-objective and sign-symbolic forms, transmitted from generation to generation in the process of socialization.

The characteristic of culture as a social phenomenon was given above. However, the analysis of culture will not be complete if we do not consider the main elements of culture and their functioning.

The first and most important element is the conceptual and logical apparatus, i.e. knowledge formulated in certain concepts and representations and fixed in the language.

Let us briefly consider what language is as the most important element of culture.

First of all, language is a relay of culture. Obviously, culture is spread by both gesture and facial expressions, but language is the most capacious, accessible relay of culture.

At the same time, it is impossible to absolutize the role of language as almost the only carrier of culture. Very often, especially in the 20th century, language acts only as a means of communication. Non-Russian culture can be conveyed in Russian to some extent, while non-English culture can be conveyed in English.

The second most important element of culture are beliefs and knowledge. Institutions are a certain spiritual state, a property in which intellectual, sensual and volitional components are combined. Any beliefs include in their structure certain information, information about a given phenomenon, a norm of behavior, i.e. knowledge.

One important circumstance should be borne in mind: the connection between people's knowledge and beliefs is difficult and ambiguous. For example, doctors remind us of the "two white enemies of man" - sugar and salt, and urge us to stop or limit their use. But not all people for whom diet is very important listen to this. The same can be said about the knowledge of the laws and their violation even by law enforcement officers.

The reasons for the inconsistency of knowledge and beliefs can be different: when knowledge contradicts human development trends, when knowledge is ahead of reality, etc.

It is necessary to analyze these causes in a timely manner and take measures to eliminate them.

The third most important element of culture are values. To identify values, a person must apply certain criteria, measures by which the object will be evaluated. These criteria for evaluating the actions of objects, ideas, opinions are the main thing in culture. We will call them values.

Values ​​act, firstly, as a desirable state of social connections, the content of ideas, artistic form, etc., preferable for a given subject; secondly, as a criterion for evaluating real phenomena; thirdly, they determine the meaning of purposeful activity; fourthly, they regulate social interactions; Fifthly, internally motivate to activity. In other words, value both orients a person in the world around him and induces and motivates him to take specific actions.

The value system of the subject includes the following.

1. Meaningful (ideas about good and evil, happiness, purpose and meaning of life).

2. Universal:

a) vital (life, health, personal security, welfare, education, law and order, etc.);

b) public recognition (industriousness, social status, etc.);

c) interpersonal communication (honesty, disinterestedness, benevolence, compassion, etc.);

d) democratic (freedom of speech, conscience, national sovereignty, etc.);

3. Particular (private):

a) attachment to a small homeland, family;

b) fetishism (belief in God, striving for absolutism, etc.).

Today, there is a serious breakdown, a transformation of the value system. New for culture are approved recent years values, those that were on the periphery, go to the rank of priority. Now it is too early to talk about some kind of established system of values, a new spiritual culture of our society. There is a process of search, doubt and instability.

The fourth element of culture is ideology.

When we considered beliefs, we noted that beliefs have certain information as their basis, statements that are justified at the theoretical level. Accordingly, values ​​can be described, argued in the form of a strict, logically justified doctrine or in the form of spontaneously formed ideas, opinions, feelings.

In the first case, we are dealing with ideology, in the second - with customs, traditions, rituals that influence and convey their content at the socio-psychological level.

Considering the ideology internal structure and diversity, the same principle can be applied to it as to values. With this approach, ideology appears as a complex and multi-tiered formation. It can act as the ideology of all mankind, the ideology of a particular society, the ideology of a class, social group and estate.

At the same time, different ideologies interact, which, on the one hand, ensures the stability of society, and on the other hand, allows you to choose, develop values ​​that express new trends.

in the development of society.

Finally, the fifth element of culture is the patterns of behavior already mentioned above: rituals, customs, and traditions.

A rite is a set of symbolic collective actions that embody certain social ideas, ideas, norms of behavior and evoke certain collective feelings (for example, a wedding ceremony). The strength of the rite is in its emotional and psychological impact on people.

Custom is a form of social regulation of the activities and attitudes of people taken from the past, which is reproduced in a certain

society or social group and is familiar to its members.

The custom consists in steadfast adherence to the instructions received from the past (for example, blood feud). Custom - unwritten rules of conduct.

Traditions - social and cultural heritage passed down from generation to generation and persisted for a long time. Traditions function in all social systems and are a necessary condition for their life. You can not neglect the traditions, because. this leads to a violation of continuity in the development of culture, to the loss of valuable achievements of the past. And vice versa, worship of tradition gives rise to conservatism and stagnation in public life.

Disclosure of the nature and history of the development of culture in conjunction with the structure and content of human activity is one of the areas of modern cultural studies. However, the understanding of the connection of culture with the whole variety of human activities was not characteristic of various stages of historical development. Initially, the concept of "culture" was closely connected with its etymological meaning "cultivation", because it denoted the expedient human impact on nature, agriculture. But then it also began to mean upbringing, that is, a kind of "cultivation" of the person himself. So, the Hellenes saw in "pandeia", which meant "education", the main difference from the barbarians.

In the Middle Ages, culture was associated with signs of the perfection of the individual. In the Renaissance, it correlated with humanistic ideals, and later with the ideal of enlightenment. Throughout a long historical period, there has been a tendency to perceive culture only as a spiritual phenomenon, opposite to the sphere of material production. It seemed that culture manifested itself only in the forms of spiritual and political development of a person and society: art, science, morality, religion and forms of government were attributed to cultural phenomena.

For the first time in the depths of German classical philosophy, judgments appear that link culture with human labor activity. We meet similar judgments, for example, in the philosophy of Hegel, although "Hegel knows and recognizes only one type of labor, namely, abstract spiritual labor."

The Marxist stage in the development of the theory of culture is distinguished by the fact that the essence of culture is correlated with the practical activity of man. According to K. Marx, labor becomes the source of culture. At the same time, the conditionality of the culture of society and the individual was noted by the level of development of productive forces, natural and economic conditions of life. At the same time, the founders of Marxism warned against the vulgarization of historical materialism. In polemics with their ideological opponents, they had to defend main principle- the primacy of material, economic conditions community development. At the same time, they emphasized the mutual influence, interdependence of economic factors and factors of spiritual culture, the impact of science, politics, art, that is, cultural phenomena, on economic development society. The dialectical approach to the interpretation of the interaction of culture and practical human activity, characteristic of the position of K. Marx and F. Engels, is often overlooked in modern criticism of Marxism.

The idea of ​​the relationship between culture and production, labor and art was recognized in the first decade of Soviet power. It found organizational embodiment in the activities of the Central Institute of Labor (CIT), established in 1921 by A.K. Gastev. In his book How to Work, the culture of work was correlated not only with the complex of working conditions, but also with the culture of the worker himself, with the culture of relationships between members of the production team. Developing methods for teaching labor culture, A.K. Gastev paid attention not only to the elements of labor technology, but also to the manifestation of an interested, responsible attitude to work, the manifestation of the spiritual culture of the individual.

Unfortunately, in the following decades, the idea of ​​a connection between the culture of work and the culture of the individual, material and spiritual culture, did not receive proper development. To a certain extent, this can be explained by the fact that for a long time the issues of culture and labor were studied in parallel, without intersecting. Culture was the subject of study of philosophy, sociology, art history, and labor was predominantly the subject of analysis of economic science. A purely economic approach was reflected in the fact that, if the problem of labor culture was revealed, it was understood as a culture of conditions, organization of labor and the quality of its results, but not the culture of a working person. In other words, they evaluated mainly the object, and not the subject of labor.

Moreover, in the philosophical theory, the problems of the correlation of scientific, technical and spiritual progress were treated as alternative ones, their interdependence was not analyzed. It was only in the 1960s that a number of studies drew attention to the illegitimacy of opposing these processes. The most consistent and reasoned new approach was formulated by L.I. Novikova in Aesthetics and Technique: Alternative or Integration. The author emphasized that the unjustified opposition of these spheres of human activity adversely affects both the pace of scientific and technological progress and the development aesthetic culture personality .

It is significant that in the same period, the essence of aesthetic activity began to be interpreted differently. The attitude to it has changed as an activity only in the field of artistic creativity and the perception of works of art. The researchers drew attention to the functional relationship of aesthetic activity with various types social practice: industrial, scientific, economic. It was during this period that the rapid development of technical aesthetics as theoretical basis design, artistic design.

Analyzing the dynamics of ideas about the essence of culture, V.S. Bibler draws attention to the fact that the concept of culture, which was entrenched earlier in the historical consciousness, limited to the range of phenomena related to art, philosophy, morality, religion, in the 20th century “is shifting more and more clearly to the epicenter of modern life ... Understanding culture as the focus of human spiritual activity is combined with understanding of culture as a kind of cut of values ​​and, perhaps, in the first place, its material, material activity.

In this understanding, culture turns out to be interconnected with all types of human activity. Human activity is diverse, because it reflects all possible relations of a person with the world. It is possible to distinguish cognitive, creative, artistic, scientific, communicative, economic, environmental and other activities. The diversity of human activity also determines the multidimensionality of culture as a process, result and quality level of any activity.

The idea of ​​the relationship between culture and multifaceted human activity is the common thing that unites the positions of various researchers of the phenomenon of culture. But there are different approaches to assessing the relationship between culture and activity. Some view culture as the result of activity. This approach is called axiological or value approach. Others, as the main content of culture, consider its influence on the development of man himself as a social being. This is a dynamic, or anthropological, approach to the interpretation of culture. Still others interpret culture as a mode of activity achieved at a certain stage in the development of culture (functional approach). However, with certain differences, these approaches do not contradict each other, but give an idea of ​​a multilateral analysis of the relationship between culture and human activity.

Researchers also characterize the structure of culture in different ways, since they take as a basis a different classification of activities with which the structural components of culture are associated. But one way or another, the analysis of the content of culture is based on the content of activity. To imagine the possibility of classifying culture according to the mode of activity, consider the views of some philosophers.

Based on activity theory, M.S. kagan draws attention to two main functions of culture: ensuring the progressive development of society and mobility, dynamism of human self-improvement. He distinguishes three layers of culture: material, spiritual and aesthetic.

The artistic culture of M.S. Kagan distinguishes it as an independent one, arguing this approach with the culturological function of art, its unique ability to create around itself a relatively autonomous sphere of activities, one way or another related to art. Transformative activity is associated with artistic creativity.

E.S. Markarian approaches the structuring of the phenomenon of culture, defining culture as a special way of activity peculiar only to man. He classifies culture on the basis of its adaptive functions. The first is the natural-ecological subsystem, which allows society to adapt to the natural environment. The second subsystem is socio-ecological, adapting society to the socio-historical environment. The third defines the interaction of individuals within a limited space environment in order to meet needs.

For the classification of culture proposed L.A. Zelenov, characteristic is the desire to correlate the structure of culture with the structure of human activity as clearly as possible. Based on the principle of polarization, he classifies, first of all, activity, starting from its generalized spheres and ending with specific types of activity, correlating the corresponding structure of culture with a specific type of activity. So, for example, he divides all social activity into the production of things and people. The production of things is carried out in two forms: natural-thing and symbolic. Natural things correspond to economic and ecological culture. The sign form of production also corresponds to two types of culture: scientific and artistic. .

Structuring the content of culture in accordance with the structure of human activity has not only theoretical, culturological significance, but also significant practical meaning. The activity approach to the consideration of the essence of culture allows not only to reveal the multidimensionality of culture, but also to substantiate the penetration of culture into all types of human activity. In relation to any kind of activity, culture characterizes its qualitative level. Culture is manifested both in the goal and motives of activity, and in the moral and value choice of means to achieve the goal.

The analysis of activity from the standpoint of culture makes it possible to assess the progressivity or regressivity of the content of activity, its significance for the development of a person and society, compliance with cultural traditions, value orientations of social development. This is the essence of practical cultural studies. It allows one to explain the priorities in the development of one or another component of culture, depending on the leading trends in scientific, technological and social progress, and to understand the value meaning of cultural development.

So, in the early 30s of the last century, under the influence of industrialization, the development of technical culture was an urgent need for social development. In modern conditions, the transition from industrial to post-industrial society has determined the special value of information culture, which involves the development of an analytical mindset, the ability to abstract, transfer algorithms of actions to new conditions, and mastery of computer literacy.

The importance of the design culture associated with the design of both technology and finished products, complex design, capable of foreseeing the feasibility of the process of activity and the competitiveness of labor results.

The value and normative system of culture in modern society more and more difficult. Those values ​​that in an industrial society were on the periphery of cultural development are brought to the fore. German psychologist Rolf Rüttinger, analyzing the culture of entrepreneurship, cites the results of a study by the Batelle Institute. They note that the importance of such values ​​as obedience, hierarchy, centralization is decreasing; they are replaced by others: self-determination, participation, collective, orientation to needs, creativity, disclosure of personality, ability to compromise, decentralization.

At the turn of the third millennium, the value of an ecologically healthy environment is of particular importance. The prerequisite for such a change in value priorities was a real threat to the health and life of humans and wildlife. The installations of the ideology of the Soviet period, which focused on the transformation of the environment "in the interests of man" and in order to create the "material base of communism", turned out to be disastrous for nature.

Changing the course of rivers, flooding floodplain lands with artificial seas, thoughtless destruction of forest resources led to a violation of the ecological balance. Moreover, the reason was not only in illiterate management, the lack of the necessary production culture, but also in erroneous ideas about the unlimited creative possibilities of man. The introduction of state control over the activities of environmentally harmful enterprises, the activities of the "green" do not yet solve the problem. It is necessary to change the value orientations, stereotypes and norms of behavior, which determines the ecological culture of the individual and society as a particularly significant component of the manifestation of a culture of activity in modern conditions.

a) the main features of culture

In science, and in everyday life, it is difficult to find a term that could be compared with "culture" in terms of frequency of use and ambiguity of interpretation. It accompanies specialists in the humanities and social sciences everywhere: whether we consider the history of ancient civilizations or modern youth, aesthetic problems or politics, and so on. It is extremely difficult to give this term an unambiguous interpretation precisely because culture penetrates into all pores of our life and in each case acquires a special shade.

Let's try to describe culture through its main features.

Culture and nature

1. The word culture comes from the Latin cultura and originally had the meaning of cultivation, ennoblement of the land. Obviously, the meaning of the word "cultivated by man", "ennoblement" has become one of the main ones for culture. Here, apparently, is the main source that gives rise to that wide range of phenomena, properties, united by the word culture.

2. When we talk about culture, we mean those phenomena, properties, elements of human life that qualitatively distinguish a person from nature.

First of all, the range of these phenomena includes phenomena that arise in society and are not found in nature. These should be recognized as the manufacture of tools and sports; the political organization of public life, its elements (state, parties, etc.) and the custom of giving gifts; language, morality, religious practices and the wheel; science, art, transport and clothing, jewelry, jokes. As you can see, the range of these extra-natural phenomena of our life is very wide, it includes both complex, "serious" phenomena, as well as simple, seemingly unpretentious, but very important and necessary for a person.

3. The range of phenomena united by the word "culture" includes such properties of people that are not regulated by biological instincts.

Of course, in modern life purely instinctive human actions are extremely rare and, accordingly, the range of problems of such phenomena is extremely narrow. But it cannot be denied that there are elements of human life that directly depend only on the biological constitution of a person, the physical health of a particular individual. They are found, most often, in the intimate sphere, related to issues of personal hygiene, health, relationships between a man and a woman. It also includes involuntary reactions to light, pain, etc. You cannot directly apply cultural assessment to many such phenomena.

But the circle of human actions is significant, to which instinctive and cultural principles are intertwined. And whether we are talking about sexual desire or the need for food - even in these cases, we most often encounter an interweaving of the instinctive basis and the cultural content. The instinct manifests itself in a feeling of hunger, appetite, a predisposition to eat certain foods: high-calorie in conditions of cold, large physical activity; to food rich in vitamins - in the spring. Culture is manifested in the way the table is cleaned, in the beauty and convenience of dishes, in whether a person sits down at the table, or eats on the carpet, sitting cross-legged under him. And in the combination of seasonings, how the meat will be cooked, etc. The culinary traditions of this or that people, and the skill of the cook, etc. will affect here.

4. Let's note another category of phenomena where instinct and cultural control over behavior are intertwined. So, the predisposition of an emotional person to violent forms of reaction, to rapid excitability, sharp forms of expressing one's ideas, remarks (which, as a rule, is explained by the type of temperament, other innate properties) can be significantly neutralized, ennobled by the developed ability to control oneself, etc. . And this control, including man's control over his natural instincts, is the most important element of culture. And in different cultures specific forms of control, what and to what extent is controlled, to what extent instinct is suppressed and for what reason - acquire a rather tangible specificity.

So, culture is connected with the extra-natural in human life, with what is different from the animal, instinctive, with what is cultivated by man in himself, in others, and not born in him from nature.

Please note that I do not use the term "opposes nature" in my lecture. This is very sharp in form and incorrect in content. Analyzing the natural and geographical conditions for the development of social life, I showed that culture contains certain natural "imprints" associated with the characteristics geographical conditions, the dominant type of temperament. Consequently, being different from nature, culture, especially in the early stages of its formation, to some extent takes into account natural factors, but does not oppose them.

It is necessary to distinguish: a) culture itself as such, as a very mobile and elusive "ether", spreading over all aspects of our life; b) the process of incarnation of culture; c) specific forms (products) of the embodiment of culture; d) the process of familiarization with culture and its transmission from generation to generation.

Let's take a quick look at each of these aspects.

Culture and consciousness: mentality

1. What is the source of the extra-natural that actually makes the supra-instinctive possible in people's lives? Consciousness. Everything that is connected with what is "cultivated" in human life is in one way or another generated and "burdened" by consciousness. Whether we are talking about the economic activity of people or politics, the use of advanced technologies or the moral quest of people, behavior in everyday life or the perception of artistic values ​​- everywhere we are dealing with the knowledge, skills of people, their values, preferences, traditions, commitments, etc.

Naturally, culture is connected not only with the rational, it covers the entire spiritual life of a person. We are talking about the culture of feelings, emotions - the most important element of culture. Or let's pay attention to the culture of skills, abilities, everyday skills. In real life they are realized, as a rule, automatically, involuntarily. But in both cases, the role of the rational, the conscious becomes dominant.

Culture as a phenomenon is woven from consciousness, its elements. And all the advantages that human consciousness gives, the role that it plays for the formation and development of the social, the significance of values ​​in the functioning of social ties, institutions and communities - all this should rightfully be attributed to culture.

2. But culture is not consciousness in general, not its separate elements. Culture is a way, a method of value development of reality.

In search of ways and options to meet their needs (material, social, spiritual, etc.), a person most often faces the need to evaluate phenomena, the means to achieve them in terms of benefit and harm, good and evil, permissible or forbidden, etc. d. In other words, an active, practically meaningful activity immediately puts a person in a position in which he must determine (or at least assume value for himself, for other objects that he needs). Without this there is no motive, without this there is no conscious social action. The way, the method of revealing values ​​is culture. Culture is a view of the world through the prism of good and evil, useful and harmful, smart and stupid, beautiful and ugly, etc.

3. As a way of mastering reality, culture is not separate assessments, norms, not their set, sum, but only value elements taken as a value. The latter manifests itself in several ways.

a) When we talk about culture, we primarily mean cultures, i.e. various variants of cultures as variants of knowledge, values, preferences, norms of behavior are coordinated, associated with each other. The internal conjugation of culture manifests itself in the form of a stable, logically traceable in the main elements of consciousness, the certainty of perception of the world, the assessment of real phenomena, values, - mentality. Logically traceable certainty can characterize spiritual world as a specific society (the culture of American society, the culture of Russian society), representatives of a particular social community (for example, territorial: Muscovites, Odessans, St. Petersburg, Tula; ethnic: Russians, Kazakhs, etc.), and an individual .

b) Culture as a phenomenon of consciousness represents integrity in another respect as well. Culture is not a dead baggage of unclaimed, unrealized knowledge, skills, and clear convictions. It is a kind of process, internal activity, which is based on the interaction, mutual transition and conjugation of knowledge, skills and beliefs, informational, sensual and volitional components.

Culture and activity: patterns of behavior

Culture as a way of axiological assimilation of reality is embodied in the practical activities of people: in industrial and domestic, artistic and political, scientific and educational, etc. It is known that in any practical activity, internal and procedural-external activities interact relatively independently. In the course of internal activity, motives are formed, the meaning that people give to their actions, the goals of actions are selected, schemes, projects, technologies for future actions are developed. It is culture as a mentality that resembles internal activity with a well-defined system of values, offers related projects, choices, preferences, etc. This shows another characteristic of culture - it is an element that organizes, determines the content, direction of people's practical activities.

In the relationship between culture and activity, we will focus on the following points:

Culture and activity determination

Activity as an indicator of culture

Patterns of activity as the embodiment of culture.

1. The significance of culture as a social phenomenon is explained primarily by the fact that it is the immediate, actual "culprit" of the content, the style of people's practical life. Naturally, culture itself does not develop in isolation as an entity "in itself" and "for itself". It incorporates impulses arising from the natural conditions of life of a given group of people, the socio-economic circumstances in which they carry out their activities. But on the way of the impulses of the external environment to a particular person, his actions, culture is by no means an inconspicuous way station that can be easily slipped through. This is a complex spiritual system in which external information is digested, comprehended, evaluated, which directly determines how a person should react to these impulses, how he should act.

Here lies the key to the question: why representatives different peoples they react differently, act in similar situations, why, with the coincidence of fundamental foundations, the Japanese lead one way of life, and the French - another, the British have one system of encouragement, incentives for advancement, and the Americans have another. In other words, the impulses coming from the outside world, passing through the "purgatory" of culture, are deciphered in their own way.

And vice versa, all the actions of people, including in the sphere of production, politicians bear a powerful imprint of the culture of a given society, people, group of people. Soviet (at that time) people were always struck by the clarity and regularity of the labor rhythm of workers from the GDR: no rush work and no smoke breaks, no "black" Saturdays and no disruption to the schedule for the implementation of the plan. If two artists, a Japanese and a European, are seated side by side and asked to paint a landscape, then with the same colors, on the same canvas, we will see a rather different image of the same area.

2. Culture strives to realize itself in practice. The focus on practice determines the special significance of culture in social life. What has become its heritage, culture necessarily embodies directly or indirectly in practice. And when we want to know the culture of another person, we must judge it not so much by his statements, words, statements of intentions, goals, but by his actions. Real practical activity, including artistic, scientific, is both a real embodiment of culture and its indicator.

3. Culture is embodied primarily in stable, repetitive patterns of activity. Naturally, behind the "back" of repetitive patterns of behavior are stable motives, preferences, skills and abilities. And this aspect of the problem is of particular importance for the sociological analysis of culture as a phenomenon.

Sporadic, random, no longer recurring culture should not be attributed. If from a sporadic, irregular one or another moment of life begins to turn into a fairly stable, repetitive one, then we can state that certain changes are taking place in the culture of a given person, group of people, society.

One way or another, not only the instinctive actions (or the instinctive side of the action) of people fall out of the circle of phenomena described by the concept of "culture", but also those moments, aspects that are random, unstable, i.e. did not become a model of activity.

It is customary to breed samples (standards) of elementary actions (bathing a child, greetings, planing a tree) and activity models in activity models: models of social ties (type of relationships in the family, at work), institutions (type of activity of the army, state, etc.) , models of artistic activity, etc.

Patterns of activity reveal themselves both in the industrial sphere and in everyday life, science and recreation. They are manifested both in semantic content, and in the technology of action, style, manner of action. In all nations, temples serve similar purposes, but a Gothic temple does not look like an Orthodox one or a mosque. As I said earlier, a landscape made in the European artistic style is not like a landscape made in the manner inherent in the fine arts of the peoples of the Far East.

Whether we are talking about the way of planing a tree with a planer (in many nations this is done by moving towards oneself, and not away from oneself), about organizing elections, holding meetings of parliament or the manner of singing, the order of serving dishes during a dinner party - patterns of activity are the embodiment of culture, there are actual culture.

Culture is embodied, objectified in various products of activity. Naturally, once we are talking about objectification, that means we are talking about material embodiment. Here, I would like to make one clarification. For many years it was recognized to divide culture into material (machines, buildings, economy) and spiritual (science, morality, art). But lately sociologists have not been satisfied with this division. And that's why. Isn't the machine the embodiment of both a scientific idea and an artistic taste? Or a car. Is not its appearance, design evidence of certain aesthetic attachments, but the quality of execution of its details - the moral culture of those who produced it?

It would be more accurate, in our opinion, to divide the material products of culture into material-objective ones: machine tools, automobiles, buildings, etc., in which technical knowledge, artistic tastes, and moral norms are embodied; and symbolic. The latter refers to those products of culture that convey their information through the word, symbols, signs, images: scientific articles and oral folk art; popular science books and fiction; paintings, frescoes, notes, diagrams, drawings and manuals such as "How to build a house", "Renovation of an apartment", or an analogue - a textbook on building skills, etc.

Culture: continuity and socialization

Due to the fact that culture is embodied in activity, objectified in material-subject and sign-symbolic forms, firstly, there is a certain fixation and structuring of the historical experience of a given people, community, family, and secondly, culture, its meanings and meanings, technology and skills can be passed on to another person, another generation.

1. Culture thereby reveals one more stroke of its sociological understanding: as a means, a method of shaping the past, accumulated experience, traditions of our current ideas and, more broadly, our life activity in the present. Culture is always a continuum. When we talk about the culture of this or that nation, we always want to understand its present, lift the veil over its future, as if looking into the past. And vice versa, when we call a person uncultured, we emphasize the insufficient degree of assimilation of the culture accumulated by previous generations.

Emphasizing continuity, we by no means absolutize the stability and immutability of culture. At least the ability for self-development, variability is the most important feature of the socio-cultural process. If the culture of this or that people has developed traditions of freedom of creativity, manifestation of individuality, etc., then in this case the cultural tradition itself, as it were, "pushes" people to search, to innovate. A people whose culture has little developed traditions that promote search, innovation, dooms itself to lagging behind, to serious difficulties. Each step in the distance of the development of social life will be given to him with great difficulty. Excessive cultural conservatism, distrust of the new, rejection of social risk block innovation.

At the same time, it is important that in the culture the traditions of supporting innovation are combined with reasonable conservatism, with a commitment to stability, sustainability, and predictability.

2. The continuity of culture is carried out in the process of socialization of the individual, primarily its upbringing and education. Culture, as something extrabiological, acquired, does not generally obey the laws of genetic heredity. It can be mastered only in the course of social inheritance. Therefore, when we talk about the education and upbringing of a personality, we mean the process of personality formation, first of all, as a carrier, successor and successor of culture.

The mechanisms of socialization ensure the self-renewal of society, the spiritual replacement of one generation by another. At birth, a person finds a certain world, not created by him, but which is the basis of his life. With the help of words, books, films that will teach him how to live, build relationships with others, how to use those material objects that surround him, observing the behavior of others (patterns of activity accepted in society) and, most importantly, implementing his own practical activity, developing his own experience, he internalizes, i.e. makes the culture of the family, society, humanity its own heritage.

In this part of the lecture, I analyzed, perhaps, the main characteristics of culture. And we were convinced once again how ambiguous this phenomenon is, how difficult it is to give it a scientific definition that could quite accurately reveal its so mobile and difficult to fix essence.

So, culture is not genetically inherited, it is cultivated, created by the person himself, in himself, in other people, in the external environment.

CULTURE is a way of spiritual mastery of reality based on the identification of values, which is an integral system of logically connected, stable ideas, assessments, orientations, norms, techniques, embodied in patterns of activity, objectified in material-objective and sign-symbolic forms, transmitted from generation to generation. generation in the process of socialization. Culture is a decisive way of regulating social interactions, integrating individuals into society.

b) the main elements of culture

The fundamental basis of any culture is the conceptual and logical apparatus, which is inherent in the worldview of a particular people. All people master the world, comprehend, fix its elements in something in their own way, in a special way. Among the small peoples of the North, who live by hunting, picking berries, each special state of maturity, for example, cranberries, has its own name. It has long been known that among peoples where sheep breeding has been developed from time immemorial - lamb, sheep, ram, depending on age, have their own numerous names; the same variety of names of fish, their fatness, age - among peoples who live by fishing.

Some peoples have only a “who” person, everything else is a “what” (including domestic animals). For others, along with man, "who" refers to the animal world. In the languages ​​of some peoples, a rigid construction of a phrase with the subject always in the first place, in others, the subject can be both at the beginning, in the middle, and at the end of the phrase.

It would seem, what does all this have to do with our subject? It has. After all, a person structures and perceives the world around him through the conceptual and logical apparatus. People who do not know the number over 100, apparently, comprehend the set, the number in something in their own way. Let's think: if a person evaluates a dog, a cat, not to mention wild animals as a thing, similarly to furniture, fences, will his attitude towards animals differ from the attitude of those who see them as their younger brothers, living partners by nature.

Of course, the way of conceptual and logical ordering and perception of the world depends on many circumstances, including the type of economic activity. What is more significant, for one reason or another, turns out to be more precisely and in detail structured, and this may not affect the stylistic diversity of cultures, become one of the components of the subtle flavor of each culture.

We also note the role of language as a relay of culture. It is obvious that culture is also spread by gesture, ritual, facial expressions, and dance. The departed generations convey to us their skills, habits, structure of thought in material forms, etc. But in all cases, hardly anything can compete with the most capacious, accessible, accurate relay of culture, which is the language.

There are two extreme positions in the assessment of language as a cultural retransmitter. Some people generally believe that the role of language is insignificant for the transfer of national identity. Therefore, the practice of replacing the native language with a language that has an international status is, they say, a completely acceptable phenomenon that does not cause real harm to the development of national culture. Numerous empirical studies and the practice of life have provided many strong arguments against such statements.

At the same time, it is impossible to absolutize the role of language as almost the only carrier of culture, as some researchers, and especially politicians, are trying to do. Very often, especially in the twentieth century, language is only a means of communication. Non-Russian culture can also be transmitted in Russian to some extent. On the English language- non-English.

By the way, sociologists who have studied career types in England and the USA have obtained, using subtle methods, some interesting data on this subject. It turned out that in these two countries, which formally use the same language, different meanings were put into the same terms describing a person’s career, his promotion.

Knowledge, beliefs

The main elements of culture are beliefs. It is beliefs that contain what people are actually committed to, what they are guided by in their daily activities, what they embody in patterns and models of behavior.

Belief is a certain spiritual state, a property that is characterized by the genetic indivisibility of the intellectual-rational, sensual-emotional and volitional components. This is a sensual experience of knowledge as personally significant, reliable, filled with current, energy of will. Beliefs can be associated with both natural objects and social ones.

Any beliefs, whether they are connected with objects of nature or with social objects, include in their structure certain information, information (which may be scientific or everyday) about a given phenomenon, about the essence of norms, principles of behavior, i.e. knowledge. Beliefs associated with objects of nature - information about natural processes in the form of ideas about the physical picture of the world, natural science, technical knowledge, technologies, relevant information about methods of action, techniques, how and what should be grown, produced, etc. Beliefs associated with social objects - ethical, economic, political knowledge, ideas about traditions, customs, rituals, standards of behavior, information about what is considered desirable or undesirable within a given culture, fair or unfair, etc. One important circumstance should be borne in mind: between the information existing and disseminated in society, knowledge about certain phenomena and people's beliefs embodied in behavior, the connection is difficult and ambiguous. From time to time, doctors remind about the "two white enemies of man" - sugar and salt, and call to stop their consumption. (Let's not talk about nicotine - it's too trivial). But the number of people for whom this information has become a guide to a significant restructuring of nutrition is much smaller than those who are informed about it.

Even more complex and dramatic is the connection between knowledge and beliefs about social objects. Knowledge of the laws does not at all deter even law enforcement officials from violating them. Nowhere and never will you hear approving words in favor of corruption, bribery. But in reality...

The reasons for the mismatch, inconsistency of knowledge and beliefs are different. Without setting ourselves the task of a detailed analysis of these reasons, I would like to warn against both absolutization and belittling the significance of knowledge, the promotion of social knowledge in the functioning and development of culture, and the substitution of education for political information.

If knowledge, ideas contradict the needs, immanent tendencies of human development, but at the same time have the status of dominant ideas, are imposed on society, people sooner or later begin to resist their implementation. The mind of a person in this situation most often "cunning", in words remaining committed to the moral code of the builder of a great society, but in fact, which is quite natural, in order to achieve the satisfaction of personal needs, it often oversteps the principles and norms recognized in words. As a result, a massive bifurcation of the spiritual world of people, culture, unprecedented in history, a gap between the disseminated knowledge, words on the one hand, beliefs, actions - on the other.

But history knows other types of disagreement between knowledge and beliefs. Knowledge can also outpace reality and practice. It can contain ideas that can improve the world. In this case, the rupture of ideas and beliefs is quite natural. Overcoming it through the active dissemination of such knowledge and ideas is an important condition for the progress of society. The ideas of Christ with great difficulty, slowly but surely reached the souls of people. Today we go Christianity constitute the core of European civilization.

Involvement in the circulation of modern thinking person great values ​​of world culture creates the necessary information and intellectual basis for the spiritual renewal of society. Let us agree that the protest against barracks socialism, which had been accumulating for many decades, largely thanks to the educational ferment, acquired a clearly expressed humanistic-democratic orientation.

It is knowledge that gives meaning to beliefs, endows with an idea. Poverty, scarcity of culture is largely determined by the narrowness, primitiveness, fragmentation of knowledge involved in the circulation of this culture. At the same time, it is not only about knowledge that has become beliefs. It should be borne in mind that there are different forms of knowledge acquisition by culture. A scientist may not agree with this or that theory, scientific idea. but awareness of it, a detailed knowledge of this theory, undoubtedly affects the argumentation of his own concepts. Such knowledge, in our opinion, is an element of culture, although it has not become a conviction.

This approach is no less important when analyzing the role of social knowledge in the development of culture.

Today, having such a dramatic experience, no one will give any one system of knowledge the promissory note of the only true teaching. This is not required. The very spirit of enlightenment is close to the atmosphere of competition of ideas, pluralism. Involvement in the cultural field of our society of information about various theories, approaches to solving economic, political, moral issues enriches our vision of our own problems. The culture of society, the consciousness of people acquires multidimensionality, flexibility, rigidity in assessments, primitiveness of decisions and judgments are overcome. Not all of this knowledge will become our moral, political, scientific convictions. But the range of information that is mastered in one form or another by a person, society, willy-nilly, sometimes in subtle forms will influence the system of social regulators of behavior, make its own, at first glance, imperceptible, but quite significant contribution to culture.

Values

Beliefs as a unity of knowledge, emotions and will appear in a variety of specific forms. Among them should be named value orientations, attitudes, norms, principles of behavior and direct motives for actions and deeds. Some determine the strategic direction of an individual's activity, others normatively regulate it, and others directly, situationally determine people's behavior. These phenomena of the spiritual world form a hierarchical system, at the top of which is orientation towards values.

As a conscious being, a person carries out actions that are significant for himself consciously, i.e. weighs, evaluates, tries on. Naturally, values ​​are studied from different angles by different sciences. A special role in their study belongs to philosophy and ethics. The sociology of values ​​is primarily of interest as a factor that plays a decisive role in the regulation of social interactions.

Values ​​are the defining element of culture, its core. It should be recalled that culture is a way, a method of value-based development of reality. Moreover, this applies to both natural phenomena and technical inventions, political structure and elementary etiquette, works of art and family relationships. In order to evaluate, to determine what is significant and what is not, what is useful and what is harmful, what is good and what is evil, i.e. to identify values, a person must apply certain criteria, measures by which the object will be evaluated. It is these criteria for evaluating actions, objects, ideas, opinions that constitute the main thing in culture. We will call them values. (Value as an ideal, imaginary, as a criterion should not be confused with the object itself, an object that has already been recognized as valuable, a value for a person. It is in the latter sense that we are talking about the acquisition of material values, etc.).

Culture, considered in this purely value aspect, is a kind of social mechanism that reveals, systematizes, organizes, addresses, reproduces, preserves, protects, develops and transmits values ​​in society.

Values ​​appear as:

a) desirable, preferable for a given social object (individual, social community, society) state of social ties, content of ideas, artistic form, etc.;

b) criterion for evaluating real phenomena;

c) they determine the meaning of purposeful activity;

d) regulate social interactions;

e) internally motivate to activity.

In other words, value both orients a person in the world around him and induces and motivates him to take specific actions.

Values ​​are a complex world. In this lecture, we are mainly interested in the values ​​that act as regulators of the interaction of people in society, i.e. social values.

Among them, one should distinguish between economic and moral, political and aesthetic values. These values ​​within a particular culture are not an arbitrary combination, set, sum. They exist primarily as a whole, a system. Mentality - an expression of this integrity - is manifested both in the general logic characteristic of a given system of values: its subordination to material sensibility or the tasks of spiritual improvement, the idea of ​​collectivity or individual freedom and responsibility, and in the specifics of a set of values, their hierarchy, sequence, sequence.

Each system of values ​​has, as it were, one basis. Such a foundation is moral values, which represent desirable, preferred options for the relationship of people, their connections with each other, with society in an extremely personally significant form addressed to the person himself: as good, good and evil, duty and responsibility, honor and happiness. Moral values, penetrating the entire system of values, appeal to the free choice of a person, supported by intrapersonal, the most profound forms of control (conscience, shame, repentance, etc.).

In the lecture, I have already emphasized that within the framework of one society, the leading values ​​of most people are the same. The culture of a society is a mechanism for the preservation, reproduction and development of common values ​​recognized in a given society, approved in a given society, desirable for the majority of members of this society. At the same time, the integrity of the system of values ​​does not at all mean the fundamental impossibility of the emergence of contradictions and even conflicts of values ​​within the framework of one culture.

Conflicts of values ​​manifest themselves in various forms. Thus, artistic values ​​in the construction of a house very often come into conflict with economic expediency. The political values ​​of ensuring the stability of the state - with the economic values ​​of the development of competition as a means of achieving high efficiency and profitability of production. Overcoming the last conflict is carried out primarily on the basis of moral values. If in a society the priority is not freedom, the independence of the individual, but the ideas of equality between people, social protection, then the corresponding political values ​​will take precedence over economic values ​​focused on efficiency and profitability.

Significant differences can be characterized by the value systems of social strata, classes, groups of society. These specific features express the features of the social functions performed by a particular social group, they represent the options for social organization that are desirable for its representatives, etc. But possible conflicts of values, ideals, and then social conflicts between social groups can and should be regulated on the basis of universal human values, recognizing the unconditional value of peace for people, human life, as well as public (nationwide, nationwide) values, recognizing the priority of preserving the unity of the nation, integrity of the state, etc. Is it possible for a given culture to resolve controversial issues in an acute conflict form, turning into open armed confrontation, to what extent respect for universal values ​​is developed in the culture of conflicting social forces, the whole society, is there recognition in society, among all its strata, of unity as one of the highest values? nation, the preservation of the state, the inadmissibility of civil war - these socio-cultural factors determine the forms in which the social conflict will unfold, whether the parties will seek a compromise, etc.

Within any culture, society, there are socio-cultural differences between generations, there are countercultures, etc. It is important to bear in mind that, in principle, the integrity of culture is a state far from monotony and stagnation. It (integrity) is ensured through the diversity of subcultures, new elements are formed and developed in its bowels, and along with this, significant differences arise that can lead to contradictions and conflicts. The integrity of culture is not achieved automatically, but involves efforts to ensure the synthesis of the universal, national and specific principles, the search for compromises in values ​​within a single culture, and the overcoming of conflicts. The Westerners, just like a hundred years ago, are still at war with the Slavophiles today, the Communists are at war with the liberals, and so on. There is nothing supernatural and unusual in the presence of a conflict of values. But today in our country, which is in the stage of actual renewal of the system of values ​​- the most complex, dramatic (and sometimes even tragic) social progress - the level of conflict in society is sharply increasing.

In stable societies, value conflicts tend to be resolved within the existing culture. At the same time, disputes between egoists and altruists remain "eternal", "eternal" problems arise with the values ​​that new generations carry, and so on. Society lives, culture develops, maintaining its integrity. In our society, the zone of coincidence of leading values ​​is sharply narrowed. Conflicts cannot be resolved within the framework of old ideas and ideals; all this dramatically complicates problems, creates real threat the existence of society. Under these conditions, the ability to resolve conflicts of values ​​and ideals is of particular importance. The main thing that needs to be taken into account is the basis of what fundamental unifying values ​​will be used to regulate more frequent political, socio-economic conflicts.

The difference in value systems, ideals should not obscure the common that unites the bearers of a single culture (and human civilization as a whole). Awareness of one's social-group, class interests should not lead to their absolutization, which we have been following for many years. It is important to ensure in the culture of all members of society the priority of those values ​​that unite the nation, strengthen society, the state, guarantee the safe life of a person, his rights, peace on earth - this is a great lesson that our difficult history has taught us; this is the conclusion that science makes when analyzing the nature of social interactions, the role of values ​​in their regulation.

Ideology

The world of values ​​exists in different forms. When I considered beliefs, I noted that as their basis, beliefs have certain information, statements that are justified on a theoretical or everyday level. Accordingly, values ​​can be described, interpreted, argued in the form of a strict, logically justified doctrine, or in the form of spontaneously formed ideas, opinions, feelings. In the first case, we are dealing with ideology, in the second - with customs, traditions, rituals, rituals that influence and convey their content at the socio-psychological level.

Considering the ideology, its internal structure and diversity, it is necessary to apply the classification that I used earlier in relation to the values ​​themselves.

With this approach, ideology appears as a rather complex and multi-tiered formation. It can act both in the form of the ideology of all mankind, the ideology of a particular society, and the ideology of a class, social group, estate. But this by no means means that each class, social group has, as it were, a completely isolated, only its "own" ideology. The reduction of all types of ideology to class ideology at one time led to the subordination of the ideology of humanity, the ideology of society, to specific narrow class aspects. The latter have become dominant in the activities of some states. Emphasis was placed on what distinguishes, separates social subjects, groups, classes, and this, willy-nilly, strengthened the confrontational principle, and not only in the sphere of ideological activity.

The ideology of any social subject has, as it were, several layers, tiers. The first is basic, universal, in which universal humanistic values ​​find their ideological expression. This system of ideological views and principles has been calculated and should be in the culture of every social object. There have been misanthropic, racist, extremely nationalist ideologies in history (fascism, apartheid, above all). They were condemned by all mankind represented by the UN. The international tribunal in Nuremberg, fairly broad sanctions against South Africa, etc. - all this is nothing but a form of control over the implementation of universal norms and rules. Today, the member states of the world community assume obligations to be guided by universal human values ​​that have received their ideological expression, in particular, in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, etc.

Public (nationwide, national) values, which are fixed in the most consistent form, in particular, in the Constitution of a particular state, represent the second tier of the ideology of a particular social subject. These values ​​become the basis of the unity, integrity of a particular society, a guarantee against its collapse. T. Parsons, noting the role of values ​​in the life of society, the implementation of certain norms, emphasized that "the value prerequisites of American society are formulated primarily in such historical documents as the Declaration of Independence, the preamble to the Constitution and the Bill of Rights" (American Sociology. Prospects, Problems , methods, edited by T. Parsons, Moscow: 1972, p.369). From these ideological sources much of the American belief in equality of opportunity is drawn, that no member of society should be deprived of the opportunity to achieve what he wants.

At the same time, it should be taken into account that every modern civilized state includes in its Constitution, in one form or another, universal human values ​​in the form of norms that ensure the priority of human rights.

The third tier of ideology, expressing specific social-group, class interests, substantiates the forms of social organization of society that are desirable for a given class, stratum, etc. Class, group ideologies are put forward by political parties that seek to unite around themselves those who share common group values ​​in order to fight for political power in order to implement ideas about the desirable option for the development of society. At the same time, in a civilized society, the development of social group, private ideologies should not contradict, enter into antagonism with national and universal values. Recognition of the value and unity of the state, the constitutional order are a condition for the ideological activity of individual parties.

In the course of voting, citizens actually vote for certain values ​​(liberalism, conservatism, etc.). As a result, in the course of parliamentary elections, values ​​that claim to express new trends in the development of society receive or do not receive the support of the majority of society.

As you can see, there is a constant interaction of ideologies, which, on the one hand, ensures the stability and integrity of society, on the other hand, allows you to choose, offer, develop values ​​that express new trends in the development of society.

Natural nature exists and changes according to its own laws. Material objects of the “second nature” are also subject to the action of natural laws, but not as cultural phenomena, but precisely as material objects. For these objects to remain cultural phenomena, they must be maintained or reproduced by human activity. The park, if it is not constantly looked after, overgrows and turns into an ordinary forest, buildings require maintenance and repair, any equipment, if it functions, has a certain period of operation, and then must be changed. Consequently, the material objects of the world of culture are not only created by man, but are inseparable from human activity in general. Out of touch with it, they either dissolve in nature, or remain monuments of a dead culture, the subject of study by archaeologists and historians. And already in this capacity they are included in a living culture. Thus, the very "materiality" of culture differs from the materiality of natural nature by its inextricable connection with human activity, which includes not only the material, but also the ideal (spiritual, intellectual) principle, represents their unity. She also transfers this quality to the objects she creates. The material objects of culture, so to speak, are spiritualized by human activity, which gave them a certain content, endowed them with certain functions, breathed into them a “soul” in the form of a certain value principle or meaning. Therefore, all material culture is actually a unity of the material and the ideal.

This unity is also inherent in the phenomena belonging to spiritual culture. It includes different types arts - music, painting, fiction, as well as ethical values ​​and norms, systems of philosophical ideas, religious teachings, etc. But in order for these human creations to become available to other people, they must be objectified, that is, materialized in human actions, in language, oral or written, are embodied in some other material forms (for example, on the canvas of the artist, on the tape of an audio or video cassette). This means that any cultural phenomena combine the material and the ideal. This circumstance gives philosophy a reason to make culture as such an object of comprehension, regardless of its division into material and spiritual, bearing in mind that the difference between them in terms of the essential characteristics of the phenomenon of culture is purely functional, and not fundamental. Tools of labor and works of easel painting are created for different purposes and satisfy different social or personal needs, but as human creations they belong to culture.

So, culture in its objective existence depends on human activity, is its product, result. Activity is completed, realized, embodied in cultural objects. And at the same time, objects of culture remain such not outside the activity, not outside it, but in the human activity itself. So, a work of art, for example a book, outwardly is simply material object. The book enters the life of culture when it is read, that is, when it is included in spiritual activity, it is an element of this activity. The true existence of culture is active, procedural. And it includes its objective being. Culture is generally inseparable from human activity.

But let's continue with this example. Before a book reaches the reader, it must be written. Writing a book and reading it are two different activities. In the first case, we are talking about creativity, in the second - about development. True, there is also a creative moment in the very assimilation of culture. Following the author, the reader forms in his mind the images of the characters in the book, they evoke certain emotions, assessments, etc. Therefore, it is said that the assimilation of an already functioning culture is a process of co-creation, and not just passive assimilation. But still, the starting point in culture is culture-creative, creative activity, the result of which is something new. Objects of culture created in the process of creativity have one essential property - they are unique, unique, unrepeatable. Then they can be reproduced, replicated, but they enter the culture as something unique. In this way, the creativity of culture differs from mass production, where, on the contrary, there is a standard, and the task is to follow it, exactly copying the object being produced.

Works of art, scientific discoveries, technical innovations are all products of creative work. Its specificity lies in the fact that the artist, the scientist relies on all the previous development of culture and, in cooperation with his contemporaries, continues the process of cultural creation. Indeed, in order to create something new in any field of activity, one must master its achievements, that is, be at the height of the culture of one’s time. This circumstance conceals enormous, albeit historically limited by the level of culture achieved, opportunities for the development of consciously purposeful and free creative activity.

In general, any human activity is conscious and purposeful. This is one of its fundamental differences from the actions of an animal. But in creativity, the conscious beginning of activity is associated with freedom - the freedom of goal-setting, the choice of means, the freedom of a person to manifest his abilities, qualities, his "generic essence". Creative work is not work according to a program given from the outside, imposed regulations, a ready-made scheme, but the search for a new, unknown in advance, the creation of something that did not exist before. Culture cannot develop without freedom of creativity. And that is why people of creative work value their freedom so much and fight for freedom.

The only limiter to this freedom is culture itself. In other words, in the process of free creative activity, culture must be created, that is, something of public interest, satisfying a public need, and having general cultural significance. The subject of culture carries a certain universal content. Any culture is a certain systemic integrity, has its own criteria and norms, and rejects what does not correspond to them. Not every rhymed text is poetry, not every painted object is a work of fine art.

The creative process is embodied in a unique work. All reproduction is carried out by labor, measured by value. Creative work is not associated with value categories. This labor is the social substance of the specific labor of a scientist, artist, constructor, designer, etc. Its peculiarity is that it belongs to a cultural-creative process in which it is impossible (sometimes very difficult) to determine in advance the working time socially necessary to obtain the final result.

The subject, the person, is the central figure of the whole process, he carries out this activity, his essence, his activity are manifested in it. Not activity without a subject, but an active subject is the bearer of culture. He takes over culture and creates it.

Thus, culture is not reduced to the objects of culture, nor to activity as such. Culture is not something external to man, for it is man who is the bearer and subject of culture. Without a human being, cultural objects simply turn into a collection of material objects, and in the presence of a subject, what is created by a human becomes culture. The external objective "body of culture" depends on the activity and its subject. The "system of culture" includes cultural objects, human activity and its subject, the bearer of culture.

In their unity, there is a phenomenon called culture. Such an understanding of culture clearly shows the lack of its interpretation only as a “second nature”: it reflects only the external objective side of culture. But culture is rooted in the being of a person as a subject creating the “world of culture”. This is a world in which subjective and objective, material and ideal, internal and external are inseparable from each other, and any external expression of culture is a manifestation of the degree of development of the person himself. Man himself forms himself in the process of his activity and communication as a cultural and historical being. His human qualities are the result of his assimilation of the language, familiarization with the values ​​and traditions existing in society, mastering the techniques and skills of activity inherent in this culture, etc. Biologically, a person is given only an organism that has a certain structure, inclinations, functions. Therefore, it would not be an exaggeration to say that culture is a measure of the human in a person, a characteristic of the development of a person as a social being. The existence of culture is the existence of a person as a subject, this is his subjective activity, activity, this is the material and spiritual world created by him, this is their unity and interconnection.

No. 2. The relationship of culture and man

But nevertheless, the main, pivotal beginning of a cultured person is morality. The German writer G. Hesse characterized the place of morality in culture with a laconic formula: "Each classical self-expression of culture is evidence of a certain ethics, it is a prototype of human behavior brought to plastic expressiveness" .

Since the subject of culture is a separate individual or social group, there are various forms of group and individual culture. Group culture is understood as national, settlement (the culture of a small, large city or metropolis, village, village, town); the culture of a class, professional group, etc. Under the influence of specific conditions, group culture changes, its new forms arise. For example, mass and elite culture occupies a special place in modern society.

Elite culture acts as a search and affirmation of the personal principle. It is complex, serious, refined, has an innovative character. Its products are designed for the refined intellectual elite of society, capable of understanding and appreciating the skillfulness and virtuosity of the innovative search of its creators. The emergence of mass culture was facilitated by the development of mass communication - newspapers, popular magazines, radio, cinema, television, video recording. Thanks to these funds, numerous action films, detectives, soap operas and bestsellers flooded the market. But these processes are evaluated ambiguously. On the one hand, they led to the democratization of culture, opening access to it to a wide audience. On the other hand, the commercialization of the mass media has led to the use of a number of techniques that reduce its creative potential and vulgarize high culture.

Individual culture is a measure of a person's sociality. What is the person, so is the culture. It is characterized in terms of the level of culture, its presence or absence. An individual culture can be more or less systemic, but it cannot be “mosaic, formed under the influence of a multitude of random and disparate facts. Man is not only a creation, but also a creator of culture. He is cultural insofar as he masters and realizes the highest values ​​of society, turns it into his inner spiritual property. A person can be judged not by what his judgments about culture are, but by how he implements these ideas. Therefore, culture is an individual and social consciousness realized, embodied by human activity, ideals and tastes, moral attitudes and political aspirations.

Culture is the world of a person, a way of activity peculiar only to him, in the process of which he spiritualizes the objects he creates, humanizes nature, his environment. cultural activities conscious and value-oriented. It harmoniously combines expediency, adherence to norms and relative independence from them. In ethnic or religious form, it expresses universal ideals and values. Human activity in the sphere of culture is determined by his needs, but cannot be reduced to them. It has elements necessary to achieve the goal and redundant. The concept of redundancy means the presence in the phenomena of culture of elements that exceed some necessary minimum. Although culture is subject to the influence of biological, physical, social, techno-economic and similar factors, they receive a variable, multi-valued embodiment in it. This testifies to the freedom and possibilities of generating a fundamentally new objectivity.

The redundancy of culture is explained by the fact that it generates subjective value experiences that have a deeply personal meaning. It manifests itself even at the level of natural human needs, which are satisfied in accordance with the simplest cultural universals. Culture spiritualizes human needs, gives them an aesthetic form, surrounds them with symbols. Culture is in a certain sense opposed to nature, marking the separation of man from the natural world. Even the simplest vital, vital needs of a person as a living being (the need for food, procreation, protection from dangers, etc.) are mediated by etiquette forms of behavior. Culture is a specifically human way of satisfying needs, a deviation from its norms is a manifestation of lack of culture, the savagery of a person. But culture does not contradict nature, as Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Sigmund Freud and some other thinkers argued, but is its continuation. Cultural activities are not limited to needs, because its regulators are motives, ideals, values, i.e. spiritual guidelines. They encourage a person to be guided in his actions not only by his own needs, but to take into account the characteristics of the object transformed by a person (whether it is about nature or about another person). The animal only consumes nature, a person sees in any object not only his own purpose, but also its special properties. Consumer attitude to nature is a symptom of savagery, barbarization of man. The formation of culture is initially associated with the awareness and consideration of the rhythms of nature, the preservation of the possibilities of its reproduction. Defining culture as a way, technology of activity, one can single out the cultural side of various phenomena of social life: the culture of work, life, thinking, production, political, legal, the culture of social relations, etc. It is a way of human existence and every manifestation of sociality.

Cultural phenomena guide social changes, directing them towards the realization of socially significant goals. Cultural values ​​perform the function of social orientation and regulation in this particular society. Culture serves the system of social relations, mediates and prepares the shifts and changes taking place here, creating specific mechanisms that ensure the regulation of human behavior. It can be direct, indirect regulation (law, morality, taboo). It can also be indirect regulation, carried out by prescribing certain actions that symbolize certain values ​​and requirements of society. Thus, etiquette replaces direct information about a person's attitude to another person with neutral forms of politeness that hide their true content. Culture creates an extensive system of symbols that testify to a person's place in society (clothes, life, jewelry), his religious affiliation or adherence to political views and organizations. Often, direct belonging to these groups or values ​​is replaced by symbolism: an individual does not seek spiritual consolation in a religious ritual, but demonstrates his religiosity; he does not seek to achieve specific political goals, but declares his intentions, and so on. Nevertheless, both ritual practice and direct fulfillment of social requirements ensure the integrity of the ethnic group, its social, economic, political and cultural life.

But not every object created by man is a phenomenon of culture, and not every person is cultured. lack of culture, or low level culture, means the separation of a part of the population from its culture. Illiteracy, immorality, lack of behavioral skills, communication, labor, elementary hygiene skills that meet cultural norms, a thoughtless attitude to nature and similar manifestations of low culture are the result of a low cultural policy or its total absence. Lack of culture can also be the result of a conscious policy that can be called anti-culture. The nihilistically simplified idea of ​​the cultural process was excellently reflected by I. S. Turgenev in his novel Fathers and Sons. Nihilism sees the condition of progress in the overthrow of the cultural values ​​created by the people over the centuries. The nihilistic attitude towards culture in Russia in the post-revolutionary period was expressed in the destruction of churches, icons, paintings, oblivion and condemnation of the works of outstanding cultural figures. Irreparable damage to culture was caused by the physical extermination of prominent scientists, philosophers, artists, church ministers.

But in whatever conditions culture exists, it resists the chaos and disorganization of society. “Culture is the beginning of eternity,” wrote Berdyaev.

In works of art, household items, in scientific works and architectural monuments, in all the diversity of culture, the human spirit continues life, ensuring the immortality of the human race.

Culture covers all spheres of human activity, links together the economic, social, political and spiritual subsystems of society. The coordinates of the cultural process are determined by civilization, its norms.

In order to understand the place that culture occupies in the process of human self-fulfillment, the following should be distinguished from the many aspects of culture:

valuable (axiological);

sign-symbolic;

activity.

Value does not mean every thing, object, phenomenon that has a certain significance for a person, but a certain “thing” that has absolute meaningful life significance for a person (for example, happiness, goodness, freedom, immortality), which is unattainable in full in real life and therefore represented in the world of culture in a symbolic form. The sign-symbolic aspect of culture helps to understand it as a communicative system, allows you to connect the stages of human history, find a form of contact between a person and society, a person with a person, a person with himself. The activity approach assumes the functioning of cultural patterns as aspects and forms of human activity. Thus, what a person strives for, what he wants to be, is already in culture, represented in the form of symbolic forms, in likenesses and symbols. Culture is a world of own human possibilities, but objectified, presented through a system of artifacts. With the help of culture, chaotic everyday life becomes something harmonious and holistic; Culture is, in a certain sense, the organ of the "production" of human life.

Culture as a human activity includes the moment of reflexivity, awareness in one form or another of cultural patterns. It is "given" along with its awareness. The reflection of culture is carried out in contradictory forms: culture is opposed to life, the normativity of culture is opposed to a nihilistic attitude towards it, the word is opposed to deed. The inconsistency of cultural reflection reflects the real inconsistency of culture.

Culture presupposes stereotyped actions, which ensures the stability of society, the socialization of the individual. The possibility of social foresight, forecasting is also based on the standard of culture. The stabilization aspect of culture comes to the fore in quiet, "normal" periods of history. The means of communication within this aspect of culture are traditions, customs, norms, natural language, etc.

In revolutionary periods of history, "extraordinary", another aspect of culture comes to the fore - creative, the destruction of old patterns and the creation of new ones. It is extremely difficult to connect the disintegrating "connection of times": one must perform a feat, get on a fire, die, live in a barrel in order to introduce life into a new norm, new language stereotypes. Within the framework of the meaning-creating aspect of culture, its communicative mechanism is embodied by a cultural hero - a saint, a holy fool, who, with his extraordinary behavior, destroys the old stereotype and introduces a new form; a philosopher who, like Diogenes, teaches to observe the measure by the excess of his actions; sweat that creates new literary language; king, "cutting a window to Europe." This is the so-called first cultural opposition - the dialectic of normative-stabilization and creative

The second cultural opposition concerns various ways of transmitting culture, cultural communication. The transfer of certain information in culture can be carried out directly, with the help of direct prescriptions, formulas, recipes (this is the “instrumental” aspect of culture), and indirectly, through prescriptions for certain actions that directly mean something else (this is the socio-symbolic aspect of culture). For example, social distances between different social groups can be established directly (“taboo”) and by appropriating a certain “style” of life, designed to interpret, decipher its secondary, hidden meaning. The mechanism of fashion is also a characteristic example of social symbolism. Hypertrophy of the symbolic aspect of culture leads to the loss of creative impulses in society, while this threatens the individual with the loss of individualism. Hypertrophy of the instrumental aspect, "seriousness" leads to a loss of a sense of reality, a misunderstanding of the significance of one's activity.

Finally, the third opposition outlines collisions in the sphere of cultural reflection. Often the cultural significance of the same event from the point of view of the individual and from the point of view of the state is assessed differently. The figures of the ideologue, the philistine, and the intellectual personify various ways of resolving this opposition.

"Man - in - culture" is either an impostor or an apostate. He either does not want to be responsible for what he has done, referring to the pressure of the law, moral standards, public opinion, looking for an "alibi" in culture; or he appropriates the right to speak on behalf of someone else, begins to feel like a participant in a holiday that is not his own, an author of something that is not his own, by “attributing” to himself (using symbolic forms, through cultural staging) the merits of creating cultural forms. Thus, the appropriation of majestic manners, the external appearance of the members of the Platonic Academy without mastering the depth of Platonic thought makes a person an impostor.

The “man of culture” enters the world of culture in a different way. He does not adapt to it, does not make it a means to achieve his "vital", vital needs. Culture for him is not the framework of his life, but life itself. It is in culture that he realizes his ontological need. But culture is alive thanks to people of culture. It cannot exist on its own, apart from man. It is human vital, existential needs that lead to the search for a new "image of eternity" in culture. Culture, according to N. Berdyaev, is always a failure, because it cannot respond to the ontological “challenge” of a person, cannot introduce him into the world of absolute being. Without awareness of the inevitability of its failure, culture turns into an empty game of meanings.

In the philosopher as a man of culture, wrote F. Nietzsche, there is nothing impersonal. On the contrary, his conception, above all moral, testifies who he is, in what relation are the innermost instincts of his nature.

A man of culture is the antithesis of darkness, confusion, chaos of individual spiritual life. All the secret movements of his soul, the contradictions of his worldview have the form of a semantic manifestation to the world. But how is such a being in culture, understood as sense-creation, possible?

The fact is that culture is not a frozen hierarchy of human values ​​that have a normative character, the meaning of which is forever fixed in some kind of “cultural tablets”. Culture is also a human activity for the embodiment and realization of these values. This activity itself is stimulated by the human existential need, the need to secure oneself in eternity as a free, individual "self-lawful" being. Cultural values ​​are not the world of absolute being itself, by joining which a person solves his life-sense super-task. These are only signs, symbols, “likenesses” of the Absolute, forms of movement towards it. The modern philosophy of culture, speaking of culture as a set of “symbolic forms” (E. Cassirer), or as a universal structure of human consciousness (E. Husserl), or about the “axial originality” of culture (K. Jaspers), just has in mind the presence in culture of some universal structures, "forms" that each person fills with his content, interprets in his own way. So, for each person, beauty, goodness, truth, eternal life are unconditional values. But what is good and evil, for example, a person, is forced to decide for himself, in each specific situation, thus acting as an interpreter of culture. In its interpretive function, the self-reflection of culture acts as a contradictory unity of the individual and the universal. Cultural reflection is carried out with the help of philosophy - the organ of self-knowledge of culture.

Conclusion

So, in the broadest sense, culture is a set of manifestations of life, achievements and creativity of a people or a group of peoples. It is the embodiment of that peculiar, new process on earth, the individual products of which are only human demands and could never be generated by nature. Culture branches into various areas or spheres, the main of which are: customs and customs, language and writing, the nature of clothing, settlements, work, education, science, technology, art, religion, all forms of manifestation of the objective spirit of a given people. The level and state of culture can only be understood from the development of culture or from the history of culture; The degeneration of culture creates either lack of culture or "refined culture", i.e. primitive. In the old cultures there is weariness, pessimism, stagnation and decline. These phenomena make it possible to judge how much the bearers of culture remained true to the essence of their culture.

In modern society, the level of development of the culture of any country is measured by the volume of material and spiritual values ​​created in it, the scale of their distribution and the depth of their assimilation by people, by each person. Assessing, for example, the level of spiritual culture of the society of a given country, it is important to know how many cultural monuments, museums, theaters, protected areas, conservatories, libraries, universities, research institutes and much more it has. But it will all be quantitative indicators. No less important is the quality of spiritual products - musical works, scientific discoveries, films, performances, books, their content, bringing up a true culture. Taken together in a quantitative and qualitative ratio, these indicators determine the goal of spiritual culture - the ability of each person to be creative, his susceptibility to the highest achievements of culture.

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