Ideas and Ideals

The article examines theoretical development of the idea of a Russian University in the XVIII-XIX centuries. The author considers the ideas of outstanding scientists and thinkers of the time. She also analyzes the charters of Russian universities and their role in the development of University education and considers the attitudes and influence of society on the development of universities. It is highlighted in the article that relations between the state, society and universities are well-defined in the University statutes. Four University Charters were adopted in Russia in the XIX century: 1804, 1835, 1863, and 1884. If the first Charter granted relative autonomy to the universities, the Charter of 1835 strengthened the power of Trustees, thereby limiting the previously given autonomy. The third Charter of 1863 restored the universities in their rights granting them broad autonomy, while the Charter of 1884 abolished them altogether. The author studies both points of view: the Russian and the foreign ones on the topic of University autonomy from the government. The article shows that Russian universities couldn’t even think about any autonomy, because they were created by the state with the aim to strengthen and preserve the monarchy. The author presents a comparison of missions of the first University and the already reformed University. While the mission of the first university was training of officials for the state service, the reformed universities focused on the development of science within its walls. The article considers development of the Russian University within one hundred years frame from the utilitarian to the classical one.

The article is devoted to the phenomenon of political power as it is depicted in the artistic world of Pushkin’s “Boris Godunov”. The concept of Tzar Boris is analyzed in the context of contemporary view on the nature of power elaborated by Eugen Fink. The author of the article focuses on the dialogue of historical truth and artistic credibility. The article shows that the complexity of Godunov’s character gives way to a wide range of interpretations in nowadays theatre and movies. Boris Godunov is comprehended by stage directors as the “actor” (acting subject) of modernity capable to struggle through the problematic current reality. In addition to the problems of the relationship between power and an individual, the authorities and the people in Boris Godunov, the author raises the most important topic of relations between Russia and the West. The author draws attention to the most famous performance of "Boris Godunov" in new Russia, the play, staged in 2000 by the British producer of Irish descent, Declan Donnellan, and expresses the opinion that this very performance solves the problem in the context of the "unhealed present" at the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries. The study is addressed to theatre professionals, philologists, specialists in cultural studies and aesthetics, cultural scientists and educators.

This article deals with analyzing traditions from archaic societies to the modern society going through the hard crisis period being full of different risks. Speedy changes over the world are continuing to increase rapidly herewith to multiply risks for speedy achieving favourable future. The growing needs have been aggravating the destruction of harmony between a human and his mental, social and native world. The unbridgeable gap between a man and a tradition has been becoming obvious. The origin of Latin word "traditio" pays attention to education which implements continuity in society developing, and maintains culture. The analysis of examples of forming the traditions in ancient Israel, India and China, in ancient Greek policies and in Rome has revealed the importance of attitude for preserving the values keeping harmony between man’s inner world and society, and providing the balance between privacy and social life. Preserving tradition is carried out in conditions supported by culture which is certain to be the stronghold of any state. A tradition is focused on values and their transference mechanisms, and language is sure to have the priority among them. Language as a means of communication in time and space plays the paramount role keeping universal and professional knowledge for using by humanity. The etymology of loan words pays attention to the cultural and historical conditions of their emergence in a language and emphasizes the successive nature of knowledge. The tradition has been gaining the status of the basis allowing both person and society to get out of crisis.

The article gives quite an unusual view on quite usual things. The author speculates upon different, but utmost important aspects of love. He reflects on love of self, love for another human being, love for the mankind, love for the Motherland, physical love and terrestrial love. But the author doesn’t share his thoughts with the readers on parental love and love of God. The article is full of philosophical comments to literature passages, irony and curious, nontrivial, conclusions. In our opinion, the article will be of great interest to people, who are not indifferent and inclined to reflection and it can be perceived as the additional opportunity to touch eternity.

The article considers the essence and nature of a human. The authors substantiate the necessity of a holistic view of a person in modern conditions, when the human development has become the goal of civilized development. The authors discuss various approaches to understanding of human entity. The article criticizes unreasonable use of the mechanistic model of an “economic man”. Forming the empirical models of a human, it is suggested coming from his essence as a socio-natural-spiritual phenomenon.

The author considers the formation and development of the “public sphere”, the construction of its theoretical image, prospects and threats in the epoch of IT prevalence. The author analyzes different concepts of “public sphere” and reveals its substantial similarities and differences. He also gives a thorough analysis of the most popular approaches (terms, ideas, concepts) to the definition of "public sphere" in scientific literature. The author comes to the conclusion, that the result of the long-run discussion is the understanding of the fact, that the rational and fair space for discussions, which was mentioned by J. Habernas, needs the new forms of its implementation. It is quite possible and logical to put it into action in the Internet. At the same time, the problem of threats and the limits of the virtual public sphere are still unsolved. Therefore, the society needs support and coordination of people in the interaction with the new embodiment of “the public sphere”. The concept of "public sphere" is used rather often, but being highly controversial it gives rise to the need for careful consideration of its content for systematizing ideas and concepts that relate to it and predict further ways of its development or transformation to the virtual public sphere in the space of the Internet.

The article examines how the program of acmeism, proclaimed in the manifestos of N. Gumilev, S. Gorodetsky, O. Mandelstam, finds its practical embodiment in the early lyrics of M. Zenkevich, the representative of Adamism - the "left wing" of this poetic school. Adamism is characterized by a radical follow-up to the manifestos of N. Gumilev, S. Gorodetsky, O. Mandelstam, which emphasizes the need for aesthetic mastering of the earthly, material, objective world as opposed to the symbolist slogans of theurgy. M. Zenkevich "brings to the scene" a new hero, reflecting on his place in the universe, his nature - in the unity of the carnal / animal and spiritual. The task of "making peace in the whole aggregate of beauties and disgraces" set by the Acmeists in the work of M. Zenkevich does not receive practical implementation. In the collection "Wild Porphyry" nature appears as a unity of "earthly and mystical", unknowable and beyond the control of man. But to adopt its laws, where "equilibrium" is achieved through the rotation of infinite destruction and creation, would mean for the lyrical subject "dissolution in matter", the loss of subjectivity. In the second book "Under the Meat Purple" nature as the creative absolute is almost not paid attention. The same problem of natural and super-natural gets an aesthetic embodiment at the level of the microcosm, where man and woman are dual beings: "animal" nature is manifested in the erotic instincts of the first and - the physical perfection and cruelty of the second. In this case, the woman is a sacred creature (like nature in the «Wild Porphyry»), the earthly and mystical in it are merged together, and the man is sacrificed under the sign of death, sacrificing himself. But even in these "personified" models there is obviously a disequilibrium of "earthly and mystical": a woman is partly defective as a natural being (she is barren), and a man is doomed to die in the name of Eternal Femininity. At the same time, in the lyrics of M. Zenkevich, in the 1910s, the appearance of a new hero, "the coming Apollo," a human machine civilization free from natural determinism, begins to form. Thus, there is a rapprochement with the aesthetics of the avant-garde, where the subject challenges both nature and God, usurping the right of creation.

The article is devoted to the problems and prospects of functioning of the Lusatian Serbs traditional culture at the present stage. On the basis of official documents and interviews with native speakers, the author examines the influence of assimilation processes on cultural identity as well as the possibilities of preserving and developing the Serbian culture. The main problems are identified: economic, political, linguistic and interethnic, which impede the full existence of the Lusatian Serbs culture. The author gives the assessment of its development potential and makes the conclusion about the significant role of the young generation in preserving the traditions and reviving the native language. She also emphasizes the role of folk art culture in the mechanism of storage and transmission of traditions.

The research is devoted to philosophical reflection on the impact of socio-cultural factors on the modern theory of communication development. The source of the observed diversity of the disunity of modern communication research primarily contains in the multidimensional nature of the phenomenon. Multidirectionality of communication studies is also a consequence of the researchers’ aptitude to the influence of certain socio-cultural factors. The article offers the challenge to outline a number of socio-cultural determinants that caused the dynamics of communication studies of the XX – the beginning of the XXI centuries and to clarify the mechanisms, procedures of their influence on the formation of the theory of communication. As a result of linguistic and chronological approach to modern communication research in the article the author traces the genesis of certain intentions of the communicative theory generated by the state of social and cultural backgrounds of the implemented communication studies. There is a revealed number of significant socio-cultural determinants based on the analysis conducted by the author, such as: a high level of internal autonomy of researchers and research dissonance of cultural and linguistic chronotopes. The impact of social and cultural events from the outside (especially in cases when the events affect the deep layers of society) is located in the same row. Actually, the purpose of the article is a factual verification of generally known terms of the socio-cultural determination of modern communication studies. As a result, we plan to designate a number of socio-cultural factors behind a range of the research intentions in the framework of the theory of communication.