Ideas and Ideals

The article is a study of the “Divine Service of Thanksgiving ...”, dedicated to the Poltava victory of 1709, according to a handwritten copy (the first half of the XVIII century) from the Chekuevo village, Onega district of the Arkhangelsk region. Hermeneutic analysis of the service text and the study of the manuscript history reveal the significant characteristics of the Peter's time culture. The service text, attributed to Archbishop Theophilactus (Lopatinsky), is strictly canonical, but while meeting the traditional service form, the author creates his work in accordance with the Baroque aesthetics of the modern era. Using the moral and rhetorical exegesis principles allows Archbishop Theophilactus to extract “all the potency of the visual” (A.V. Mikhailov) from the verbal image. Traditional expressions in the battle description acquire visual expressiveness. At the same time, the author does not draw the detailed battle pictures, but only names the most significant semantic points. One of such significant events for the author is the fact of Charles XII wound in the leg. It is subjected to multilayer allegorical interpretation in the text. “Emblematic” thinking of the era is manifested in a special attention to the exegesis of the Swedish heraldic lion. Freedom of association and a wide scope of combining meanings is the essence of the Baroque combination game as a manifestation of creative thought, the very essence of human culture. Throughout the eighteenth century, the text of the “Divine Service of Thanksgiving ...”, published in 1709, 1711 and 1717, was distributed in manuscript copies. One of such lists is the manuscript found by this article authors in the Chekuevo village. The manuscript history connects such historical subjects as Peter I's visit to the Russian North and the Solovetsky monastery and the events of the Northern war. It reveals the Northern peasantry's awareness of involvement in the naval successes of Russia, and demonstrates the specifics of the peasant and monastery libraries functioning.

The participants in the Round table “The Value of Scientific Journal” discuss a number of problems that are currently encountered by authors and publishers of corresponding journals. Will scientific journal be preserved in its present form in the competitive environment with drastic growth of electronic communications? Is a printed on paper journal the best way to present scientific results? Are its functions changing? What is the audience of authors and readers of scientific journals in recent time? These questions get different answers. The traditional functions of a scientific journal can now be carried out in new forms, and it is not clear what will remain of the habitual printed copy in the nearest future. In particular, this concerns the function of presenting scientific knowledge, which is gradually moving to specialized electronic portals. The issue of the relationship between socio-humanitarian journals and journals which present natural sciences is discussed separately. The standardization and formalization of the presentation of results for humanitarian articles is in most cases unacceptable, but it is this feature that is one of the most important when including the journal in most significant international databases. The same applies to journals that popularize science at the serious level. The problem of scientometrics’ objectivity is discussed. What does the fact of a higher citation level, for example, in economics, mean when Keynes and Marx are inferior to many modern researchers according to the Hirsch index? The participants discuss the problem of the scientific level of authors in Russian conditions, the problem of the lack of originality of publications, and some other issues.

Stanza della Segnatura ("Signature Room") painted by Raphael, is one of the most famous works of the great master. At the same time, the relations between the paintings on the four frescoes and other images in this room, as well as this room itself, form a kind of “abstract object” that can be decoded. The key to this decoding can be the text on the slate, which is presented on one of the frescoes, the most famous of the cycle, known as the "School of Athens." Perhaps we will never know for sure whether Raphael himself invented all the mathematical schemes that can be found in this room, or whether he simply carried out the arithmetic plans that were imposed on him by the Pope or his advisers. Nevertheless, we can assume with a high degree of certainty that the visual iconography in Stanza della Segnatura with a reliable “margin of error” is indeed consistent with the central features of the mathematical theory of music described in Plato's “Timaeus”. It can be shown that the relations between the frescoes obey quite definite mathematical relations. If Stansa della Segnature is really a "room for a signature", then this "signature" is a musically harmonious ‘World soul’, described in the Plato’s “Timaeus”

The article deals with the social and socio-political processes taking place in Central Asia. The new understanding of social solidarity in the traditional Eastern society and the emerging transition to the model of national statehood of Uzbekistan based on the principles of interaction with civil society are discussed. The problem is that social solidarity in the modern era of democratic freedoms is built in the context of finding a balance between the need to strengthen the national state and the natural process of development of civil society, but for the Eastern States this “balance” has always had its own specifics. The aim of the study is to analyze the opportunities and barriers of social and socio-political processes based on the appeal to solidarity as a social mechanism that allows effective integration of society. At the same time, there is a political and ideological component of social solidarity, which is often used as a slogan. The authors analyze the factors and conditions of social solidarity development. Social solidarity itself is interpreted as a factor in the development of national statehood. At the same time, Uzbekistan is increasingly becoming the initiator of unification and solidarity of states and societies throughout Central Asia and the East. On the basis of the conducted interview data, the authors present the assessment of social changes by the expert community, and show how the intelligentsia accepts the concept of solidarity. Social solidarity, from the point of view of the intelligentsia, will allow: to reduce social tension in the multicultural/multi-ethnic Uzbek society, with the territorial designation of the borders remaining from the Soviet era, as well as the remaining clan system; it will lead to the growth of civil society institutions: non-profit, non-governmental organizations, and, accordingly, it will reduce the role of power structures. Finally, it will benefit the socio-psychological atmosphere in the society, support positive social attitudes. The authors have come to the conclusion, that there is a new scientific problem related to the search for criteria of social solidarity (or the state of the process), and the need to conduct a survey of public opinion, to understand what different social groups think on this issue.

The article analyzes self-management as a science of rational construction of one’s own life. The authors highlight the most important resource – the resource of time. The culture of using one’s own time and the time of other people is the most important aspect of the general culture of a person. The authors show that up to now self-management has been mainly considered as a set of some positive recommendations, or ready recipes of life. This is how it is mostly presented in modern literature. However, building your own life is a creative process, and these ready-made recipes do not work here. They do not take into account individual qualities of a person, as well as many other circumstances. The article presents another approach to self-management, which can be referred to as “inversive self-management”. It mainly deals with errors and difficulties (limitations) in self-management. Limitations in self-management are shown not as insufficiently developed skills, but as independent destructive stereotypes of behavior. In contrast to the methods of self-organization that require an individual approach, the limitations of self-management are quite stereotypical. In order to study them, the inverse relationship analysis is used. Inversion is a form of intra-system relationships in which the lowest element in the hierarchy actually becomes dominant in it, formally remaining in the same subordinate position. Hierarchical relationships are provided by the work of several organizational principles in the hierarchy. Inversion appears when there is a conflict between these organizational principles. So there are many limitations to self-management. Some components of human behavior that have adaptive significance begin to work against human productivity when the importance of these components is too great. The article examines a number of such examples. This article is an abstract of a more extensive study, which provides an analysis of the particular manifestations of restrictions in self-management, where the authors consider the difficulties in the formation of their own lives, caused by dependencies, adverse life scenarios, time orientation, etc. A number of these limitations are deeply rooted in culture.

The article considers the iconography of Christian art associated with the rainbow motif. A rainbow is a beautiful optical phenomenon in the atmosphere that occurs when light is scattered on water droplets; it has the form of a multicolored arc or two arcs. The shining rainbow in Scripture is closely related to God's acts of communication with the chosen people such as Noah and the prophets. In such iconographic schemes as the Last judgment, the All saints’ Day and the Ascension of the Lord, the rainbow motif, based on the prophetic visions of Ezekiel and John the Apostle, is a symbol of the radiance of the Divine Glory and Majesty of God in His appearance to the prophets. In these iconographies, the rainbow is depicted with different degree of conventionality. Thus, it can be represented in one or two colors, but can also be made with expressive brightness in several colors of the spectrum. In these iconographies, the rainbow often represents the throne of the Lord within the mandorla - an oval or round frame around the figure of Christ or the Virgin, which has a complex symbolism associated with the image of a cloud, with the Divine Glory, as well as with the special nature of the image of Christ or the Virgin, which is outside the physical time and space. In a number of other iconographic schemes, the rainbow motif has the meaning of God's mercy. These are compositions associated with God’s Covenant with Noah, as well as with the Lord Covenant with the chosen people – the Church, which is reflected, in particular, in the compositions of Noah's Ark and the iconography of Our Lady of Mount Nerukosechnaya.

The article explores such a kind of musical genre – a Soviet lyric song, its place in the Soviet everyday life, aesthetic task, and its fate during the 70-year period of life. The author substantiates the reasons why this genre in the Soviet era turned out to be so popular that it became a part of folk culture. The author also studies the phenomenon of some songs of that period, heavily propagated, but not popular among people. The author highlights the idea that even pseudo-folk songs, such as V.G. Zakharov’s songs for the Pyatnitsky Choir, although actively propagandized and often performed from the stage and on the radio, did not really become popular. The article attempts to explain the reasons for this spontaneous mass ostracism by “popular censorship”. Thieves' lyrics as such are not explored, with the exception of the “anthem of prisoners” - the song “I remember that Vanino port.” The author analyzes the reasons for the sudden end of the “golden age” of the Soviet lyric song, which nature ceased to correspond to the commercial interests of post-perestroika Russian song variety.

This article discusses the demographic, ethnic and religious aspects of the life of megaregions of Canada and Siberia. Canada actively continues to attract migrants, while Siberia, on the contrary, after Perestroika, is experiencing a steady decline in population, and the more to the East, the more noticeable this process is. The important factor determining the ethnic diversity of both Siberia and Canada is the presence of indigenous peoples who inhabited these lands before the arrival of the Europeans. In the market economy, the processes of transformation of lifestyle and mentality of various ethnic groups are underway. The vectors of these processes are quite different - from assimilation with more numerous groups of the population and gradual dissolution in a market economy with the assimilation of the corresponding mentality to the formation of a new way of life with preservation of ethnic identity. A significant role in Canada is also played by new ethnic groups formed by migrants who have recently arrived from Asia. In both megaregions Christianity played a large role in spiritual life, and missions were formed for the conversion of the indigenous people. But if in Canada the Catholic Church was under severe pressure from Protestants, in Siberia Orthodoxy faced not only pagans, but also Muslims and Buddhists. However, during the Soviet era, Orthodoxy lost its significance and was forced to revive its influence, but traditional forms of religiosity has increased.

The nature of Western civilization has been interpreted in many ways in the majority of non-European societies, which faced it. This process was mostly pronounced in British India. The representatives of the new, colonialist-built elites had to reflect upon not only their own and European living principles, but also to discuss the topics concerning their submissive and fairly complicated position in that political system. The paper analyzes the personal views of a famous Bengali writer of the XIX century Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay. He was not only a famous writer, but also an extremely successful person in the Bengali society of those times. After getting a perfect education, he achieved the highest point of his career. Then he started sharing his opinions in public, which, considering his social status and Bengali social structure of that time, was fairly venturous. Entering a public epistolary intercourse with one prominent European figure, he began to protect the Hindu religion from the outside attacks and he even questioned the well-known idea of Europe’s intellectual supremacy. With the help of his satiric writers, e.g. «Kamalakanta», he actually poured ridicule not only on the colonial position of his country, but also on the Western system of International Law. Remaining a bearer of Western world view and values, he did not challenge the key achievements of the European world, Bankim Chandra tried to reveal its various problems. Thereby the writer proposed his own way of overcoming one of the most essential colonial state questions – the dilemma between westernization and the drive for their own identity.

The main object of imagological research is perception of the ‘other’ by representations of various cultures. The question is ‘what’ and not ‘who’ represents a culture. The key concept in imagology is that of ‘archetype’, which is fixated through centuries in folklore (fairytales, mythology and epics). It is exactly the archetype which predetermines the images dominant in this or that folk. Imagologists presume that an image is not static and constantly changes. The change in the spiritual condition of a folk, stipulated by certain events, triggers the respective archetypes. A phenotype, just like an image, does not remain unchanged, either; it changes under the influence of natural forces, such as genetics and environment. An image, on the other hand, evolves under the influence of three main characteristics of sapiens: the capability of creative thinking, speech, and creative activity (the capability of creating essential objects). In the self-consciousness of every nation, there are certain elements of nature (landscape types, rivers, mountain peaks, steppes etc.) which represent an integral part of archetype. They occupy a particular place in songs, poems and legends (e.g. Rhine for the Germans, Volga for the Russians or the Carpathian basin for the Hungarians). The individual and collective perception of the ‘other’ is often selective, i.e. when only a certain part of the whole is scrutinized, which naturally results in the appearance of prejudices and stereotypes, even given a careful study of this isolated element. The ‘other’, is, according to imagology, not synonymous to ‘hostile’, it all depends upon the individual characteristics (content) of the ‘other’. Realization of the contours of one’s own and foreign cultures allows better communication with the ‘other’. In his article, the author illustrates the potentially useful nature of imagological applications, in order to clarify the inalienable discrepancy between interests and values in the field of inter-ethnic and inter-national relations.