It would seem a strange question. Everything is clear: “Culture is needed in order to...” But try to answer it yourself, and you will understand that everything is not so simple.
Culture is an integral part of society with its own tasks and goals, designed to perform functions unique to it.
Adaptation function environment. We can say that this is the oldest function of culture. It was thanks to her that human society found protection from the elemental forces of nature and forced them to serve itself. Already primitive made clothes from animal skins, learned to use fire, and as a result was able to populate huge territories globe.
The function of accumulation, storage and transfer of cultural values. This function allows a person to determine his place in the world and, using the knowledge accumulated about him, to develop from lower to higher. It is provided by the mechanisms of cultural traditions, which we have already talked about. Thanks to them, culture preserves the heritage accumulated over centuries, which remains the unchanged foundation of the creative searches of mankind.
The function of goal setting and regulation of social life and human activity. Within the framework of this function, culture creates the values and guidelines of society, consolidates what has been achieved and becomes the basis for further development. Culturally created goals and patterns are the perspective and blueprint of human activity. These same cultural values are established as the norms and requirements of society for all its members, regulating their lives and activities. Take, for example, the religious doctrines of the Middle Ages, which you know from your history course. They simultaneously created the values of society, defining “what is good and what is bad,” indicating what to strive for, and also obliging each person to lead a very specific way of life, set by patterns and norms.
Socialization function. This function enables each individual person to acquire a certain system of knowledge, norms and values that allow him to act as a full member of society. People excluded from cultural processes, for the most part, cannot adapt to life in human society. (Remember the Mowgli - people found in the forest and raised by animals.)
Communication function. This function of culture ensures interaction between people and communities, promotes the processes of integration and unity of human culture. It becomes especially clear in the modern world, when a single cultural space of humanity is being created before our eyes.
The main functions listed above, of course, do not exhaust all the meanings of culture. Many scientists would add dozens more provisions to this list. And the separate consideration of functions itself is quite conditional. In real life they are closely intertwined and look like an indivisible process cultural creativity human mind.
Imagine a huge tree with all its branches and twigs that intertwine with each other and are lost from sight. The tree of culture looks even more complex because all its branches are constantly growing, changing, connecting and diverging. And, in order to understand how they grow, you need to know and remember what they looked like before, that is, you need to constantly take into account the entire vast cultural experience of humanity.
Plunging into history, we see in the depths of centuries the historical cultures of ancient civilizations, threads from which stretch in our time. Remember, for example, what modern world owes to the cultures of Ancient Egypt and Ancient Greece.
When we look at a world map, we realize that cultures can be defined by race and national characteristics. A single interethnic culture can historically be formed on the territory of one state. Take, for example, India, a country that has united many peoples with different customs and religious beliefs into a single cultural space.
Well, if, taking our eyes off the map, we plunge into the depths of society, then here too we will see a lot of cultures.
In society they can be divided, say, according to gender, age and professional characteristics. After all, you must agree that the cultural interests of teenagers and older people differ from each other, just as the cultural and everyday life of miners differs from the lifestyle of actors, and the culture of provincial cities is not similar to the culture of capitals.
It is difficult to understand this diversity. At first glance, it may seem that culture as a single whole simply does not exist. In fact, all these particles are connected and fit into a single mosaic. Cultures intertwine and interact with each other. And over time, this process only accelerates. For example, today no one will be surprised by an Indian sitting on a bench in a Moscow park and reading Sophocles in an English translation.
In the world around us, there is a constant dialogue of cultures. This is especially clearly seen in the example of the interpenetration and mutual enrichment of national cultures. Each of them is unique and unique. Their differences are due to individual historical development. But history transcends national and regional boundaries, it becomes global, and culture, like a person, simply cannot be in isolation, it needs constant communication and the opportunity to compare itself with others. Without this, its full development is impossible. Domestic scientist, academician D.S. Likhachev wrote: “True cultural values develop only in contact with other cultures, grow on rich cultural soil and take into account the experience of neighbors. Can grains develop in a glass of distilled water? Maybe! “But until the grain’s own strength is exhausted, then the plant dies very quickly.”
Now there are practically no isolated cultural communities left on Earth, except somewhere in inaccessible equatorial forests. Scientific and technological progress related to it information Technology, the development of transport, increased mobility of the population, the global division of labor - all this entails the internationalization of culture, the creation of a single cultural space for different nations and peoples. The easiest way to assimilate the achievements of technology, natural science, and exact sciences in interethnic communication. It is somewhat more difficult for innovations in the field of literature and artistic creativity to take root. But here too we can see examples of integration. So, let's say, Japan with its centuries-old literary traditions greedily absorbs and assimilates the experience of European writers, and the whole world, in turn, is experiencing a real boom, reading works of Japanese literature.
We live in the era of the formation of universal human inter national culture, whose values are acceptable to people all over the planet. However, like any other global phenomenon, the process of cultural internationalization gives rise to a lot of problems. Difficulties arise in preserving one’s own national cultures when centuries-old traditions people are being replaced by new values. This issue is especially acute for small nations, whose cultural baggage may be buried under foreign influences. An instructive example is the fate of the North American Indians, who are increasingly dissolving into American society and culture.
Among the problems of globalization, it becomes obvious how carefully it is necessary to treat the core native culture- To folk traditions, since they are its basis. Without its cultural baggage, no people can enter world culture on an equal footing; they will have nothing to contribute to the common treasury, and will only be able to offer themselves as a consumer.
Folk culture is a completely special layer of national culture, its most stable part, a source of development and a repository of traditions. This is a culture created by the people and existing in the masses. It includes the collective creative activity of the people, reflects their life, views, and values. Her works are rarely recorded; more often they are passed on by word of mouth. Folk culture is usually anonymous. Folk songs and dances have performers, but no authors. And that is why it is the fruit of collective creativity. Even if copyrighted works become its property, their authorship is soon forgotten. Remember, for example, the well-known song “Katyusha”. Who is the author of its words and music? Not all of those who perform it will answer this question.
When we talk about folk culture, we first of all mean folklore (with all its legends, songs and fairy tales), folk music, dance, theater, architecture, fine and decorative arts. However, it doesn't end there. This is just the tip of the iceberg. The most important components of folk culture are morals and customs, everyday phraseology and methods of housekeeping, household life and ethnoscience. Everything that people, due to long-standing traditions, regularly use in their everyday life is folk culture. Her distinctive feature is that it is in constant use. While grandmothers tell fairy tales, folk culture is alive. But as soon as some of it ceases to be used, at the same moment a living cultural phenomenon disappears, it becomes just an object for study by folklorists. Folk culture as a whole is constant and indestructible, but the particles that make it up are very fragile and require careful and attentive treatment.
culture people creativity
Society, culture and people are inextricably, organically linked. Neither society nor a person can exist outside of culture, the role of which has always been and remains fundamental. However, the assessment of this role has undergone a marked evolution.
Until relatively recently, the high assessment of the role and importance of culture was not in doubt. Of course, in the past there were crisis periods in the history of a particular society, when existing image life was questioned. Thus, in Ancient Greece, the philosophical school of Cynics arose, which came out from the position of complete denial of generally accepted values, norms and rules of behavior, which was the first form of cynicism. However, such phenomena were still the exception, and in general the culture was perceived positively.
Criticism of culture
The situation began to change significantly in the 18th century, when a stable trend of a critical attitude towards culture arose. At the origins of this trend was the French philosopher J.-J. Rousseau, who put forward the idea of moral superiority " natural man", not spoiled by culture and civilization. He also proclaimed the slogan of “return to nature.”
For other reasons, but even more critically, F. Nietzsche assessed Western culture. He explained his attitude by the fact that in his contemporary culture science and technology dominate, leaving no room for art. He declared: “in order not to die from science, we still have art.” At the beginning of the 20th century. Austrian psychologist 3. Freud finds new grounds for criticizing culture. He looks at human life through the prism of two basic, in his opinion, instincts - sexual (instinct of Eros, or continuation of life) and destructive (instinct of Thanatos, or death). Culture, according to Freud's concept, suppresses the sexual instinct with its norms, restrictions and prohibitions and therefore deserves critical assessment.
In the 1960-70s. has become widespread in the West counterculture movement, which united in its ranks radical layers of youth and students, based on the ideas of Rousseau, Nietzsche, Freud and his followers, especially on the ideas of the philosopher G. Marcuse. The movement opposed the spreading values of mass culture and mass society, the fetishization of science and technology, and the basic ideals and values of traditional bourgeois culture. One of the main goals of the movement was proclaimed a “sexual revolution”, from which a “new sensuality” should emerge as the basis for a truly free man and society.
Some totalitarians demonstrate a sharply negative attitude towards culture. An example in this regard is fascism. The phrase of one of the heroes became widely known Nazi writer A post that declared, “When I hear the word culture, I reach for my gun.” To substantiate such a position, the already familiar reference to the fact that culture allegedly suppresses healthy human instincts is usually used.
Basic functions of culture
Despite the above examples of a critical attitude towards culture, it plays a huge positive role. Culture fulfills several vital functions, without which the very existence of man and society is impossible. The main one is socialization function, or human creativity, i.e. formation and education of a person. Just as the separation of man from the kingdom of nature went along with the emergence of ever new elements of culture, so the reproduction of man occurs through culture. Outside of culture, without mastering it, a newborn cannot become a human being.
This can be confirmed by cases known from literature when a child was lost by his parents in the forest and for several years grew up and lived in a pack of animals. Even if he was later found, these few years were enough for him to be lost to society: the found child could no longer master either the human language or other elements of culture. Only through culture does a person master all accumulated social experience and become a full member of society. Here special role play traditions, customs, skills, rituals, ceremonies, etc., which form a collective social experience and way of life. In this case, culture really acts as « social heredity ”, which is transmitted to a person and the significance of which is no less than biological heredity.
The second function of culture, closely related to the first, is educational, informational. Culture is capable of accumulating a variety of knowledge, information and information about the world and transmitting it from generation to generation. It acts as the social and intellectual memory of humanity.
No less important is regulatory, or normative, function culture, with the help of which it establishes, organizes and regulates relationships between people. This function is carried out primarily through systems of norms, rules and moral laws, as well as rules, the observance of which constitutes the necessary conditions for the normal existence of society.
Closely intertwined with those already mentioned communication function, which is carried out primarily through language, which is the main means of communication between people. Along with natural language, all areas of culture - science, art, technology - have their own specific languages, without which it is impossible to master the entire culture as a whole. Knowledge of foreign languages opens access to other national cultures and the entire world culture.
Another function - value, or axiological, is also of great importance. It contributes to the formation of a person’s value needs and orientation, allows him to distinguish between good and bad, good and evil, beautiful and ugly. The criterion for such differences and assessments are primarily moral and aesthetic values.
Deserves special mention creative, innovative function culture, which finds expression in the creation of new values and knowledge, norms and rules, customs and traditions, as well as in the critical rethinking, reform and renewal of existing culture.
Finally, important has a gaming, entertainment, or compensatory function culture, which is associated with the restoration of a person’s physical and spiritual strength, leisure time, psychological relaxation, etc.
All these and other functions of culture can be reduced to two: the function of accumulating and transmitting experience, or adaptation (adaptation) and the critically creative function. They are also closely and inextricably linked, since accumulation includes a critical selection of the most valuable and useful from everything available, and the transfer and assimilation of experience does not occur passively and mechanically, but again presupposes a critical, creative attitude. In turn, the creative function means, first of all, the improvement of all mechanisms of culture, which inevitably leads to the creation of something new.
It is impossible to recognize as justified the judgment that culture is only traditions, conservatism, conformism, stereotypes, repetition of what is already known, that it impedes creativity, the search for something new, etc. Traditions in culture do not exclude renewal and creativity. A striking example of this is Russian icon painting, which was based on a strong tradition and strict canons, and yet all the great icon painters - Andrei Rublev, Theophanes the Greek, Daniil Cherny. Dionysius - have a unique creative personality.
The thesis about that seems just as unfounded. that culture suppresses healthy human instincts. This can be confirmed by the prohibition of incest or incest. It is believed that this was the first clear divide between nature and culture in human history. However, being a purely cultural phenomenon, this prohibition is an indispensable condition for the reproduction and survival of people. The most ancient tribes that did not accept this ban doomed themselves to degeneration and extinction. The same can be said about the rules of hygiene, which are inherently cultural, but protect human health.
Culture is an integral property of a person
However, ideas about who should be considered a cultured person may differ. The ancient Romans called a cultured person who knows how to choose worthy travel companions among people, things and thoughts - both in the past and in the present. German philosopher Hegel believed that cultured person able to do everything that others do.
History shows that everything prominent figures were highly cultured people. Many of them were universal personalities: their knowledge was encyclopedic, and everything they did was distinguished by exceptional skill and perfection. As an example, we should mention, first of all, Leonardo da Vinci, who was at the same time a great scientist, engineer and a brilliant artist Renaissance. Today it is very difficult and, apparently, impossible to become a universal person, since the volume of knowledge is too vast. At the same time, the possibility of being cultured person increased unusually. The main characteristics of such a person remain the same: knowledge and competencies, the volume and depth of which must be significant, and skills marked by high qualifications and skill. To this we must add moral and aesthetic education, adherence to generally accepted norms of behavior and the creation of our own “imaginary museum”, in which people would be present best works of all world art. Today, a cultured person must know foreign languages and own a computer.
Culture and society are very close, but not identical systems, which are relatively autonomous and develop according to their own laws.
Types of society and culture
Modern Western sociologist Per Monson has identified four main approaches to understanding society.
First approach comes from the primacy of society in relation to the individual. Society is understood as a system that rises above individuals and cannot be explained by their thoughts and actions, since the whole is not reduced to the sum of its parts: individuals come and go, are born and die, but society continues to exist. This tradition originates in the concept of E. Durkheim and even earlier - in the views of O. Comte. From modern trends it includes primarily the school of structural-functional analysis (T. Parsons) and the theory of conflict (L. Kose and R. Dahrendorf).
Second approach, on the contrary, will shift the focus of attention towards the individual, arguing that without studying the inner world of a person, his motivations and meanings, it is impossible to create an explanatory sociological theory. This tradition is associated with the name of the German sociologist M. Weber. Among the modern theories corresponding to this approach are: symbolic interactionism (G. Blumer) and ethnomethodology (G. Garfinkel, A. Sicurel).
Third approach focuses on studying the very mechanism of the process of interaction between society and the individual, taking a middle position between the first two approaches. The early P. Sorokin is considered one of the founders of this tradition, and among modern sociological concepts one should name the theory of action, or the theory of exchange (J. Homans).
Fourth approach- Marxist. In terms of the type of explanation of social phenomena, it is similar to the first approach. However, there is a fundamental difference: in line with the Marxist tradition, the active intervention of sociology in the transformation and change of the surrounding world is assumed, while the first three traditions consider the role of sociology rather as advisory.
The debate between representatives of these approaches is about how to understand society: as a supra-individual objective social structure or as a human world of life filled with culture.
Based on systematic approach, laid down in the works of E. Durkheim, society should be considered not just as a collection of people, but also as an objectively existing set of conditions for their coexistence. Social life is a reality of a special kind, different from natural reality and not reducible to it - social reality, and the most important part of this reality is collective ideas. They are the foundation of culture, which is interpreted as a way of organizing social life, society as a social organism. Like any organisms that are complex systems, society has integrative properties. which are inherent in the entire social whole, but are absent in its individual elements. Among the most important properties is the ability for a historically long autonomous existence, based on the fact that only society is associated with a change of generations. Thanks to this, societies are self-sufficient systems that provide, maintain and improve their way of life. The way to realize this self-sufficiency is culture, and its intergenerational transmission allows society to reproduce itself.
Humanity has never been a single social collective. Different groups (populations) of people exist in a variety of local social groups (ethnicities, classes, social strata, etc.). The foundation of these local groups are cultures, which are the basis for the integration of people into such groups. Therefore, on Earth there is no society at all, no culture at all - these are abstractions. In reality, local cultures and societies existed and still exist on our planet. Cultures in relation to these societies (social groups) perform the tasks of integration, consolidation and organization of people; regulation of the practice of their joint life activities with the help of norms and values; ensuring cognition surrounding world and storage of information significant for human survival; implementation of communication between people, for which special languages and methods of information exchange are developed; development of mechanisms for the reproduction of society as a social integrity.
IN historical development There are several types of society and associated cultures.
First type- primitive society and culture. It is characterized by syncretism - the non-separation of the individual from the main social structure, which was the blood family. All mechanisms of social regulation - traditions and customs, rites and rituals - found justification in myth, which was a form and way of existence primitive culture. Its rigid structure did not allow deviations. Therefore, even in the absence of special monitoring social structures All rules and regulations were followed very precisely. TO primitive society and culture is adjacent archaic society and culture- modern peoples living at the Stone Age level (about 600 tribes are known today).
Second type society is associated with the processes of social stratification and division of labor, which led to the formation
states where hierarchical relations between people were legalized. The birth of the state occurred in countries Ancient East. With all the diversity of its forms - eastern despotism, monarchy, tyranny, etc. they all singled out a supreme ruler, whose subjects were all other members of society. In such societies, the regulation of relations, as a rule, was based on violence. Within this type of society it is necessary to distinguish before industrial society and culture, where class-ideological and political-confessional forms of life prevailed, and the violence used received religious justification. Another form became industrial society and culture, where the leading role was played by national-state formations and specialized social groups in society, and the violence was economic.
Third type society originated in Ancient Greece and Rome, but became widespread since modern times, especially in the 20th century. In a democracy that forms a civil society, people perceive themselves as free citizens who accept certain forms of organizing their lives and activities. It is a society of this type that is characterized by the highest form of manifestation of economic, political and legal culture, ideologically justified by philosophy, science, and art. In such a society, citizens have equal rights based on the principles of cooperation, communication, trade exchange and dialogue. Of course, this is still an ideal, and in real practice it is still impossible to do without violence, but the goal has already been set. In many ways, this became possible with the formation of a new society post-industrial type with the ongoing processes of globalization and the formation of mass culture.
Social cultural institutions
Real connections between society and culture are provided by social cultural institutions. The concept of “social institution” is borrowed by cultural studies from sociology and jurisprudence and is used in several senses:
- a stable set of formal and informal rules, principles, guidelines that regulate various areas human activities and organizing them into a single system;
- a community of people playing certain social roles and organized through social norms and goals;
- system of institutions through which they are organized, preserved and reproduced certain aspects human activity.
IN various types cultures, social institutions are formed in different ways, however, several can be distinguished general principles their appearance. Firstly, it requires awareness of the need for this type of cultural activities. Many peoples and cultures managed without museums, libraries, archives, concert halls, etc. precisely because there was no corresponding need. The withering away of a need leads to the disappearance of the cultural institution associated with it. Thus, today the number of churches per capita is much lower than in the 19th century, when the bulk of people attended services weekly.
Secondly, socially significant goals must be set that form the motives for visiting the relevant institutions for the majority of people in a given culture. At the same time, norms and rules will gradually appear that will regulate this type cultural activities. The result will be the creation of a system of statuses and roles, the development of performance standards that will be approved by the majority of the population (or at least the ruling elite of society).
Social institutions cultures perform a number of functions in society Features:
- regulation of the activities of society members; o creating conditions for cultural activities;
- enculturation and socialization - introducing people to the norms and values of their culture and society;
- conservation of phenomena and forms of cultural activity, their reproduction.
There are five main human needs and related cultural institutions:
- the need for reproduction of the family - the institution of family and marriage; o the need for security and social order - political institutions, the state;
- need for means of subsistence - economic institutions, production;
- the need for knowledge acquisition, inculturation and socialization of the younger generation, personnel training - educational institutions in in a broad sense, including science;
- the need to solve spiritual problems, the meaning of life - an institution of religion.
Core institutions contain non-core institutions, which are also called social practices or customs. Each major institution has its own systems of established practices, methods, procedures, and mechanisms. For example, economic institutions cannot do without such mechanisms as currency conversion, protection of private property, professional selection, placement and evaluation of workers, marketing, market, etc. Within the institution of family and marriage are the institutions of motherhood and paternity, family revenge, twinning, inheritance social status parents, etc. Unlike the main institution, the non-basic institution performs a specialized task, serving a specific custom or satisfying a non-fundamental need.”
Many researchers believe that culture arose primarily under the influence of social demands and needs. First of all, society needed to consolidate and transfer spiritual values that are beyond social forms human life could perish along with the author of these values.
Society, thus, has given a stable and continuous character to the process of creating values. The accumulation of values became possible in society, and culture began to acquire a cumulative character of development. In addition, society has created opportunities for public creation and the use of values, which led to the possibility of their faster understanding and testing by other members of society.
First of all, it is necessary to emphasize the idea that the concept of “culture” is one of those general historical categories that are valid for all eras. Culture arises with the appearance of humanity on earth, and every step of man along the path of social progress was simultaneously a step forward in the development of culture, every historical era, every special shape society had its own, unique culture.
The essence of culture lies in the fact that it constitutes the fundamental, defining dimension of human life and embodies the human way of existence.
IN mass consciousness The idea of culture as a special sphere of society was established, which is, as it were, separated from everyday life and is actually identical to art and literature. This view is enshrined in expressions such as “cultural worker”, “cultural workers”, which mean poets and writers, musicians and artists.
In fact, culture is a large-scale phenomenon, irreducible to art alone, a phenomenon commensurate with society and civilization. Therefore, culture is not only closely connected with all aspects of society and human life, but permeates it.
In order to clarify the nature of culture, let us first dwell on its concept. The term “culture” is of Latin origin and originally meant the cultivation of the soil. In the Middle Ages, it denoted progressive methods of cultivating grains, thus arose now well famous term"agriculture"
In the XVIII - 19th centuries culture is interpreted in an aristocratic spirit. Educated, well-read, “well-mannered” people who had “ good manners" This understanding of culture, as can be seen, has been preserved to some extent to this day: we, for example, talk about cultured and uncultured people, about lack of culture, we associate culture with education, intellectual work, etc. This division thus goes back to the division of society into cultural aristocrats and uncultured common people.
Subsequently, culture began to be understood as everything that was created by man in contrast to the natural world, nature. From the standpoint of modern philosophy and science, culture is a humanized world transformed by people. This is the second nature, built on top of the first, “natural” by man. It, therefore, includes virtually the same content as the concepts of society and civilization.
Specifically, the appearance of culture is especially clearly revealed when we compare different peoples, society, country. The differences in the ways of life typical and characteristic of these peoples, their customs, their different attitude, for example, to work or family, raising children or success in life, their habits and traditions. All these differences are focused in the systems of values and life guidelines inherent in these peoples. Thus, Americans are traditionally focused on personal success, within their culture, the myth of the bootblack who became the president of the country varies differently; they value people who have achieved high status and popularity - athletes, artists, singers, etc. A. Morito, one of the founders famous company Sony, reflecting on the Japanese and American labor relations systems, highlighted such differences. The Japanese are characterized by corporate patriotism, a system of “family ties”, democracy in relations between managers and workers, “collective management” (very reminiscent of the domestic system of constant connections and coordination of decisions), the equalizing principle of wages, according to which it increases every year by as the employee becomes older and more experienced. The American system of labor relations, according to A. Morito, is based on individualism, formal ties between the employee and the company, the narrow specialization of the employee, it is focused on extracting maximum profit and is devoid of the “human dimension.”
This example shows that the same needs (in in this case economic) can be satisfied, the same goals can be achieved on the basis of different value systems, traditions, methods, rules and models of behavior, i.e. everything that forms a special culture.
Culture, therefore, attaches a certain meaning to human activity and life (for example, work is considered and valued as a duty, or as an obligation, or as a duty, or as a way to achieve other goals), brings meaning to them. Therefore, culture can also be thought of as the set of meanings through which people make sense of themselves and the world around them.
Culture personifies the originality, uniqueness and originality of a society, people, social group, in short - the subject to which it belongs. Culture from this point of view can be represented as a portrait of a social community. This is due to the fact that it develops over a long period of time and represents the accumulation of a kind of historical experience, which people purchased. In other words, every culture certainly has a “historical dimension”, which may not be noticeable at first glance, but, nevertheless, without it no culture, even if we are talking about the culture of a small social group, exists.
Culture therefore contains the most typical, repeating, widespread, regularly reproduced features and properties of a social community. The common denominator of all the diverse contents of culture, therefore, can be considered tradition. It reveals itself in all elements of culture, forming its originality, and on the surface of social life it manifests itself in the form of habit.
We can say that each culture has a mechanism of selection, selection, thanks to which it, as it were, filters out social life, practice, leaving only some elements as cultural models, standards, canons. They become common and, to a certain extent, obligatory for all members of the social community.
These elements (models, standards, canons) must, on the one hand, be effective and appropriate, helping the social community maintain its existence as a whole under changing circumstances. This is especially clearly seen in the example of professional culture, in which there are numerous means of developing, transmitting, replicating samples and models, the canons of professionalism, maintaining it at the “proper level” and monitoring it. If professional culture is eroded (say, due to the replacement of professional criteria for assessing the work of a specialist with political demands of loyalty), then the professional community, the border between, for example, a doctor and a healer, a scientist and a charlatan, a writer and a graphomaniac, a policeman and a bandit disappears. The professions themselves are simply degrading.
On the other hand, new elements must fit into the existing culture, correspond to its fundamental values, norms, patterns, traditions, and not tear its fabric, but, on the contrary, strengthen it. Take, for example, this important component culture as a language. Although its existence is associated with the constant appearance of new words and the introduction of foreign borrowings into its dictionary, in general the vocabulary remains constant, and the rules are even more stable. Thus, the selection mechanism helps to preserve the originality and uniqueness of each culture, be it a national, professional, generational or any other culture.
From this point of view, attempts to change culture by force, in addition to the mechanism of selection, without taking into account the originality of culture, to introduce new “progressive” elements into it, are indicative. This path either destroys the integrity of culture, its internal relationships, turning the cultural fabric into a collection of “scraps and shreds” (this, however, rarely happens), or ends in nothing.
A sad example can be given here. Legal nihilism, a disdainful attitude towards law and justice is our tradition, rooted far into the past and “canonized” in the well-known proverb “the law, whatever the drawbar, wherever you turn, that’s where it comes out.” During the era of perestroika, the European idea of the rule of law was introduced into the public consciousness and since then attention to the legal regulation of society has not waned, even attempts have been made to reform the judicial system. But practice and deep relationship to the law has not changed, since the law itself has not changed, remaining illegal, “the will of the ruling class,” since the idea of the rule of law was not “linked” to fundamental values national culture, first of all - with the idea of justice. Moreover, since it is the legislators and “law enforcement officers” themselves who demonstrate disdain for the law, legal nihilism only intensifies.
The culture of a people is formed and crystallized over entire historical eras; it is the past thrown back into the present. It is a “memory” of the past, recorded in stereotypes of consciousness and behavior, symbols, rituals and customs. These are its deepest layers, which are connected by a thousand threads with more dynamic and changing surface layers, reflecting the specifics of a particular historical era and often containing new and contradictory content.
Culture as an integral phenomenon performs certain functions in relation to society.
Adaptive function- culture ensures human adaptation to the environment. The term adaptation means adaptation. Animals and plants develop adaptation mechanisms in the process biological evolution. The mechanism of human adaptation is fundamentally different; it does not adapt to the environment, but adapts the environment to itself, creating a new artificial environment. Man like biological species remains the same in a very wide range of conditions, and culture (forms of economy, customs, social institutions) differ depending on what nature requires in each specific region. A significant part of cultural traditions has rational grounds associated with some useful adaptive effect. Another side of the adaptive functions of culture is that its development increasingly provides people with safety and comfort, labor efficiency increases, new opportunities for spiritual self-realization appear, culture allows a person to reveal himself to the fullest.
Communication function– culture shapes the conditions and means of human communication. Culture is created by people together; it is the condition and result of people’s communication. The condition is because only through the assimilation of culture are truly human forms of communication established between people; culture gives them means of communication - sign systems, languages. The result is because only through communication can people create, preserve and develop culture; In communication, people learn to use sign systems, record their thoughts in them and assimilate the thoughts of other people recorded in them. Thus, culture connects and unites people.
Integrative function– culture unites the peoples of the social groups of the state. Any social community that develops its own culture is held together by this culture. Because a single set of views, beliefs, values, and ideals characteristic of a given culture is spreading among members of a community. These phenomena determine the consciousness and behavior of people, they develop a sense of belonging to one culture. Preservation of cultural heritage national traditions, historical memory creates a connection between generations. The historical unity of the nation and the self-awareness of the people as a community of people that has existed for a long time are built on this. A broad framework of cultural community is created by world religions. A common faith closely binds representatives various peoples, constituting the world of Islam or the Christian world.
Socialization function– culture is the most important means of including individuals into social life, their assimilation of social experience, knowledge of values, norms of behavior that correspond to a given society’s social group and social role. The process of socialization allows an individual to become a full-fledged member of society, take a certain position in it, and live as required by customs and traditions. At the same time, this process ensures the preservation of society, its structure and the forms of life that have developed within it. Culture determines the content of the medium and methods of socialization. During socialization, people master behavioral programs stored in culture, learn to live, think and act in accordance with them.
Information function of culture– with the emergence of culture, people have a special “suprabiological” form of transmission and storage of information, different from animals. In culture, information is encoded by structures external to a person. Information how to acquire own life and the ability to develop yourself. Unlike biological information, social information does not disappear with the death of the individual who obtained it. Thanks to this, it is possible in society to do something that will never be possible in the animal world - the historical multiplication and accumulation of information at the disposal of man as a species being.
Cognitive function of culture determined by a certain criterion of cognition, mastery by human forces nature and society, as well as the degree of development of the “human” in man himself. Covering all forms public consciousness taken in their unity, culture gives a holistic picture of knowledge and exploration of the world. Of course, culture is not reduced to a body of knowledge about the world, but systematized scientific knowledge are one of its most important elements.
However, culture not only characterizes the degree of a person’s knowledge of the world around him. At the same time, culture reveals not only the degree of development of forms of social consciousness in their unity, but also the level of skills and abilities of people manifested in their practical activities. Life is extraordinarily complex and poses more and more new problems to people all the time. This creates a need to understand the processes occurring in society, to understand them from both scientific and artistic and aesthetic positions.
Culture also contributes to the implementation heuristic human goals, his search for the most productive forms of learning new things, the discovery of new paths and methods social life, strengthening human power over the elemental forces of nature.
As follows from the above, the role of culture was reduced to something specific and small, but important.
In today's ideas about the functions of culture, the most important place, as a rule, is given to the human-creative function.
So the efforts of the great thinkers, who called for seeing culture only as a condition for the development of human qualities, were not in vain. But real life culture is still not limited to the human-creative function. The diversity of human needs served as the basis for the emergence of a variety of functions. Culture is a kind of self-knowledge of a person, since it shows him not only the world around him, but also himself. This is a kind of mirror where a person sees himself both as he should become and as he was and is. The results of cognition and self-knowledge are transmitted in the form of experience, worldly wisdom, through signs, symbols from generation to generation, from one people to another.
Axiological (value) function of culture, it captures the ability to accumulate artistic values in culture and their influence on a person’s way of thinking and behavior. The entire diversity of material and spiritual culture can act as material and spiritual values, which are assessed in terms of truth or non-truth, beautiful or ugly, acceptable or forbidden, fair or unfair, etc.
The totality of the established, established value orientations of an individual form a kind of axis of his consciousness, ensuring a certain continuity of culture and the motivation of his behavior. Because of this, orientations are the most important factor regulating, determining human actions. Developed value orientations are a sign of a person’s maturity, an indicator of the measure of his sociality. This is the prism of perception of not only the external, but also the internal world of the individual. Thus, axiological or value function culture is manifested not only in the assessment of culture and its achievements, but also in the socialization of the individual, in the formation of social relations, and people’s behavior.
Aesthetic function of culture, first of all, manifests itself in art, in artistic creativity. As you know, in culture there is a certain sphere of the “aesthetic”. It is here that the essence of the beautiful and the ugly, the sublime and the base, the tragic and the comic is revealed. This area is closely related to the aesthetic attitude to reality, to nature. V. Solovyov noted that “the beauty diffused in nature in its forms and colors, in the picture is concentrated, condensed, emphasized,” and the aesthetic connection between art and nature “consists not in repetition, but in the continuation of the artistic work that was started by nature ".
Associated with aesthetic function hedonic function. Hedonism translated from Greek means pleasure. People enjoy reading a book, visiting architectural ensembles, museums, visiting theaters, concert halls, etc. Pleasure contributes to the formation of needs and interests and influences people’s lifestyles.
The main, synthesizing function of culture, reflecting it social meaning, is humanistic function. All of the above functions are in one way or another connected with the formation of personality, human behavior in society, with the expansion of his cognitive activity, the development of intellectual, professional and other abilities.
The humanistic function is manifested in the unity of opposite, but organically interconnected processes: socialization and individualization of the individual. In the process of socialization, a person masters social relations and spiritual values, turning them into the inner essence of his personality, into his social qualities. But a person masters these relationships and values in his own, unique way, in individual form. Culture is a special social mechanism that carries out socialization and ensures the acquisition of individual individuality.
For a sociologist, the culture of a society is a system of values, ideas about life and patterns of behavior common to people associated with one particular way of life. (N. Smelser)
Culture is a system of regulatory mechanisms that largely control human behavior. Ants, birds and other social insects and animals have a genetically programmed ability to obtain food, build housing, etc. They also have some social skills - they have a hierarchy, division of functions in collective actions, etc. But it is generally accepted that they have no culture, culture is purely human image life! Because, human behavior less determined genetically, a person has some innate reflexes, but in all other respects, acquired culture plays a significant role.
Culture is formed long time and mostly spontaneously, assimilated unconsciously. But culture is also learned, reproduced and passed on. Cultural appropriation is the basis of the socialization process. The formation of personality is the result of the assimilation of values, norms, beliefs, rules, laws, symbols, etc.
Components of culture
N. Smelser identifies four main parts of culture:
Concepts. They are contained mainly in the language. One culture may have only 300 concepts, while another may have 300,000 concepts. They organize people's experience and activity algorithms. IN different cultures the same concepts can have different meanings.
Relationship. Cultures not only distinguish certain parts of the world with the help of concepts, but also reveal how these components are interconnected - in space, in time, in cause-and-effect. For example, in one culture they understand that the Earth revolves around the Sun, in another - vice versa.
Values. These are generally accepted beliefs about what should be honored, respected, about the goals to which a person should strive. They are the basis moral principles. Different cultures have different values.
Norms. These are rules that govern people's behavior in accordance with the values of a particular culture. Where there are norms, there are always sanctions (punishments and rewards) that promote compliance with the norms.
In general, we can put it this way: culture contains patterns that help decide what exists (ideas and concepts about the world around us), what can be (how it is connected), how to relate to what is and can be (values), how to do it (norms).
How are these basic elements of culture formed? Based on ideas about the structure of the world and man’s place in it (initially this idea is given by religion, then by science), values are formed. Values are ideas shared by most people about what should be revered, respected, and goals to strive for. Values are what are not questioned. These are not written instructions, but almost all people of a given culture know about them. True, not all people are guided by them. Therefore, sociologists say that values are what relates to society, and a person has value orientations, that is, what orients him personally towards this or that behavior, which determines his personal choice in critical situations. Next, sociocultural norms emerge.
Sociocultural norms are requirements for the activities and relationships of individuals and groups. They develop historically and always express some kind of social necessity and are determined by objective conditions. In sociocultural norms, more than in values, there is a commanding element, a requirement to act in a certain way. Cultural norms: habits, customs, traditions, mores, laws. How do they stack up?
Habit is a person’s psychological tendency to repeat the same actions in similar situations. They are first formed by individuals, then adopted by groups of people and become collective habits.
Custom is a traditionally established order of behavior, fixed by collective habits. Then customs, already as mass patterns of actions, are passed on from generation to generation, that is, they turn into traditions. Sanctions are already being applied to those who violate customs.
Mores are customs that acquire moral significance. Close to morals, the concept of morality is a set of cultural norms that have received ideological justification in the form of good or evil, justice, etc. It is immoral to insult elders, beat a woman, or offend the weak. For a believer it is immoral not to go to church, but for an unbeliever it is not so. That is, in different subcultures, concepts of morality may differ.
Law - a normative act adopted by a supreme body state power according to established order. This type of sociocultural norms requires unconditional submission.
Diversity of cultural forms
Traditionally it was believed that there is high culture(elegant, classic...) for the elite, folk (fairy tales, folklore, myths...) for the rest. With the advent of the media (newspapers, radio, and especially television), mass culture emerged. It is not related to regional, ethnic, religious and other characteristics. Its products are standard, designed for the mass “average” consumer, and therefore of “average” quality. There is reason to believe that its influence on a person is already comparable to the influence of a family on a child and that its influence on children is rather negative.
Subculture
This is a system of values, norms, ideas, characteristic of certain social groups that differ from the generally accepted ones. It is formed under the influence various factors- ethnic, religious, place of residence, etc. and greatly influences the personality of group members. There are subcultures of young and old, men and women, rich and poor, Orthodox and Muslims, Russians and Jews, etc. and so on.
Counterculture is a type of subculture that is in conflict with the dominant, generally accepted one (for example, among criminal youth).
Since even in one society, different social groups have various conditions life activity, there are always many subcultures in society.
Cultural universals
These are universal traits shared by all cultures. J. Murdoch identified more than 70 such cultural universals: dancing, sports, cooking, hygiene, prohibition of incest, government, decoration, education, joint labor, laws, personal name, music, mourning, festivals, language, fortune telling, courtship, the doctrine of soul, jokes, treatment of pregnant women, greetings, etiquette, etc.
Attitudes towards foreign cultures
We can distinguish two polarly different types of attitude towards other cultures - cultural ethnocentrism and cultural relativism.
Cultural ethnocentrism is the tendency to judge other cultures from the position of the original superiority of one's own. Why do missionaries strive to convert barbarians to their faith? Because they believe that their own culture is higher, better, more correct, etc.
However, it is important to understand that no matter what in beautiful words Ethnocentrism was not justified; it was always based on one thing - xenophobia (fear, hostility towards other people's views and customs). In fact, there are no better or worse cultures, right or wrong - they are just different! The characteristics of each culture are determined by the characteristics of its formation - natural-geographical, religious, economic, traditions, etc.
Cultural relativism - states that another culture can only be understood through an analysis of its own values, in its own context.
Don't be so quick to judge or criticize someone else's culture! First try to understand her. No one will force you to love another culture, but respect its originality, and when in a foreign culture, behave in such a way as not to violate its values and rules. And if a foreign culture, in defending itself, causes damage to you, then understand that it is not she who is “to blame”...
This type of attitude towards a foreign culture is more conducive to understanding the subtle differences between close cultures.
Each culture creates in people a sense of belonging to “their” group, strengthens solidarity, but can cause conflicts with other groups.
Cultural statics and dynamics
Cultural statics - elements and complexes that describe culture at rest. An element of culture is an indivisible unit of a behavioral pattern or material product. A cultural complex is a set of elements that are functionally interconnected.
Elements of culture: Cultural complexes:
Tie wearing a tie
Ball playing soccer
Driving on the right side of the road, traffic rules
Kiss as a form of greeting at a social reception
Material and intangible culture
Elements of culture are material and intangible. The combination of the former creates material culture (physical objects created by people - books, temples, jewelry, weapons, etc.) Physical objects created by people and having a certain symbolic meaning Objects that perform a specific function and are of known value to a group or society are called artifacts.
A set of intangible cultural units and complexes - forms an intangible or spiritual culture (values, laws, rituals, symbols, knowledge, language, etc.) They cannot be touched, seen, heard, but they exist in our consciousness, are supported by our communication, and are an integral part of culture. These are also artifacts created by the mind and feelings. Try to disrupt these elements of culture - and you will immediately feel their power!
Cultural dynamics - describes culture in motion. These are mechanisms, processes that describe the transformation of culture. Here are the first bricks: discoveries and inventions. Invention - new combination known elements and complexes. Discovery is the acquisition of fundamentally new knowledge about the world. The previously unknown, in combination with the old, gives rise to new elements and complexes.
Language
Always takes important place in culture. There is verbal and non-verbal language. All elements of culture can be expressed in language.
Language is a communication system carried out through sounds and symbols, the meanings of which are conditional, but have a certain structure.
Language is a social phenomenon; it cannot be mastered outside of social interaction and communication. Language organizes people's experiences. Communication is only possible if there are clearly understood meanings. Language has the power to unite and divide people.
National, professional, organizational culture
There is a distinction between national culture, the features of which are always rooted in the historically established living conditions of people (natural-geographical, economic and political). It manifests itself in such features as the ratio of spiritual and material assets, the importance of religion, attitude towards other cultures, respect for women, respect for age and seniority, criteria for success in society, etc.
The general features of cultures were highlighted by the Dutch sociologist Hovstede and noted that national cultures differ greatly in characteristics:
Power distance (not large in the USA and Holland, but large in Russia and France),
- “collectivism-individualism” (in Western cultures closer to individualism, in Russia - to collectivism)
- the “level of values” in Holland is small, in Russia it is very high (we are always inclined to great ideas, large-scale plans, etc.)
Anxiety about the future (in the USA it is small, in our country it is large: we always want certainty, details of the future, we tend to believe those who draw the near future more “beautifully”, promise more...)
Organizational culture is an original mixture of values, traditions, forms of behavior, etc., inherent in any organization, institution, enterprise. It also usually has its own history - how many years has this organization existed, what is its “mother” campaign, who was at its origins, what ideas and values dominate now, etc. Organizational culture is always influenced by national culture.
Professional culture - the characteristics of values, norms of behavior, etc., shared by people of the same profession, is largely determined by the received vocational education, the content of the work, its role in society. Less dependent on national culture, promotes mutual understanding between representatives of different nationalities, but of the same profession.
Cultural conflict
We can distinguish at least 3 types of conflicts related to the development of culture:
Anomie (E. Durkheim) a violation of the unity of culture, due to the absence (or loss) of clearly formulated social norms. Society as a whole or individual social groups can be in a state of anomie (for example, during revolutions, when habitual ideas, norms, and relationships quickly and dramatically change and everyone’s usual understanding of “what is good and what is bad”) is lost. Each of us also falls into a state of anomie if we find ourselves in an unfamiliar or unfamiliar cultural environment (in a foreign country, in another team or family).
Cultural lag (Ogborn), when change in material culture are ahead of changes in its spiritual component, which is always fraught with social problems.
Alien influence (when one culture invades another). Each culture is protected through its carriers and by all means available to it.
