Space and time in different cultural traditions. Space and time of traditional culture

The first ideas about time arose in the process of differentiation of society from the surrounding world. Becoming more and more autonomous, society acquires own time development, which arises as a break with the environment. Social time (the time of synchronous activity of large groups of people) first seems to adapt to natural time, and then becomes more and more free from it. The main factor determining the course of social time will be the transformative creative activity man, through which he changes both himself and the environment. Social time can differ significantly from calendar time. So, according to the 19th century calendar. began in 1801 and ended in 1900. But from the perspective of cultural history, but by the standards of social time, it began in 1789 (with the French Revolution) and ended in 1914 (with the outbreak of the First World War)

As a result of the interaction of natural rhythms and social time, cultural time gradually emerges, which in many ways is the opposite of natural time (it is reversible, qualitatively heterogeneous, extensible), it represents simultaneously (and entirely) the past, present and future, i.e. it is synchronously visible. These features of cultural time allow us to talk about it as a space of human spirituality.

The first ideas about time were most likely formed in the Paleolithic on the basis of attempts to comprehend the processes of movement and change. The transition from the primitive herd to the first form of social community - the clan - was a transition from “nature” to “culture”, and therefore required the replacement of natural biological connections that united individuals in the herd with artificial, supra-biological ones; the creation of shared time was extremely important, i.e. .e. life in the same rhythm. Otherwise, joint, i.e., is impossible. coordinated activity. The first rituals created a single rhythm, for which all available means were used - the human voice, clapping, stamping, extracting sound from everything that could sound, as well as joint bodily movements (ritual dances). On this basis, an image of cyclical time was formed, in which there is no clear distinction between past, present and future. Time is considered spiritual, qualitatively heterogeneous (for example, “happy” and “unhappy”), which does not precede relationships, events and things, but is created by them and is not able to exist in isolation from them.

The civilizations that appeared later, in order to overcome the limitations of tribal life, had to find such a standard of rhythm that would make it possible to coordinate the life activities of people over long distances. The first sedentary cultures, for this purpose, established a connection between the flood cycles of the rivers in the valleys of which they settled with the cycles of the heavenly bodies. Therefore, these civilizations are also characterized by a cyclical idea of ​​time. It must be remembered that such representations also remain local.

The idea of ​​a single linear time of culture will only exist in the Christian worldview. It is worth noting that it creates a single cultural time through special mechanisms based on the death of Jesus Christ. It was this event that provided the opportunity for free movement from one rhythm of life together to another. In Christianity, time was transformed from an alien force beyond the control of people into a means of educating humanity. Time was supposed to unite people and serve the purposes of creation.

Modern ideas about time could not have appeared without the birth of Protestantism, which for the first time substantiated the need for active human activity here on Earth.
From one point of view, ϶ᴛᴏ contributed to the industrial revolution, which marked the beginning of modern civilization. The new attitude towards time turned out to be economically productive, it forced us to appreciate every moment, not to put off life, hoping for the coming eternity. But on the other hand, the slogan “time is money” leads to a loss of values ​​and a meaninglessness of the world, which has become one of the reasons for the crisis of modern culture.

It was the awareness of these reasons that led to a change in attitude towards time. Today there is a demassification of time (it becomes more individual) and its restructuring. According to E. Toffler, the “third wave” challenged mechanical synchronization, replacing most of our basic social rhythms and freeing us from machine dependence. Back in the 1970s. Flexible time appeared when the employee was allowed to choose his working hours.

Now, as a result of the extreme expansion of cultural space (globalization) and the formation of common time, a new cultural identity is being formed. Modern humanity, observing on TV screens and monitors the events taking place in the world, both in real time and in recordings, demonstrates complete independence from natural, calendar, geographical and even social time. At any time of the day or night in any part of the world, a person can view any event, regardless of what real time it occurred. As humanity increasingly realizes that it has a common destiny, time itself as a phenomenon of culture ceases to be “different” (for each culture - ϲʙᴏе), it becomes more and more common, it no longer divides people, but unites them.

E. Hall's cultural grammar

It is worth saying that each culture contains a number of key elements - cultural categories that determine the ways of communication and behavior of individuals. It is important to note that one of the largest specialists in intercultural communication E. Hall identifies categories such as time, space, context and information flows.

Time as a category in all cultures it serves as an important indicator of the pace of life and the rhythm of activity.
The consequence of this will be time planning, without which the functioning of modern society is unthinkable, as well as the regulation of people's priorities and preferences. The types and forms of communication between people depend on the value of time in a culture. We should not forget that an important indicator of how time stands in different cultures, will be people's attitude towards punctuality. The material was published on http://site
For example, in Germany, Switzerland and some other European countries, as well as in North America, the early appearance of the interlocutor is usually expected, and there is a certain scale of lateness and for each level of this scale a suitable form of apology is provided. Thus, the unwritten rules of the business culture of European cultures allow you to be no more than 7 minutes late for a meeting. It is important to know that being more late will demonstrate your own frivolity and threaten the loss of the opportunity to gain the trust of your partner. Students waiting in the teacher's classroom can leave after 15 minutes and morals will be restored.

Another very important aspect will be the basic time perspective, which varies significantly between cultures. For example, Iran, India and some countries Far East oriented to the past, the USA - to the present and the near future; Russia is most likely characterized by an orientation towards the past and the future, and maximum attention is given to the future, and not so much importance is attached to the present.

Time will be an indicator of the pace of life and rhythm of activity accepted in a particular culture. According to the way they use time, cultures are usually divided into two opposite types - monochronic, where time is distributed in such a way that only one type of activity is possible in the same period of time, therefore one follows the other, like links of one value, and polychronic, when In the same period of time, not one type of activity is possible, but several at once.

In monochronic cultures, time is understood as a linear system, like a long straight street, along which people move forward or remain in the past. Here time can be saved, lost, made up, accelerated; time helps maintain order in an organization human life. Based on the fact that a “monochronic” person is engaged in only one type of activity at a certain period of time, he seems to “close himself” in his own world, where other people have no access. People of this type do not like to be interrupted during any activity. The material was published on http://site
It is precisely this system of time use that prevails in many industrialized countries - Germany, the USA, and a number of Northern European countries. Monochronic time will remain only at a high level of development of civilization, and not among all nations.

It is worth saying that polychronic time is the opposite of monochronic time. In cultures of this type, interpersonal, human relationships play a large role and communication with a person is more important than the adopted plan of activity. The material was published on http://site
Typical polychronic cultures include Latin America, the Middle East and the Mediterranean states, as well as Russia. In these cultures, punctuality and daily routine are not emphasized of great importance. It is precisely this type of time that is inherent initially in all peoples.

Space. It is worth saying that for a normal existence, each person needs a certain amount of space around him, which he considers his personal space, and intrusion into it is usually considered an attack on inner world person. The dimensions of this space depend on the degree of closeness with certain people, the forms of communication accepted in a given culture, the type of activity, etc.

It is worth saying that each person subconsciously sets and intuitively maintains the boundaries of his personal space, which traditionally do not create problems for communication. These boundaries depend, in particular, on the attitude towards a particular interlocutor.

Thus, friends always stand closer to each other than strangers. Excluding the above, the distance of communication partners depends on factors such as gender, race, belonging to a culture or subculture, specific social circumstances, etc. Hall, based on the results of their observations, identified four zones of communication:

• intimate - shared by fairly close people who do not want to dedicate third parties to your life. In almost all cultures of the world, it is not customary to invade someone else’s intimate area. Zones of intimate distance depend on a particular cultural environment. Thus, in Western European cultures it is about 60 cm; in the cultures of Eastern European peoples - approximately 45 cm, in the countries of Southern Europe and the Mediterranean - the distance from the tip of the fingers to the elbow. Partners at this distance not only see, but also feel each other well;
• personal - the distance that an individual maintains between himself and all other people when communicating; ϶ᴛᴏ personal space immediately surrounding the human body and amounting to 45-120 cm. At this distance, physical contact is not necessary. This is the optimal distance for conversation, conversation with friends and good acquaintances;
• social - the distance between people during formal and secular communication, the distance at which we keep when communicating with strangers or with small group of people. The social (public) zone is 120-260 cm. It is worth noting that it is most convenient for formal communication, since it allows all participants not only to hear the partner, but also to see him. It is customary to maintain such a distance during a business meeting, meeting, discussion, press conference, etc.;
• public - communication distance at public events (meetings, in the classroom, etc.), i.e. distance preferred when communicating with a large group of people, a mass audience. By the way, this zone involves such forms of communication as meetings, presentations, lectures, reports and speeches, etc. The public zone starts from a distance of 3.5 m and can extend to infinity, but within the limits of maintaining communicative contact. That's why the public zone is also called open.

The spatial factor in communication can also serve to express relations of dominance-subordination, and in

Each culture adopts different signals expressing power relations. For example, in Germany and the USA, the upper floors of offices are usually reserved for company executives. At the same time, corner offices with the widest view are traditionally occupied by chief managers or company owners. In Russia and France, managers try to avoid the upper and generally outer floors, preferring to place offices on the middle floors of the building. This is explained by the fact that power and control in these countries usually comes from the center.

Context. The nature and results of the communication process are also determined by the level of awareness of its participants. In some cultures, additional detailed and detailed information is necessary for full communication, since there are practically no informal information networks and, as a result, people are insufficiently informed; these cultures are called low-context cultures. In other cultures, people do not need detailed information to have clear picture what is happening, since due to the high density of informal information networks they are always well informed; such societies are called high-context cultures.

The high density of information networks implies close contacts between family members, constant contacts with friends, colleagues, clients, thanks to which they are constantly aware of everything that is happening around them. Countries with a high cultural context include France, Spain, Italy, the Middle East, Japan and Russia. The type of low-contextual cultures includes Germany and Switzerland; North American culture combines middle and low contexts.

Information flows. For the communication process, the importance of information flows is determined by the forms and speed of information dissemination. In some cultures, information spreads slowly, purposefully, through specially designated channels and is therefore limited, while in others the information dissemination system operates quickly and widely.

For example, in northern European countries with monochronic cultures and low context, especially in Germany, the information transmitted is more important than what is already in memory, since here people, figuratively speaking, are fenced off from the outside world and they need external information. This is a type of culture with a low rate of information diffusion. In these countries, everything must have the same structure and order, everything is extremely precisely defined by the rules, and there is little room for personal initiative. People are involved in a flow of information, overloaded the smallest details. It is worth saying that in order to process it, it is necessary to introduce a large number of rules governing its distribution.

In high-context cultures, which include Russia, France and the countries of Southern Europe, everything happens in the opposite way. These are polychronic cultures with a high speed of information dissemination. People of these cultures are included in an effective informal information network and traditionally do not isolate themselves from possible interference from the external environment. Information passes unhindered, and the data that is stored in memory will be more important than the data that is transmitted again. People are perfectly informed about everything, and they do not need to find out the background of each new event. Overload of information channels does not happen often, since people are constantly in contact with each other. In these cultures, it is not customary to plan a daily routine and all kinds of activities to limit one’s time and space, since they can become an obstacle to vital contacts between people.

Mental programs concept

The concept of mental programs was proposed by one of the largest modern scientists, the Dutchman Geert Hofstede (born 1928), who believes that human behavior largely depends on his mental programs. Under mental programs Hofstede understands “patterns of thinking, feeling, and acting.” It is worth noting that he distinguishes three levels of such programs. At the lower level there are universal programs that are similar for all individuals; they are inherited genetically and will be an integral part of human nature. Average level constitute those mental programs that are specific to a specific group of individuals and are formed through social learning with constant interaction within the group; Hofstede calls models at this level culture. The highest level belongs to mental programs specific to a particular individual, which determine his individuality; These programs are partly inherited genetically, partly formed through learning.

The sources of mental programs will be culture and social environment, i.e. those conditions in which socialization and inculturation of a person occur. This means that mental programs are determined by the so-called dimensions of culture, including: power distance, collectivism-individualism, masculinity-femininity, uncertainty avoidance. Later, another indicator was introduced - long-term orientation.

Power distance shows what importance different cultures attach to power relations between people and how cultures vary regarding this attribute.

In cultures with high power distance, a strong dependence is established between superiors and subordinates. In this case, the emotional distance between superiors and subordinates is very great. The latter must either recognize the authority of his boss, or, completely reject it, break off relations, exclusively in in rare cases they can ask questions of his boss, not to mention criticizing him. In family relationships, family members with authority (parents, older brothers and sisters, etc.) also require obedience. Development of independence is not encouraged. The main virtue respectful attitude towards parents and older family members is considered.

In cultures with low power distance, values ​​such as equality in relationships and individual freedom are most important. Therefore, communication here is less formal, the equality of the interlocutors is more emphasized, and the communication style is more consultative than in cultures with high power distance. In such cultures, the emotional distance between superiors and subordinates is insignificant and subordinates can always approach their boss with a question or make critical remarks. Open disagreement or active opposition to the boss is also considered the norm. In family relationships, children have been considered as equal members of the family since that time.

when they begin to actively participate in family life. The ideal state in a family is considered to be personal independence, and the need for independence will be perhaps the most important element of people in cultures with low power distance.

Individualism - collectivism- this is an indicator that people prefer to take care only of themselves and their own families, or to unite in certain groups that are responsible for a person in exchange for his loyalty.

The vast majority of people live in collectivist societies, in which the interests of the group prevail over the interests of the individual; A minority of people on the planet live in individualistic societies, where the interests of the individual prevail over the interests of the group.

In a collectivist culture, group goals take precedence over individual goals. Here people are interested in close-knit groups. Loyalty to the group is one of the most important values; direct confrontation is not encouraged, as it violates the overall harmony. In this case, a relationship of dependence initially develops between the individual and the group. The group protects the individual, but in return demands his loyalty to the group. In such societies there is no such thing as “personal opinion.” A person's opinion is determined by the group's opinion. The collectivist type of culture is currently common in countries such as Guatemala, Panama, Venezuela, Colombia, Pakistan, Korea; Russia is also considered a collectivist type of culture.

The unit of individualistic cultures is the nuclear family, in which children are taught to be independent and rely on their own strength. Children growing up in small families of individualistic cultures quickly learn to perceive the self as separate from other people. The purpose of education is for the child to become independent, i.e. teach him independence, incl. from parents. In such societies, a physically healthy person is expected not to be dependent on the group in any way. The cultures of the USA, Australia, Great Britain, Canada, the Netherlands, New Zealand and other countries are considered individualist cultures.

Masculinity-femininity. Masculinity is an assessment of people’s tendency to be assertive and tough, focusing on material success to the detriment of interest in other people, while femininity is an orientation towards home, family, social values, as well as softness, emotionality and sensuality.

Biological differences between men and women, which are the same throughout the world, do little to explain their social roles in society. Many types of behavior that are not directly related to procreation are considered typically masculine or typically feminine in society.

In societies with increased masculinity, the social roles of men and women differ sharply. Here, the generally accepted orientation of men towards material success and rigidity in their positions, as opposed to female values, among which modesty and sensitivity occupy the main place. In cultures of this type, competition, competitiveness and the desire to win are encouraged. In work, priority is given to the result, and rewards are based on the principle of real contribution to the cause. Masculine cultures include Japan, Austria, Venezuela, Italy, Switzerland, Mexico, Great Britain, Germany, etc.

In feminine cultures, role differences between the male and female parts of the population are not given much importance. Moreover, both demonstrate great similarities in their positions and views. All members of society pay special attention to spiritual values, such as maintaining relationships between people, caring for others, and attention to people. The preferred way to resolve conflicts is to find a compromise, and rewards for work are based on the principle of equality. Hofstede considers Sweden to be a feminine culture. Norway, the Netherlands, Denmark, Finland, Chile, Portugal and other countries. It can be assumed that Russia also belongs to this series.

Uncertainty avoidance -϶ᴛᴏ is an indicator of how tolerant people are to uncertain situations, trying to avoid them by developing clear rules, believing in absolute truth and refusing to tolerate deviant behavior.

In cultures with a high level of this indicator, an individual in a situation of uncertainty experiences stress and a feeling of fear. A high level of uncertainty, according to Hofstede, leads not only to increased stress in individuals, but also to the release of large quantity energy. Therefore, in such cultures there is a high level of aggressiveness, for the exit of which special channels are created. This will result in the existence of numerous formalized rules regulating actions that enable people to avoid uncertainty in behavior as much as possible. These cultures are more resistant to any change and have little risk tolerance. Countries with a high level of uncertainty avoidance include Greece, Portugal, Guatemala, Uruguay, Belgium, Japan, France, Chile, Spain, etc.

In cultures with low levels of uncertainty avoidance, on the contrary, it is accepted tolerant attitude to situations of uncertainty. People in difficult situations improvise and take initiative, and are characterized by a tendency to take risks. In countries with such a culture, there is a negative attitude towards the introduction of strictly formalized rules, so they are established only when necessary. In general, people here believe that they can solve problems without detailed formal rules. Cultures with a low level of uncertainty avoidance include countries such as Singapore, Jamaica, Denmark, Sweden, Ireland, Great Britain, India, USA, etc.

Long term orientation, formerly called Confucian dynamism, shows how a society is pragmatic and strategically oriented towards the future, as opposed to traditionalism and short-term (tactical) orientation.

In societies with a long-term orientation, people recognize the importance of values ​​such as persistence, relationship status, frugality and shame in promoting entrepreneurial activity. So, perseverance and perseverance are the key to any entrepreneurial activity; a harmonious and stable hierarchy facilitates the fulfillment of role responsibilities; frugality contributes to the accumulation of capital, which can then be reinvested in business, and, finally, a feeling of shame makes people more sensitive to social contacts and strive to fulfill their obligations. Low level Confucian dynamism, or short-term orientation, on the contrary, inhibits entrepreneurship. The desire for sustainability and stability when exceeding a certain norm prevents initiative, risk-taking and flexibility, which are necessary for an entrepreneur in a constantly changing market. “Saving face”, excessive respect for traditions is directly related to the rejection of all kinds of innovations. And the mutual exchange of gifts and congratulations, patronage are rituals in which more attention is paid to impeccable manners than to solving the assigned tasks.

We perceive time and space through a cultural network of concepts. One of the first to speak out on this issue was I. Kant, who spoke about the a priori nature of the apperception of time and space. American scientists E. Sapir and B. Whorf laid the foundations of ethnosemiotics, which asserts the existence of a connection between the means of expression and the picture of the world.

The idea of ​​the rootedness of perception in past experience (pattern, mentality, configuration, Gestalt, theme, paradigm) was considered by ethnopsychologists (W. Wundt), Gestal psychologists (M. Wertheimer, W. Köhler, K. Koffka, K. Levin), logicians (W. Quine), methodologists (T. Kuhn), anthropologists (R. Benedict, M. Mead, M. Herskovets, K. Kluckhohn), sociologists (P. Sorokin), structuralists (E Benveniste). If we accept the model proposed by these scientists, then the configuration of the TC will be responsible for the features of the perception of time and space (Table 2).

table 2

The absence in the language of the concepts of “being”, “time”, “space”, “relativity” would make it impossible to convey, for example, A. Einstein’s theory of relativity. This poses little threat to the standard Indiopropean languages, but in relation to the languages ​​of the Indians and Eskimos, this fact may occur O.E. Benveniste proved that categories of thinking are not universal. In the Ewe language (Togo, Benin) there is no substantial being; the idea of ​​existence is conveyed by five different verbs.

However, one should not exaggerate the dependence of perception on patterns of consciousness. This problem is dialectical in nature and is closely related to the level of development of a particular culture (literate / nonliterate, sedentary / nomadic, urban / non-urban), its economic practice (gatherer-hunters / agriculture). In the Eskimo vocabulary there are dozens of words to convey shades of snow, and among the Indians the concepts of “snow”, “cold” and “ice” are represented by one word with different endings. In the languages ​​of both of them there are no philosophical categories. At the same time, in Sanskrit there are hundreds of terms for recording psychological states. Aristotle, based on the syntax of the Greek language, identified formal logic.

Having carried out the reversion of concepts, we come to the conclusion that the influence of the chronotope on culture is no less strong. In classical European physics this topic is poorly developed. Chronotope is an unrecorded substance, the background of what is happening. The influence of time as an implicit factor structuring being is rather a theme traditional philosophies of Indochina. In European humanities there is a lot of research on the influence of geographical factors on culture, thinking, language (S.L. Montesquieu, L.I. Mechnikov, V.I. Vernadsky), the organizing influence of time on culture (K. Jaspers, L.N. . Gumilyov). MM. Bakhtin gave the naturalistic concept to A.A. Ukhtomsky’s “chronotope” has a value-semantic character and henceforth time and space began to participate in cultural construction. These are not just forms of transcendental apperception of I. Kant, but a living cultural and historical reality. The liveliness of time and space in artistic culture was also studied by V. Kruglikov and V. Podoroga.

Traditionalist R. Guenon studied TC as the unfolding of sacred time and space. He showed how the social and communicative essence of traditional space and time is hidden in sacred symbols (The Kingdom of Quantity and the Signs of the Times, 1945). In addition, he was the first to propose the term “traditional society” and hypothesize the existence of an “integral tradition.”

Based on the method of metaphysics, R. Guenon believed that every phenomenon has a basis in spiritual reality, regardless of how it looks from the point of view of everyday or scientific experience. He understood tradition not as inherited cultural forms, but as a kind of inscription in the power lines of the Unified Meaning. In his opinion, the closer to the original meaning the culture phase is located, the to a greater extent reality she has. According to this interpretation, the crisis of values ​​of modern man, chaos in social stability, discord in microsociety and other trends of degradation are the same Tradition, but in its potential phase. With the sum of all disorder, order in the system is preserved. Tradition does not disappear; people stop noticing it. Only physicality and consumption remain visible. People are no longer guided by traditional values, and their mentality is set exclusively by pragmatic goals. Complete external anarchy and death of Tradition is its point of transition into a new cycle. The end of the world comes with cosmic periodicity, bringing an end to the illusion of deviation from a single Tradition.

R. Guenon contrasts the progressivist concept of history with the progressive obscuration of true knowledge. He emphasized that in times of crisis there is a partial rollback to Tradition, and the Middle Ages are the latest example of this. In the countries of the East and West, up to the indicated period, there are still traces of “sacred sciences”, “sacred arts”, which are the area of ​​​​application of metaphysical knowledge.

The Renaissance borrows from the Greco-Latin civilization external forms that have already ceased to function there as traditional: sacred science is transformed into empirical method, metaphysics - into rationalistic philosophy. Gradually, only profane knowledge of science and philosophy remains, limited and contradictory. Traces of traditional knowledge in residual form are scattered throughout the world in some spiritual teachings and religions. Only the East for a long time retained the dedicated nature of knowledge transfer. R. Guenon understands the East not geographically, but in terms of values, as a place for preserving Tradition. This is precisely why he explains the attractiveness of the East for modern seekers of truth - they are attracted by the thirst for contact with the living Tradition.

The Vedas, according to R. Guenon, represent the original knowledge of Tradition, therefore Vedic cosmic chronology is an accurate tool of knowledge, with the help of which much more distant horizons are opened than from the usual historical point of view. True VC always fully preserves the content of the Tradition, regardless of its geographical location. Maintaining the Tradition among people through an unbroken chain of teachers is its mission and the basis of its existence.

Topos lays down the worldview, determines the discretization of the world, and ensures the rhythm of human activity. Time presents its cultural heroes for the sublimation of the biological substrate. TK reflects the idea of ​​​​embodiing an absolute chronotope into a relative one for the evolution of individuality. At the same time, “the level at which the subject enters into communication at the beginning of life in the absolute chronotope, at the beginning of deep communication, can and should be the custodian of unconditionally valuable potential. And this potential can then be relegated to other levels or tiers personal world, where the subject performs an activity or enters into a relationship within the limits of ordinary, conventional chronotopes.”

Time in TC is local, there is no uniform time, since there is no bus and train schedule. Time is not converted into monetary units. The life of a traditional society takes place in sacred time, as M. Eliade excellently reproduced: “Labor, craft, war and love - all these were sacraments. The repetition of what the gods and heroes experienced gave human existence a sacred aspect, complemented by the sacred nature attributed to life and the cosmos. Opening itself thus to the Great Time, sacred existence, poor as it often was, was nevertheless rich in meaning: at any rate, it was not under the tyranny of time.” Further, the Romanian scientist writes about the power of time over industrial man, who now, more than ever, feels like a prisoner daily work, since it is controlled by operating time. Modern civilization has invented an overwhelming number of ways to escape time during leisure hours. Whereas in TC, each activity was a way of living in sacred time and escaping immanent time.

The same can be said about space. Being in the same space, the TK person correlated with sacred geography. Each event had a referent in sacred time and space. Now we have an everyday routine space and developed tourist leisure to replace it.

Culture appears in a certain segment of the chronotope. Extreme chronotope conditions are not favorable for RTK. All known developed centers of civilization are located in favorable natural conditions: Egypt, Sumer, Babylon, India, Hellas, China, Mesoamerica, Peru. There are other examples where the presence of favorable natural conditions does not provide a civilizational leap: Australia and Oceania, Southern and equatorial Africa.

Thus, the question arises: do time and space influence TC or does TC set the format of time and space? At this key point we come to the intersection of ontology and epistemology and the long-standing dispute about the primacy of substance or its knowledge. We believe that both and a potential third occur. These two approaches are similar in the subordination of the subject to power structures (language, thinking, subconscious, society, chronotope). The situation, however, is not so fatal. Along with the subject’s dependence on a specific segment of culture, there is also the possibility of transcending, “jumping out” beyond everyday experience. Such “breakthroughs” in culture will be discussed in the last chapter.

Space and time as scientific categories.

The human world is the world of culture. In its original meaning (“cultivated”), culture is opposed to “nature” - natural, “wild” and means everything that distinguishes man from nature, distinguishes the artificial from the natural. Culture includes not only the material and spiritual values ​​accumulated by people, but also ways of increasing them.

Man is the only living being who lives in two worlds at the same time. On the one hand, he is a natural body, subject to all physical, chemical and biological laws, and his existence outside the natural world is unthinkable. This life, alas, is short-lived and limited in space and time. Having slipped, we fall down, and do not soar into the heavens, which is dictated by the law of gravity. According to the same laws of nature, at one moment in time we can only be at one point in space.

But, on the other hand, man belongs to the world of eternity. It is worth going to the bookshelf, reaching out your hand, opening a volume of Aristotle, and we begin to perceive thoughts, that is, communicate, with the great sage of antiquity, although there are thousands of years and thousands of kilometers between us. This world is free from the shackles of time and distance. In it, a person empathizes with the discoveries of Ibn Fadlan and communicates with the thinkers of the Renaissance, meets the genius of Heine and Pushkin, and empathizes with the views of Shakespeare and Diderot. Perhaps it is precisely this belonging of man to two worlds that underlies religion, which in its own way reflected it and contrasted the earthly (natural) world with the divine world, the transitory world with the eternal world. Therefore, it is wrong to exclude religious views from the world of culture. But for us, the main thing about such a phenomenon is that it clearly shows: social characteristics time and space cannot be reduced to natural science.

Culture arises together with people and undergoes historical changes together with them. The first layer of culture - the emergence of language and speech - served as the dividing line that once and for all separated the animal world from the human world, the biological world from the social world. Anyone who says that culture is a kind of code applied by society to objects of nature and forms of interpersonal relationships will not be mistaken.

Society, by creating artificial nature, simultaneously creates people who are capable of consuming the culture encrypted in it. This is how the culture of society reveals its dual nature. On the one hand, it is fossilized forms of activity, fixed in objects, on the other hand, it is mental forms of activity, fixed in the minds of people. The living culture of society arises from the unity of the objective and conceivable components.

A person’s thought may remain unmaterialized, but the person himself is part of the material world. Since becoming familiar with the basics of a university philosophy course, everyone knows that “there is no matter in the world that does not have spatiotemporal properties.” Accepting this statement, we must agree that all processes and phenomena occurring with man and society also unfold in space and time. This means that not a single sociocultural phenomenon can be imagined in isolation from its functioning in space and time.

“Space is a form of existence of matter, characterizing its extension, structure, coexistence and interaction of elements in all material systems.” Problems of cognition associated with ideas about the category “space” are multifaceted. And yet there are general laws of the existence of space and everything that is in it. It is no coincidence that I. Kant emphasized: “You can imagine only one single space, and if they talk about many spaces, then by them they mean only parts of the same single space. Moreover, these parts cannot precede a single, all-encompassing space, like its constituent parts (from which it could be composed): they can only be thought of as being in it.”

Philosophers focus on the ontological nature of the concept of “space”, believing that it plays important role in culture, is one of its basic concepts. “Space” and “time” in philosophy are two categories by which the forms of existence of things and phenomena are designated, which reflect, on the one hand, their event, coexistence (in space), on the other, the processes of replacing them with each other (in time) , the duration of their existence. They represent the supporting structure of any hitherto known explanatory picture of the world.

First of all, the concept of “space” is considered in close connection with the category of “time”, which is defined as “the form of existence of matter, expressing the duration of its existence, the sequence of changes in states in the change and development of all material systems.” Most often, the problem of perception of space and time was associated with the objectivity and subjectivity of these categories. If for natural sciences objectivity in judgments about space and time is the main centripetal tendency of all research, then for humanitarian knowledge space and time can be perceived as subjective (perceptual) and objective characteristics of human existence equally. This duality is an inherent feature of the study of any category in the humanities.

The main properties of space traditionally include extension, homogeneity, immutability and three-dimensionality. Therefore, space can be defined as a coordinate system of coexisting objects, processes and phenomena. Accordingly, the main characteristics of time are duration, one-dimensionality, irreversibility and homogeneity, and it can be defined as a coordinate system of changing objects, processes and phenomena. Data character traits space and time are completely related to the substantial concept, which is based on the autonomy of space and time, which exist parallel to matter as a whole. “Substance, objective reality, considered from the side of its internal unity; matter in the aspect of the unity of all forms of its movement; the ultimate basis that allows us to reduce the sensory diversity and variability of properties to something permanent, relatively stable and independently existing.”

In such a case, the position of any object in relation to others in space can be accurately indicated using three quantities. Time establishes and correlates events with each other according to one indicator. This is a purely mathematical view of the spatio-temporal characteristics of human existence and the processes occurring in society.

I. Newton, reflecting on space and time, emphasized that “these concepts usually refer to what is comprehended by our senses. This is where some incorrect judgments arise, to eliminate which it is necessary to divide the above concepts into absolute and relative, true and apparent, mathematical and ordinary.” The great English theologian and founder of classical mechanics clearly separated mathematical existence and ordinary (or sensory) perception of the surrounding world, absolutizing space and time, and being skeptical about ordinary perception. “Just as the order of the parts of time is immutable, so the order of the parts of space is immutable.” Absolute space, in its essence, is not connected with the objects placed in it, and regardless of anything else, it always remains the same and motionless. Relative space is a measure that is determined by the senses, and which is perceived as motionless space.

However, unlike E. Kant and I. Newton, in this study we cannot allow ourselves to be distracted from feelings. We consider the manifestations of space and time through the prism of social reality, where their content is influenced by both the psychology of the individual and the psychology of the masses. The psychological time of an individual is related to the individual and mass perception and the experience of time and space, since only specific feature that here it is social space and social time.

Social space is determined by material characteristics and includes the wealth of natural objects of labor and natural objects of consumption that are disobjectified and included in the production process. As we can see, the main point here is labor as the basis of both the process of disobjectification and the production process. Without going into detailed analysis, we emphasize that the labor process is always a purposeful activity, i.e. activities consistent with specific goals.

The concept of "social time" was introduced in scientific circulation in the 60s of the last century. Already Ya.F. Askin, one of the first to specifically study the problem of time, considered it necessary to separate it from the problem of space; emphasized the limitations of an exclusively physical interpretation of time. Determined by the specificity of the social form of movement of matter, the special nature of social time was deduced in the works of this period logically, through the connection of space and time with matter and the conditionality of the diversity of spatio-temporal forms by the subordination of forms and levels of movement of matter

Around the same years, based on the specifics of their sciences, economists and sociologists intensified their research into the time budget of workers, making the transition to theoretical generalizations of the accumulated material. The problem of time attracts the attention of historians; psychologists, art historians, and aestheticians are interested in its subjective and personal aspect. Such a multifaceted, versatile and at the same time “synchronous” consideration of the specific characteristics of time in various fields public life contributed to the “emancipation” of social time from physical time, the realization that “the essence of time (in society - author) cannot be reduced to what is contained in the equations of physics.”

The successes achieved on the path of understanding social time have made it possible to move on to its more fundamental research. It was found that “the essence of social time is determined by the nature of social life and the form of social relations that dominate.” All this gave the right to M.S. It is reasonable for Kagan to summarize: “thus, the first significant step towards understanding a specifically philosophical understanding of time has been made - the concept of time as such in its universal content has been differentiated from the concept of physical (in particular astronomical) time as a form of natural processes.”

And yet the content of the concept of “social time” is still quite vague. Most often, it is understood as a certain period of time during which a particular social entity exists. There is no need to prove that social time exists “within” physical time. But it is hardly advisable to consider it as a simple projection “from Romulus to the present day” onto the boundless flow of physical time from the past to the future, because social time, in addition to the “past - future” characteristic, must also have its own social-qualitative characteristic. We should agree with E.A. Belyaev and L.N. Lyublinskaya: “the reason for the difficulties in analyzing the category of time is, first of all, that the concept of time itself, having an attributive status, manifests itself as many specific implementations at various structural levels of the existence of matter, therefore it is always necessary to clarify the system in relation to which you consider time, while defining and the aspect of consideration itself."

Unlike physical time, perceptual time “accelerates” when life is filled with events and “stops” when a person is tensely waiting for something. It depends on certain situations and events in the life of an individual and entire nations. Ideas about the individual and social space of a person and ethnic group may also depend on a large number of external and internal factors. Time and space can have different evaluations that are in no way related to their objective characteristics: “ a nice place" - "deaf corner", "terrible time" - " best years", etc. The subjective, psychological sensation of time and space is extremely unique in its incarnations, although it can be determined by purely physical parameters.

For our research, the connection of these categories with a person’s perception of the world around him is important. Therefore, we cannot accept the substance approach as fundamental. This does not mean that we reject it as incorrect in principle. We just cannot accept this approach as correct for studying the stated problems.

More valuable to us is the relational concept. “Relativism, a methodological principle consisting in the metaphysical absolutization of relativity and conditionality of the content of knowledge.” This view represents space and time as a system that interacts in inextricable connection with matter in general, and man in particular. In this case, space and time act as the most important coordinate system, within the framework of which and with the help of which a person builds his life.

According to A. Einstein's principle of relativity, all processes in inertial reference systems proceed in the same way. Spatial distances change when moving from one reference system to another moving relative to the first. According to this theory, space does not exist separately, as something opposite to what fills it and what depends on the coordinates. Empty space, i.e. space without a field does not exist. The theory of relativity showed the unity of space and time, expressed in the joint change of their characteristics.

Cultural space, of course, is not only visible, tangible and tangible. This space is also imaginary and conceivable, which is expressed in the emergence and interaction of various ideas and concepts created in the course of the development of specific spheres of human activity.

Due to the fact that space and time are conceivable and understandable only by man and due to the impossibility of absolute objectivity of human perception, they become dependent on the characteristics of the latter. Space and time, in this case, begin to change their content depending on the degree of subjectivity in the perception of the surrounding world by a person and the team of which he is a member. In this case, these categories receive the utmost degree of relativity. The correlation and degree of correlation between the perception of space and time by individuals and their various groups may be completely absent.

The relativity of the perception of space and time by representatives of archaic and “primitive” cultures is especially clearly visible. Peoples at the primitive stage of development do not have absolute units of measurement for anything. In addition, everything that happens in the surrounding world for primitive man is not only synchronous, but also diachronic at the same time. The worldview of primitive man as a whole not only does not resemble the modern one, but in many ways remains mysterious. “Only those who in childhood had a rich imagination can again realize how significant, important or friendly the bizarre shapes of rocks, forest thickets, trees, etc. must have seemed to the people of the Stone Age, and how dreams and fantasies created fairy tales and legends around such phenomena, which acquired credibility as they were told about them.” Unfortunately, many fairy tales and legends, as well as knowledge about the space-time constants of that distant era, have not reached us, and therefore, when studying preliterate cultures, the researcher often has to rely on his own imagination.

An important place in the formation of the culture of any nation is occupied by historically established traditions and features of the perception of space. “Any system lives not only according to the laws of self-development, but is also involved in collisions with other cultural structures,” noted Yu.M. Lotman. It is impossible to find a people on the planet who, throughout their existence, have not changed their place of residence, have not experienced pressure on their living space from a neighbor, or have not themselves put pressure on the territory of someone who lives nearby. The need to establish boundaries required an understanding of the peculiarities of the spatial organization of life.

Distance was measured by elbows, steps (“Man is the measure of all things”), the flight of an arrow, spear or javelin, or a day's march. Even at the first glance at this list of parameters, it is clear that there are no, even approximate, standards here and cannot be. The elbow and step differ greatly depending on the height characteristics of a person. The flight range of an arrow, spear or dart also depends on the muscular strength of the hunter. The day's trek depends, among other things, on the terrain and endurance individuals. The famous Russian “gak” (“there are two versts and a hook”) can be much greater than the distance in versts to which it is added when we're talking about about an unknown distance to an object. Moreover, the distance to a known object, for example, a village where relatives live, is always thought to be less than to an unknown object (a village where strangers live), even if in fact the opposite is true. Our ancient ancestors did not think about the accuracy, uniformity and absolutization of spatial criteria, including because there was no need for this yet.

The scale of the known, felt and perceived space depended and depends on the degree of familiarity of a person or a people as a whole with the dimensions of the Oecumene and the Universe. Thus, a person who never went far beyond the environs of his village (until the beginning of modern times this was a common occurrence), having arrived in the city, I found myself in a situation culture shock. Many ancient states (for example, Babylonia, Assyria, Persia) positioned themselves as world powers, having very small sizes by modern standards. Even the great Italian medieval traveler Marco Polo, who told his compatriots about the Far East, was met with misunderstanding and mistrust.

Initially, time, like space, also did not have absolute units of measurement. In most cases, time of day, lunar phases, seasons, initiations and generations were used to measure it. The viewing range over time was very small. At best, three generations. In ancient, unwritten times average duration human life was limited to 30 - 35 years. It was quite rare for grandparents to live to see their grandchildren reach adulthood. This is also why everything that lay beyond three generations was very vague and was often assessed in such categories as “long ago”, “in distant and immemorial times”.

Man, as a creator and creation of culture, lives in time, struggles with it, paves the way to the past and future of his existence. “Culture is a form of simultaneous existence and communication between people of different - past, present and future - cultures.” Man is unthinkable outside of time. Culture as a product of human activity is also inextricably linked with time parameters. “Outside of direct material action (on an object), culture should act for me as education, as a universal - unfolded in time - process of assimilation of knowledge accumulated by humanity."

The time of existence of a culture has an initial starting point associated with the appearance of man on Earth. Modern science, unfortunately, cannot accurately determine this time. Perhaps, according to genetics, this happened about 200 thousand years ago. Despite all the conditionality of our knowledge, we can only say with absolute certainty that there was such a starting point. Just like some abstract common zero reference point for all vectors of cultural development, sad as it may be, there must also be some end point to which the river of time carries all cultures.

The origin of culture is a very long and complex process, possibly determining the entire path of its further movement. From its zero reference point, culture developed along the path of the deployment of more and more new sociocultural systems in space, the emergence of genetically or relatedly similar cultures on vast areas of various continents, the formation of future relict cultures (on Easter Island, New Guinea, among South American Indians, etc.), the creation of new formations during the mixing or absorption of different tribes. The increase in the number of peoples led to the movement and interaction of cultures at various levels.

The zero point contained the potential for development, and the end point will contain all the accumulated cultural and historical experience. And if the zero point can be considered the time of the appearance of man on Earth, then there are a great many end points of the existence of human cultures. Man has created a weapon that is capable of destroying all life on Earth more than once. Perhaps humanity will master other worlds after rendering the conditions of existence on its own planet unusable. There will definitely be an end. So, in accordance with one of the scenarios for the development of the Universe, it will stop expanding. Its compression will begin again, which will end with compression to zero volume. Perhaps everything will end even earlier. There will be a rupture of matter as a result of the maximum expansion of the Universe, at which matter can remain stable. One way or another, with the disappearance of the usual state of space, the end of time will come and a limit will be put on human existence.

The age of human existence is limited, and the existence of individual cultures is also limited. Some vectors complete their development at the end point (strange and inexplicable stops in development and sudden disappearance some cultures of Mesoamerica), others may, at their end point, become the starting point for a new successor culture. “The system either ceases to exist, or, if it continues to live, must again repeat one or more turns and forms through which it has passed.”

World culture can be represented as a multitude of complex “molecules” colliding, connecting and disintegrating in time and space. Initially, the structure of cultures was simple, in comparison with modern systems, “atoms”. Constantly colliding with other “atoms”, they acquired new elements. This is how “molecules” appeared - complex systems consisting of “atoms”. During the interaction of different cultures, both a complication (or simplification) of the structure and a deviation of its development to the side could simultaneously occur, which led to a new change in the structure when interacting with the next “molecule” of culture. A powerful attack of several equal-sized and equally directed “atoms” on one led to the disintegration of the attacked and its disappearance. Different cultures, thus, convey to each other the direction of development, accepting, transmitting or imposing certain cultural dominants.

After studying the material in this chapter, the student should:

know

• sociocultural conditionality of ideas about space and time;
• basic philosophical approaches to understanding space and time;
• basic properties of space and time as forms of existence of matter;
• features of the spatio-temporal characteristics of being on the physical, biological and social levels movement of matter;

be able to

• reveal the content of the concepts of space and time, their relationship with each other and the basic forms of movement of matter;
• reveal the significance of the concepts of space and time for the modern scientific picture of the world;
• compare substantial and relational concepts of space and time;

own

Skills in analyzing the natural scientific foundations of various concepts of space and time.

Space and time as cultural phenomena and essential characteristics of human existence

Our ideas about space and time are historical; they change as our knowledge of nature develops. Modern ideas about time and space have little in common with the time and space perceived and experienced by people in other times. historical eras. A person is not born with a “sense of time”; his temporal and spatial concepts are always determined by the culture to which he belongs.

Already at the beginning of human history, the most ancient archetypes of space and time. In traditional cultures, space and time were not homogeneous, but emotionally and value-rich.

A person lives in space, realizing his dependence on such characteristics as size, boundaries, volumes, masters space, conquers it.

Mythological space is characterized by the property of a spiral unfolding in relation to a special “world center” as a certain point through which the imaginary “axis” of the turn seems to pass. This value remains the same in modern language, where space is associated with concepts denoting “expansion”, “extension”, “growth”.

Space in the mythological era was interpreted not only as a certain physical characteristic of existence, but was a kind of cosmic place in which the world tragedy of gods fighting each other, personified good or evil forces of nature, people, animals and plants unfolded.

It was an image, first of all, of a cultural space that was heterogeneous, and therefore its individual places were filled with specific meanings and significance for humans. It distinguishes between places where everyday life takes place and sacred places (from lat. sacrum – sacred) place. The concept of sacred space includes the idea of ​​​​the constant action of sacred forces, which once for the first time illuminated and transformed this space, giving it a special meaning, and thus separated it from the surrounding space. Sacred space is the boundary between the human and natural worlds, it is a mediator that connects heaven and earth, people and gods, visible and invisible, natural and supernatural; it unites extremes and unites opposites. Humanity has assigned the status of “sacred” to mountains, stones, groves and individual trees, rivers and lakes, places of life of great people, cemeteries, temples and other monuments of cultural, historical and natural heritage.

The most important property of mythological space was that it was not separated from time, forming a special unity with it, designated as a chronotope (from the Greek. chronos – time and topos – place, unity of spatial and temporal parameters).

In ancient times, man felt an even greater dependence on time, since it was associated with an understanding of the finitude of earthly life and the inevitability of death as a transition to another world. The ancient Greeks even had a god who personified time - Chronos (ancient Greek Χρόνος from χρόνος - time), space did not have such a deity.

People of ancient times and traditional cultures perceived time in the form cycle, where events occur in accordance with the rhythms of nature. Time does not flow linearly from the past to the future, but either does not move or rotates in a circle. No wonder in the Slavic word "time" is being viewed ancient image rotation, wheels; "time" akin to words with the root “ver-”, “vert-” - “spinning”, “pinwheel”, “turn”, “circulation, circulation of the celestial spheres, rotation of the heavens. Rotation, circle, cycle is a deep archetype of time in the spiritual culture of mankind.

The understanding of time in ancient culture remained under the strong influence of the mythological understanding of reality. The world was conceptualized not in terms of change and development, but as being at rest or rotating in a “great circle.” The irreversibility of time, which seems natural to our consciousness, is not at all such if we go beyond the historically determined and therefore inevitably limited views inherent in people of modern civilization. Linear time is one of the possible forms of time that has triumphed as the only system of time in the European cultural region. But here too this happened as a result of a long and complex development.

Concept linear time, which flows from the past through the present to the future, was introduced in Christianity.

The world was created by God, it has a beginning - this statement means the existence of the world in time, where there is a beginning and there will be an end. St. Basil believes that time was created by God as a kind of environment for the material world, as continuity and change of birth and death. In the beginning, and the beginning of time, God creates the world. But the beginning of time is not yet time, “just as the beginning of a path is not yet a path.”

The Christian understanding of time and history is presented in the form horizontal line: there is a beginning - the creation of the world, the tragic act of man, his fall; the central event is the Incarnation; and the end is the Second Coming of Jesus Christ.

The beginning and end of time limit the duration of human history. Historical time acquires a certain structure, dividing into two main eras: before the birth of Christ and after it.

History moves from the act of Divine creation to the Last Judgment. Historical time becomes vector, linear and irreversible. At the same time, in the annual cycle of religious rituals, the time is different: the differences between the past, present and future were relative: every year the birth of Christ, his sacrifice and his resurrection take place.

The concept of linear time was finally established in European culture during the transition to technogenic civilization and industrial society in the process of destruction of religious consciousness and the formation of rational consciousness. The invention of mechanical watches as a means of accurately measuring time, counting it sequentially at equal intervals of duration contributed to the formation of the idea of ​​time as an objective process moving from the past to the future through a point called the present. For the first time, time finally stretched out into a straight line, became linear. In an industrial society, time becomes one of the main values, and they even talk about the “despotism of time.”

Only through a series of transformations that occurred with the understanding of time did it arise modern interpretation. To paraphrase famous saying, we can say: times are changing, and with them our idea of ​​time is changing.

• Cm.: Gurevich A. Ya. Categories of medieval culture. M.: Art, 1972.
• See: Philosophy: textbook for universities / under general. ed. V.V. Mironova. Part 2. Section IV. Ch. 2. M.: Norma, 2005.
• Donskikh O. A. To the origins of language. Novosibirsk: Nauka, 1988. P. 60.
• St. Basil the Great. Conversations on the Sixth Day. P. 64.

"There is no one space and no one time,

and there are as many times and spaces as there are subjects..."

L. Binswanger

“...time, which is rooted in the soul and is, as it were, the very duration of the world soul, does not lose its cosmic character because of this

and does not become something subjective..."

P.P. Gaidenko

“Nothing puzzles me more than time and space, and at the same time nothing excites me less: I never think about either one...”

Charles Lamb

Everything that exists has spatiotemporal characteristics. Space and time are the forms of existence of all objects and processes that were, are and will be in the world. Space and time are present in the empirical experience of every person, so people have always sought to understand what they are.

Space and time have been the subject of rational reasoning since the birth of philosophy. Most researchers identify two main paradigms that have developed in the history of philosophical understanding of time and space. In different historical eras, one of them comes to the fore, then gives way to another.

The first direction considers these categories as special forms, independent of the systems and processes that “take place” in them (Democritus, Epicurus, Newton, etc.). The second direction of philosophical knowledge interprets time and space as certain orders of change and coexistence of things and phenomena that depend on the interaction of the latter (Aristotle, Descartes, Leibniz, etc.).

However, in the 20th century, under the influence of natural scientific discoveries, primarily the theory of relativity, set forth in 1905 by A. Einstein, the idea of ​​the interconnectedness of space and time, which are interpreted as relative and dependent on reference systems, was finally consolidated (i.e., the tradition continues, coming from Aristotle).

Being as a universal process encompassing human existence is not homogeneous. There is natural being, social being, cultural being. Based on these defining spheres of human existence, three main levels of spatio-temporal parameters are distinguished:

1) physical space and time;

2) social space and time;

3) space and time of culture.

Physical space acts as one of the main forms of existence, expressing the extent and order of coexistence of things, the structure of stability. Time category expresses the duration of events, the order of their succession, and the aspect of variability. Time and space set the initial orientations on which any famous picture peace.

The difference between social space and time and physical time is determined by the fact that their emergence and development are entirely related to human activity.

Description social space, its structure and characteristics is a difficult task, because, as M. Castells notes, “space is not a reflection of society, it is its expression. In other words, space is not a photocopy of society, it is society. Spatial forms and processes are shaped by the dynamics of the overall social structure.” Similar difficulties arise when describing social time.

There are complex interactions between physical and social space.

One of the first to use the concept of social space was Pitirim Sorokin in his work “Man. Civilization. Society" to create a theory of social stratification and social mobility. He noted the difference between geometric and social spaces: “People who are close to each other in geometric space (for example, a king and a servant, a master and a slave) are separated by a huge distance in social space. And, conversely, people who are very far apart in geometric space (for example, two brothers or bishops professing the same religion...) can be very close socially.”

Bearing in mind that a spatial description of phenomena is impossible without a reference system - a body of reference, a landmark in relation to which observation is being made, P. Sorokin continues: “In order to define social space, let us remember that geometric space is usually presented to us in the form of a kind of “universe” ”, in which physical bodies are located... In the same way, social space is a certain universe consisting of the population of the earth... Accordingly, to determine the position of a person or any social phenomenon in social space means to determine his (their) relationship to other people and other social phenomena , taken as such “reference points”. The very choice of “reference points” depends on us: they can be individual people, groups or a set of groups.”

Based on the tradition in the study of social space (the works of G. Simmel, P. Bourdieu, P. Sorokin, V.E. Kemerov, etc.), it can be characterized as the order of placement of social objects in the field of social activity, their interaction and hierarchical juxtaposition. Social space has its own coordinates. Individuals and groups of people occupy a certain position in this space. The diversity of social phenomena presupposes a diversity of spatial connections and characteristics of society. At the level of individual consciousness, the coordinates of social space are set by a person’s ideas about his place in the social system, about participation in social interactions.

Category "social time" records the duration and sequence of social processes. Social (also called "historical" time) does not literally coincide with physical time: “For natural sciences, time is a collection of homogeneous segments. And history is a collection of heterogeneous events. There are periods when time seems to freeze, and there are periods of such historical transformations when entire centuries seem to fit into the life of one generation. In addition, history develops in such a way that the intensity of events and changes is constantly increasing. For a historian, it is not so important how many years Caesar spent on the conquest of Gaul, and Luther spent on carrying out the Reformation, in any case, no more than one conscious life. That's why historical time“is the duration, the fluidity of specific events from the point of view of their meaning for people of both their own and our time.”

The flow of social time can differ in its tempo depending on the territory or historical period - in the city the pace of life is faster than in rural areas at the turn of the 20th–21st centuries. the speed of life has increased many times over in comparison with previous centuries, the vastness of the Russian land has traditionally contributed to a leisurely rhythm of life: “The slowdown of historical dynamics in Russia was also facilitated by the country’s largest, sparsely populated space. Giving the opportunity for diverse movements to individuals, communities and entire communities, the Russian expanse implied the extensiveness of social life, its spreading in breadth, and, accordingly, a slowdown in social time. Because the latter... is measured by tempo social change, the extensiveness of the development of social, political, and economic forms slows down the time dynamics. The vast expanses of the Russian land, as well as the peculiarities of traditional cultural consciousness, absorb, slow down, and stop the course of history...”, and further: “In a vast country with quantitatively different time zones, qualitatively heterogeneous time types arose, and, accordingly, zones of increased social activity - capitals and large cities – and zones of increased social passivity – provincial towns and rural areas.”

The need for social cooperation acts as the basis of social systems of time. According to the characteristics of P.A. Sorokin and R.K. Merton: “social time, unlike time in astronomy, has qualities, and not just quantity; These qualities are derived from the beliefs and customs of the group, they also serve to reveal the rhythms, pulsations, beats of the societies in which they are found.

Social time can be analyzed in the characteristics “external” and “internal” (L.G. Ionin, V.D. Leleko). External time is independent of the individual. It exists before a person is born and after he dies. However, the events of a person’s individual biography are tied to historical time and oriented in it. A calendar and a clock help to keep track of external time.

Unlike external time, a person’s internal time has a beginning and an end, coinciding with birth and death. Internal time is directed to the future and is structured by a person’s system of life plans for the next day, week, month, year... It is emotionally colored: one of the most powerful experiences that stimulate a person’s active activity is the experience of one’s own mortality, the finitude of one’s existence. And finally, internal time must adapt to external time, since it depends on it.

The most important conclusions characterizing the specifics of social space/time include the following: social time and space act as categories of social existence not only for its description at the spiritual and theoretical level. They “are the initial patterns for constructing people’s everyday behavior and their everyday interactions, i.e. they constantly operate at the level of existence of social individuals as conditions of connectedness, continuity, and organization of the social process...”

In historical dynamics, the relationship in the system of spatio-temporal coordinates of social existence changed: “In traditional forms of society, the spatial characteristics of social existence expressed time and subordinated its dimension. In modern times, during the formation of an industrial society, this dependence is being “reversed”: time becomes the main measure of the social qualities of people and things...”

When people talk about the space and time of culture, they often mean two different aspects in which these categories are represented.

1) The first aspect is related to the objective development of culture in its spatio-temporal characteristics.

2) The second aspect involves the perception of space and time in culture, as well as the depiction of space-time processes in works of art.

Let's start with an analysis of the spatio-temporal existence of culture itself.

Space of culture represents specific form existence of social space. It is characterized by the implementation of cultural activities, the object and subject of which is a person. On the one hand, as L.N. Kogan notes, the cultural space is formed by human cultural activity – “i.e. e. activities for the production, distribution, consumption of cultural values.” On the other hand, only a space that has a direct and immediate impact on a person can be called a cultural space.

In our opinion, the fundamental mechanism that determines the boundaries of social space and cultural space is the processes of socialization and inculturation.

Under socialization refers to the harmonious entry of an individual into the social environment, his assimilation of the value system of society, which allows him to successfully function as a member of it. As a result of socialization, a person becomes a full member of society, freely performing the required social roles.

In contrast to socialization, the concept enculturation involves teaching a person the traditions and norms of behavior in a particular culture. Enculturation implies mastery of the symbolic meanings of a culture, since it is the process of meaning formation that distinguishes activity as a cultural phenomenon.

Culture in different countries is more specific than social structure. It is more difficult to adapt to it, fully engage and get used to it. An adult emigrant who left Russia, for example, for Germany or the USA, quickly assimilates the social laws of life, but it is much more difficult for him to assimilate the laws of others cultural norms and customs.

If a person’s position in social space is determined by identifying the system of his social relations, then in the space of culture - through a set of value relations to the experience of a particular group, the degree of value adaptation to it. Here we see how the external - social turns into the internal property of the individual.

The most important characteristic of cultural space is its clear structure. It should be highlighted horizontal and vertical parameters of cultural space . The interrelations of both individual people and different subcultures in a single field of culture can be either at the same horizontal level or at different levels vertically. One culture, according to different characteristics, can be included in different coordinate systems: in one case, being in the horizontal plane, in another – in the vertical plane.

The vertical space of culture can be associated with the social structuring of society. For example, the class organization of a social system, usually including several classes, is characterized by hierarchy, expressed in the inequality of their position and privileges. Estates occupying different levels in social space also occupy different positions in cultural space (in P. Bourdieu’s terminology, they have different “cultural capital”). In Russia from the second half of the 18th century to revolutionary events the beginning of the 20th century, in accordance with class division, one can distinguish noble, merchant, peasant, petty bourgeois culture and the culture of the clergy. In the 19th century, two geniuses of Russian culture were contemporaries - A.S. Pushkin and Seraphim of Sarov. One belonged to a secular secular culture, and the other to a traditional religious movement, but in life they had no common ground.

Thus, social differentiation may underlie the formation of cultural boundaries within a single cultural integrity. In this case, we can talk about a partial coincidence of the coordinates of social space and cultural space.

Along the vertical axis p Almost any sphere of human activity presupposes the division of those “involved” into amateurs and professionals. This distinction between professional creators and amateurs arises in sports, art, religion, etc. If amateurs usually engage in one or another form of activity once in a while, in their free time from their main activities, then for professionals it is the main area of ​​application of energy and a source of livelihood. Professionals act as “trend setters”, creators of norms and models. Amateurs, as a rule, reach a lower level in this form of activity. It is important for them that they receive pleasure and satisfaction both from their activities and from the achievements of professionals. Amateurs can show great passion for their work and spend a lot of time and effort on it, and sometimes see the meaning of their life in it.

The vertical axis dominates the space of Russian culture, in which traditionally the most important role is played by relations of power and subordination and the supreme leader has unquestioned authority, while horizontal relations are not so important.

Orthodox culture is characterized by a strict verticality. In Orthodoxy, the dominant importance is the relationship between the world above and below, God and man through the priesthood, and against this background, horizontal connections are less strong (which brings Orthodoxy and Catholicism closer, but distinguishes them from the main Protestant movements).

S.N. Ikonnikova offers a different interpretation of the coordinates of cultural space. In it, the vertical symbolizes the principle of continuity, the transition of previous cultural forms or their elements into new cultural formations. According to S.N. Ikonnikova, cultural space has a “porous” structure. Ancient layers and artifacts are able to rise into modern layers of culture through internal channels. Thus, classical antiquity became a role model in the era of the Renaissance, classicism, and elements of the culture of the Middle Ages - in the era of romanticism. The horizontal in this case can be conceptualized as the synchronous existence of various local and national cultural spaces, their interaction and mutual enrichment.

Horizontal coordinates of cultural space can be constructed along the axis "center / periphery".

Considering the space of any cultural area as a whole, it is possible to distinguish between a center and a periphery.

If in a city its center is also the center of “high” culture (theatres, libraries and other cultural institutions), then on the city outskirts an unofficial, peripheral culture of everyday life dominates. If houses and apartments are the centers of “normal” “cultural” housing, then attics, basements, and stairwells turn into habitats for other, peripheral cultural traditions. Day is the time of life of the dominant forms of culture, night is the world of the cultural periphery and “anticulture”.

But the introduction of the idea of ​​center and periphery as the basis for structuring the spatial existence of culture raises the question not only and not so much about the study of territorial centers. What is important here is the role of the center as an “embryo” or, using O. Spengler’s concept, a “proto-symbol”, i.e. the deepest foundation of culture.

The semantic sacralized center performs the functions of adaptation and protection, since through it the culture preserves its identity, its structural and functional features. In the center of cultural space, certain interests are satisfied through the very status of this zone of space and its recognized legitimate properties, expressed in the generation of normativity, power, and belonging to the elite.

The periphery, on the contrary, is a zone of cultural space that is characterized by relative passivity, lack of concentration of elites, and often increased danger. Most often, the periphery appears as a space for mastering the content that comes from the center. It is this meaning that is fixed at the level of everyday consciousness, within which the periphery is associated, as a rule, with the opposite of the center.

Despite all the functional and structural differences, the center and periphery are inextricably linked with each other as complementary opposites. The center, in order to exist in its basic capacity, must constantly restore its resources - informational, technological, personnel, scientific, artistic and many others. The cessation of this restoration means for the center the loss of its status and displacement by new growing centers. Thus, the center is constantly, as it were, “ordered” from the periphery, which consumes those innovative processes that are developed in the center, thereby confirming their importance.

One of important features space of culture is that it determines the coordinates of not only the external existence of the individual, but also the intrapersonal existence of culture. Intrapersonal aspect of the functioning of the cultural space is associated with a person’s self-identification, with his ability to be himself in his sociocultural environment. The space of culture acts as a unique synthesis of the internal and external world of man, his ethical and aesthetic ideas and activities.

The life world of each person consists of a set of relatively independent subspaces of culture. Thus, a different value system acts as a guideline for a person’s behavior at work, at home, in the theater, at the stadium, in the temple. A person can move from one dimension of cultural space to another.

Culture time– “the most important aspect of the model of the world, a characteristic of the duration of existence, rhythm, tempo, sequence, coordination of changing states of culture as a whole and its elements, as well as their semantic content for humans.” Just because the time of culture cannot be perceived with the help of the senses – This is an extremely difficult category to define, in many ways metaphorical. It reflects the continuity of the flow of culture from the past through the present to the future, connected by the image of eternity. The question of the relationship between time modes in culture is fundamental for researchers.

So L.N. Kogan comes to the conclusion that “cultural creations have only the present tense.” He introduces the seemingly paradoxical phrase “eternal present.” According to the position of L.N. Kogan, eternity “shines through” in time through enduring values, through immortal masterpieces of culture, the lifespan of which is almost unlimited.

The authors of the textbook “Introduction to Cultural Studies” focus on the parameters of each of the modes of time. So, past always co-existential, it is questioned, reconstructed, interpreted in the present. The past is present in the present through reference systems (calendar date, which determines the place of the present, current day in relation to the beginning of chronology). The past is present in the present, realized through customs and traditions. The past no longer exists, but it is present in us as a continuous dialogue with the creators and works of past eras.

The present characterized as the direct existence of culture “here and now”. It no longer presupposes questioning, but an effective act, an action. Man, as a subject of culture, continuously constructs, organizes, and improves the present.

Future present in the present as foresight, anticipation, expectation. This foresight can be realized in the form of predictions (fortune tellers, oracles, astrologers), plans, promising projects, long-term development forecasts. The future is characterized as a projective reality, which implies responsibility at the moment of choosing one’s step into this future.

Of course, our desire to highlight modes of time is to a certain extent a simplification, since the flow of time is continuous. But this approach makes sense. The history of mankind unfolds in a combination of tradition and innovation. Every moment of time contains traces of the past and a hint of the future.

In the continuous flow of time, one can discern boundaries, transition points at which the past “fights” with the future. In ecology, the intermediate zone between two ecological communities is usually called the word “ecotone”. It seems possible to us to introduce the phrase "temporary ecotone" to designate a boundary in time, a period when the past fades away and the future is just emerging.

Case in point temporary ecotone is the Russian culture of the 17th century. In the 17th century, the history of ancient Russian culture, based on the church worldview, came to an end, and elements of modern culture, which was characterized by the process of secularization, emerged.

A prominent representative of the transitional period was Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, who combined deep piety with an interest in theatrical “fun” and encouragement of other similar innovations. He chose the famous educator Simeon of Polotsk as a teacher for his children. The pupil of this learned monk, Princess Sofya Alekseevna, was able to stand at the head of the uprising and take over the government of the state (an amazing example that testifies to new trends in a culture in which women were expected only to be humble and submissive, do handicrafts and read prayers). No less striking figure of the transitional time was Archpriest Avvakum - a fanatical defender of the old faith and at the same time the author of a life-autobiography - a work that belongs to a new genre, testifying to the value of an individual in culture.

In general, the culture of the 17th century was closer to medieval culture than to the culture of subsequent periods. However, the future of Russian culture was nevertheless determined by those new phenomena (“secularization” of culture, expansion of cultural ties with other countries, changes in attitudes towards the human person, etc.) that arose at that time.

Ideas about space and time (physical, social, and cultural) directly depend on a specific historical and cultural context. Behind each way of organizing space / time there is a certain worldview, which finds its symbolic expression in these coordinates. Let us give some examples of the perception of space/time in culture.

We support the position of A. Ya. Gurevich, who not only emphasized the historical, cultural and social fullness of the categories of space and time, but also pointed out that these categories arose and existed for a long time precisely as categories of culture, and not natural science.

Each cultural and historical era forms its own ideas about space and time. These ideas also differ within the boundaries of individual cultural phenomena.

Already in the era of dominance mythological consciousness within it, ideas about space and time are formed as the most important elements of the world model.

Each area of ​​space (north or south, right side or left side, top or bottom) was given a special meaning. So, for example, in the system of binary oppositions, the right side and top traditionally had positive connotations, and the left side and bottom had negative connotations. And today, echoes of ancient ideas can be heard in the words “sublime” and “base,” in the phrases “just cause” and “left work.”

Mythological consciousness is characterized by the division of space into profane and sacred. profane space- the space of real material life, filled with the content of real human relationships, this is a sensually perceived space. Sacred space– this is the space where the sacred reveals itself to man. Places of worship are filled with sacred meanings - Stonehenge in England and other megaliths of Europe, as well as temples of Ancient Egypt, Babylon, China, Mexico. The area of ​​sacred space was usually internally structured; it was identified with center, which was marked by an altar, temple, cross, world axis, world tree or world mountain. The images of the world tree or the world mountain embody the idea of ​​a trinity vertical division of the world (upper, middle and lower world) and at the same time its unity.

Periphery of space, on the contrary, is a danger zone that in myths and fairy tales the hero must overcome (the “bad” spaces included a swamp, forest, gorge, forks in roads, crossroads, etc.). Sometimes it is even a place outside of space (in some kind of chaos) - “go there, I don’t know where.” If we recall fairy tales and epics, it was at crossroads that evil spirits most often appeared to people; at forks in roads, heroes choose their fate.

Victory over evil forces means the fact of appropriating space, i.e., introducing it to a cosmicized and organized “cultural” space (for example, in epics, a hero defeats a snake, crosses a bridge, which is a border zone, destroys the lair of baby snakes, frees captives - foreign territory becomes yours). New areas, “foreign space” were introduced to the mastered space through sacralization. To do this, they placed amulets and later crosses at key points in the new space, read prayers and incantations, installed guards and guards of the boundaries of space, etc.

An important role within the framework of mythological consciousness belonged to border-transitions- stairs, bridge, threshold, window, etc. So, for example, today it is customary to cover mirrors in a house where a person died with a dark cloth. This is a long-standing tradition, the origins of which we do not think about, simply repeating what was done before us. Previously, it was believed that a mirror was a border, a “portal” for transition to another world, and so that the deceased would not be taken with him, this border was temporarily blocked.

Thus, already turning to mythology allows us to say that space is filled with content, has a specific value characteristic, and appears as a structured sphere of human existence.

Mythological ideas about time are based on dichotomy profane time(i.e. empirical) and "pre-time"(which preceded it). Proto-time is the time of the past, the time of “proto-events” in which the ancestors participate, cultural heroes and other mythological characters. According to E.M. Meletinsky, mythical time “seems to be the sphere of the root causes of subsequent actual empirical events.” Mythical time is actualized for living bearers of myth through rituals and dreams. The events of the era of first creation are reproduced in rituals, that is, they are “called to life” during the sacred time of the holiday.

Gradually, the mythical model of time becomes more complex, acquiring a cyclical character. The idea of ​​circulation and repetition, characteristic of ancient cultures, is formed on the basis of the repeatability of natural phenomena and is associated with human economic activity.

Time in myths, like space, is described using binary oppositions: day / night, morning / evening, summer / winter, spring / autumn.

One of the most important characteristics of mythological consciousness should be considered the inseparability of ideas about time and space, which were thought together, forming an inextricable unity: “Any full-fledged description of space by primitive or archaic consciousness presupposes the definition of “here-now”, and not just “here” ...”

Within religious painting world also form their own ideas about the spatio-temporal coordinates of existence. Some of these ideas are universal, characteristic of all religious systems. For example, religious consciousness, just like mythological consciousness, is characterized by the “doubling” of space, the recognition of the existence of two spaces – profane (empirical space) and sacred (sacred space). Other characteristics of the space-time coordinates of existence will be characteristic only of one religion or another, since each religion offers its own picture of the world. For example, let's analyze the Christian concept of existence.

Within the Borders Christian culture a new understanding of time is emerging, contributing to the formation of the idea of ​​historicism. In the Christian worldview, the concept of time is separated from the concept of eternity. Eternity is immeasurable by time periods. Eternity is an attribute of God. Time is created and has a beginning and an end, limiting the duration of human history.

The new awareness of time is based on three defining moments - the beginning, culmination and end of the life of the human race. Time becomes linear and irreversible. The Christian time orientation differs from the ancient one. Time in antiquity lacks chronological sequence. The “Golden Age” is behind us, in the past. The Jewish concept of time is also different. The Old Testament is directed to the future, to the “messianic time.” The Christian understanding of time attaches importance to both the past, since the New Testament tragedy has already happened, and the future, which brings retribution. It is the presence of these reference points in time that “straightens” it with extraordinary force, “stretches” it into a line and at the same time creates a tense connection of times.

In the linear concept of time, the present began to be perceived as fleeting, elusive, elusive: “The chiming clock, evenly heard from the city tower, constantly reminded of the transience of life and called for worthy deeds to be opposed to this transience...” Not only in human actions are time and eternity united, but also in rhythms worship, and in prayerful communication with God.

Christian time in space is localized closer to the heavenly world. The beginning of a church service, both in European countries and in Ancient Rus', was indicated by the ringing of bells. The bell tower symbolically embodies this localization of time. Also the temples themselves, which were built on high places so that they “hover” above the surrounding area.

Spatial concepts in Christianity are characterized by strict hierarchy. The vertical dominates the horizontal. The upper sphere, the divine world, includes Paradise, in which the souls of the righteous reside. Opposite to it is hell, located below, in which the souls of sinners serve their punishment. There is also a heavenly hierarchy; heavenly beings differ in their closeness to God; its continuation on earth is the church hierarchy. The space of an Orthodox church is strictly hierarchical, as an expression of the Divine order.

Temples and monasteries are zones on earth in which empirical and sacred space coincide, in which the sacred reveals itself to man (for example, according to the ideas of the Orthodox religion, when people gather in a temple to pray together, God is certainly present among them). The temple is sometimes called “heaven on earth” or “the house of God.”

The material and spiritual worlds, physical and metaphysical reality are united in Christian symbols. The most significant of them is the cross - a symbol of the birth, crucifixion and Resurrection of Jesus Christ, a symbol of God's love for humanity and eternal life. Candles and lamps burning in front of the icons symbolize the fire of faith that burns in the soul of a religious person and hope for God’s help. The temple itself is a multi-valued symbol; every detail in its external and internal structure is symbolic. According to its plan, the temple sometimes resembles a cross, sometimes a circle, which is a symbol of eternity, sometimes a ship, as a sign that the Church, like Noah's Ark, sails on the sea of ​​life to the quiet pier of the Kingdom of Heaven. The temple building usually ends with a dome, symbolizing the celestial sphere. In the Russian tradition, as a rule, a dome with a cross is built over the dome. There may be several such chapters: three - as a symbol of the Holy Trinity, five - as a sign of Christ and the four evangelists, seven - as a sign of the seven Sacraments and seven Ecumenical Councils, thirteen - in memory of Christ and the twelve apostles. Orthodox churches are always oriented to the east. The eastern part is the region of the world, “the land of the living,” according to legend lost heaven was in the east. To the east of Jerusalem is the site of the Ascension of Jesus Christ. And the coming of the future Kingdom of God is symbolized by the rising of the sun in the east. The altar is the main shrine of the temple, always located in its eastern part. We have briefly described only the external structure of the temple; the symbolism of the interior decoration is even more diverse.

Thus, we can argue that space in the Christian religion appears as theocentric, hierarchical, symbolic, and the embodiment of all these features is the temple as an image of the “spiritual sky” on earth.

Along with the study of the religious picture of the world, the topic of space-time coordinates in art attracts the close attention of researchers. The problem of artistic space/time was addressed by Russian thinkers P.A. Florensky, D.S. Likhachev, M.M. Bakhtin, Yu.M. Lotman and many others.

The starting idea is the idea that every work of art is a self-sufficient, complete world in itself, with its own internal space and time.

According to the position of M.S. Kagan, art acts as a “mirror”, a “portrait” of culture as a whole. With this approach artistic space/ time represent the experience of history through the “prism” of ideas about space and time characteristic of a particular culture. Different types of art can create images of space, or they can express the essence of time and space as such: “One could say that if painting creates images of space, then architecture creates an image of Space; in the same way, literature talks about the concreteness of the flow of time, and music talks about Time as such.”

D.S. Likhachev pointed out that space and time in a work of art, on the one hand, reflect real world, and on the other hand, they have their own originality: “... the inner world of a work of art does not exist on its own and not for itself. It is not autonomous. It depends on reality, “reflects” the world of reality, but the transformation of this world that a work of art allows is holistic and purposeful. The transformation of reality is connected with the idea of ​​the work, with the tasks that the artist sets for himself... In his work, the writer creates a certain space in which the action takes place. This space can be large, covering a number of countries in a travel novel, or even extending beyond the terrestrial planet (in fantasy and romantic novels), but it can also narrow down to the tight confines of a single room. The space created by the author in his work may have unique “geographical” properties, be real (as in a chronicle or historical novel) or imaginary, as in a fairy tale. The writer in his work also creates the time in which the action of the work takes place. The work may cover centuries or just hours. Time in a work can move quickly or slowly, intermittently or continuously, be intensely filled with events or flow lazily and remain “empty,” rarely “populated” with events.”

To designate the inextricable unity of space and time in the works of art by M.M. Bakhtin borrows from psychology (the term was first used by A.A. Ukhtomsky) the concept "chronotope"(Greek chronos – “time”, topos – “place”). This concept metaphorically correlates with the ideas of A. Einstein and echoes the idea of ​​the noosphere by V.I. Vernadsky.

The essence of the chronotope is to establish laws according to which natural time-space is transformed into coordinates corresponding to the conditions of one or another literary genre: “The genre structure of the chronotope establishes the measure of deformation of natural time-space. Consequently, space in a novel means space in reality, translated into the language of the genre."

In literature, chronotopes have, first of all, plot significance, being the organizational centers of the events described by the author. MM. Bakhtin argues that every artistic and literary image is fundamentally chronotopic. Language itself, which is the source and inexhaustible material of images, is also chronotopic. The chronotopes of the author of the work and the reader-listener-viewer should also be taken into account. Each type of art is characterized by its own type of chronotope (spatial, temporal, spatiotemporal). According to Bakhtin, the boundaries of chronotopic analysis extend beyond the boundaries of art.

Returning to the beginning of our chapter, remember that in natural sciences They also form their own ideas about the spatio-temporal coordinates of human existence. Ideas about physical time and space are always the product of a certain culture: “in fact, the space of geometry and physics describes not a purely physical, but a cultural environment, because “points”, “straight lines”, “planes”, etc. are ideal objects representing invariants of human cultural experience, formed in the process of practical exploration of the world with the help of such first tools as a compass and a ruler,” writes B.V. Markov. Science itself is a cultural phenomenon, and therefore its way of spatio-temporally representing the world is symbolic in nature.

If we use the terminology of M.M. Bakhtin, then it can be argued that modern culture characterized by the intersection of multiple chronotopes. However, the dominant image in the modern picture of the world is the image of “compressed” space and flowing “lost” time.

According to the characteristics of A.Ya. Gurevich, modern man is a “hurrying” person, whose consciousness is determined by his attitude to time: “Time enslaves a person, his whole life unfolds sub specie temporis. A kind of “cult of time” has developed. The very rivalry between social systems is now understood as a competition in time: who will win in the pace of development, for whom does time “work”? A dial with a fast second hand could well become a symbol of our civilization.”

The concept of “space” has also changed in the modern world. New means of communication and transportation have given a person the opportunity to cover much greater distances per unit of time than was the case tens, and even more so hundreds of years ago. As a result, the world has become smaller. The category of speed, which united space and time, began to play a very important role in people’s lives. This is most clearly expressed in the space of virtual reality, where we can get instant access to any area of ​​​​space. In general, the topic of spatio-temporal representations in modern culture has been extremely insufficiently studied; it has great heuristic potential.

Control questions

1. What do they mean when they talk about culture as “second nature”?

2. Describe the main aspects of the interaction between nature and culture.

3. What is the role of “Russian cosmism” in the formation of a new relationship in the “man-nature” system?

4. What is the essence of the concept of “ecological culture”?

5. What is the structure of the cultural space?

6. Give examples of eternal subjects in art.

Literature

Vernadsky V.I. Biosphere and noosphere / V.I. Vernadsky. Any edition.

Vorontsov M.V. Ecological crises in the history of mankind / M.V. Vorontsov. – M., 2002.

Gachev G.D. European images of Space and Time / G.D. Gachev // Culture, man and picture of the world. – M., 1987. – P. 198–227.

Deryabko S.D. Components of environmental consciousness. To the history of the issue / S.D. Deryabko, V.A. Yasvin // Man. – 1999. – No. 3. – P. 19–33.

Kasavin I.T. Migration archetype and its transformations (shepherds and pirates) / I.T. Kasavin // Ouranos and Kronos. Chronotope of the human world. –M., 2001.

Kogan L.N. Eternity: transitory and enduring in human life / L.N. Kogan. – Ekaterinburg, 1994.

Culturology: Textbook for universities / B.A. Ehrengross, R.G. Apresyan et al. - M., 2007. Ch. 5.

Markov B.V. Temple and market. Man in the space of culture / B.V. Markov. – St. Petersburg, 1999.

Petrov K.M. Ecology and culture: Textbook. allowance / K.M. Petrov. – St. Petersburg, 2001.

Pivovarov D.V. Time and eternity / D.V. Breweries // Izvestia Uralskogo state university. – 2006. – No. 42. – Series 3. Social sciences. Issue 1. – pp. 208–218.

Foucault M. The Birth of the Clinic / M. Foucault. – M., 1998.

Heidegger M. Time and Being / M. Heidegger. – M., 1993.

Artistic models of the universe. Interaction of arts in the history of world culture. – M., 1997.