Define material culture. Which culture is more important?

Any culture is multifaceted and multifaceted. But conditionally it can be divided into two spheres of activity, into two forms. These are the material and spiritual spheres of culture.

TO material culture include the entire area of ​​human material and production activity and its results - tools, homes, everyday items, clothing, vehicles, methods of practical activity to create means of production and consumption, etc.

Spiritual culture includes the sphere of spiritual production (production of ideas, knowledge, spiritual values) and its results embodied in science, philosophy, art, religion, morality, etc.

The basis of existence material culture things are the result of human material and creative activity. Things in their totality create a complex and branched structure of material culture. It contains several important regions.

Agriculture (breeding, plant varieties, animal breeds, cultivated soils). Human survival is directly related to these areas of material culture, since they provide food as well as raw materials for industrial production.

Buildings and structures (housing, offices, places of entertainment, educational activities; workshops, docks, bridges, dams, etc.).

Tools, devices and equipment designed to support all types of human physical and mental labor.

Transport and communications.

Communications (mail, telegraph, telephone, radio, computer networks)

Technologies - knowledge and skills in all listed areas of activity.

Spiritual culture is a multilayered formation. Its basis knowledge, which are products of human cognitive activity, recording the information he receives about the world around him and himself, his views on life and behavior. Knowledge satisfies certain human needs, primarily related to the need to ensure the lives of people in society. For the same purposes, various value systems, allowing a person to realize, choose or create forms of behavior approved by society. Culture is the way and sphere of creating cultural values. The concept of values ​​as an important, fundamental element of culture was first formulated I. KANTOM. One of the founders of the theory of values, in which they are presented as cultural phenomena, is G. RICKERT.

Under values is understood as a life guideline that encourages a person to take actions and actions of a certain kind. Cultural values- a set of historically and nationally determined objects, phenomena, ideas that have social and cultural significance for humans and society. Value is not the object itself, but a special type of meaning that a person sees in it. When a person knows nothing about an object, it has no value for him. The concept of “value” is not equal to the concept of “usefulness” (value can be useless, and vice versa), it differs from the concept of “cost” (value is a monetary expression of value; a penny item can be valuable).

The selection of values ​​in society occurs in the process of practical activity.

The world of values ​​is very diverse. Among this variety, the following can be distinguished: TYPES OF VALUES:

Final values(close concept vital values, from the Latin concept of life) – the highest values ​​and ideals, more important than which there is nothing. This is life, health, happiness, love, friendship, honor, dignity, legality, humanism... These Cs are necessary in themselves.

Economic values ​​– entrepreneurship, the presence of equal conditions for commodity producers, favorable conditions for production, etc.

Social values ​​– social status, hard work, family, tolerance, gender equality, personal independence, etc.

Political values ​​– patriotism, civic engagement, legitimacy, civil liberties, etc.

Moral values ​​– goodness, goodness, love, duty, selflessness, loyalty, honesty, fairness, decency, respect for elders, etc.

Religious – God, faith, salvation, grace, Holy Scripture, etc.

Aesthetic values ​​– beauty, harmony, style, etc.

It is on the basis of values ​​that those that exist today are formed. varieties of spiritual culture: 1) morality, 2) politics, 3) law, 4) art, 5) religion, 6) science, 7) philosophy.

Spiritual material culture is always interconnected, since it cannot exist in complete isolation from one another. Material culture is always the embodiment of a certain part of spiritual culture. And spiritual culture can exist only by being reified, objectified, and having received one or another material embodiment. Example: any book, painting, musical composition, like other works of art, need a material carrier - paper, canvas, paints, musical instruments, etc.

It is often very difficult to understand what type of culture - material or spiritual - a particular object or phenomenon belongs to. Thus, we will most likely classify any piece of furniture as material culture. But if we talk about a three-hundred-year-old chest of drawers exhibited in a museum, we can talk about it as an object of spiritual culture. And a book, an indisputable object of spiritual culture, can be used to light a stove instead of firewood. Cultural objects can change their purpose. How then to distinguish them? The criterion can be an assessment of the meaning and purpose of an object - if an object or phenomenon satisfies the primary (biological) needs of a person, it is classified as material culture, but if it satisfies secondary needs associated with the development of human abilities, it refers to spiritual culture.

In addition, between material and spiritual culture there are transitional forms – signs - material objects that represent something other than what they themselves are. The most famous form of sign is money, used by people to denote all kinds of services. Money is a universal market equivalent that can be spent on buying food or clothing (material culture), or we can use it to buy a ticket to a theater or museum (spiritual culture). Money is a universal intermediary between objects of material and spiritual culture. This is their serious danger, since they equate these objects with each other, depersonalizing objects of spiritual culture.

The expression “uncultured person,” which we often encounter in everyday life, is absolutely incorrect from a philosophical point of view. As a rule, when we say this, we mean poor upbringing or lack of education. A person is always cultured, because he is a social being, and any society has its own culture. Another thing is that the degree of its development is not always at high level, but this already depends on many related factors: specific historical period, development conditions and opportunities available to society. Culture is an integral part of the life of all humanity and each individual. There cannot be a society without culture, just as there can be no culture - without society, it creates a person, and a person creates it. Any new generation begins its existence in the world of spiritual and material assets, already established among their ancestors.

Interrelation of cultures

Any human activity and all his achievements are

are part of culture, either material or spiritual. Moreover, it is impossible to draw a clear boundary between them. Material and spiritual culture, one way or another, are inextricably linked with each other. For example, the wardrobe that appeared in our house is a completely physical object, but during its creation the intellectual abilities of people were involved, imagination and logical thinking were demonstrated. In the same time greatest works arts that are of undeniable spiritual value would hardly have been born if the artist had not had a brush, and the philosopher had not had paper and pen. Even in ancient Rome, the most talented orator Cicero noted that along with cultivation, which in those days meant the cultivation and cultivation of the land, there is another culture - “cultivation of the soul.”

Basic Concepts

Material culture includes all the variety of objects produced by humanity: clothing, housing, mechanisms, weapons, cars, household items, musical instruments, etc. The basis of spiritual culture is the products of human intellectual activity, everything that has been achieved by the power of thought and talent. For example, these are new ideas and discoveries, religion, philosophy, works of art and psychology. If spiritual culture is the totality of the results of human intellectual activity, then material culture is the objective world created by human hands.

Which culture is more important?

Material culture, like spiritual culture, lives according to its own laws; there is no direct connection between the levels of their development. The improvement in people's material well-being was not always accompanied by an increase in their spiritual development, and many of the greatest works of art were created in complete poverty. However, it is also undeniable that a person in need of housing, food and clothing will not think about high matters. Only “well-fed” people who have satisfied their physical needs can be drawn to philosophy and art. Material culture will clearly show how well a person has adapted to life, whether he is in harmony with nature, while spiritual culture sets the basic standards of behavior, forms a sense of the high and beautiful, and creates ideals. Spiritual and material culture include everything that is not given to us by nature, that is created by human labor, that significantly distinguishes us from animals. Only the harmony of these two cultures will help achieve a high level of existence for both one person and an entire state.

Chapter 19. Modern geography of culture

History dates the beginning of modern times from the Great October Revolution socialist revolution, which opened the era of socialism “The victory of October is the main event of the 20th century, which radically changed the course of development of all mankind,” says the Resolution of the CPSU Central Committee of January 31, 1977 (“On the 60th anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution.” M., 1977, p. 3). Under the influence of this revolution, the emergence and development of the world revolutionary process and the deepening of the crisis of capitalism took place. As a result, two systems have emerged in the world - socialist and capitalist. Within the latter, a large group of developing countries was formed, some of which embarked on the path of non-capitalist development; many others strive to limit capitalist features and elements in their economy, socio-political and cultural life.

The geography of the cultural features of modern humanity is primarily associated with this division.

Among the many elements of culture, on the one hand reflecting the differences between countries and peoples, on the other hand, bearing many interethnic features, it is not difficult to identify the main ones: first of all, these are elements of material culture such as tools, housing, clothing, food. However, tools of labor as shifts in production methods are changing particularly rapidly; The types traditional for former HCTs are almost everywhere becoming a thing of the past. As for housing, clothing and food, they most reflect ethnic specifics, and in fact, after tools, they are of paramount importance. F. Engels wrote that “people must first of all eat, drink, have homes and clothing,” without this they would not be “able to engage in politics, science, art, religion, etc.” (K. Marx and F. Engels. Collected works, vol. 19, p. 350). We will begin our consideration of individual elements of culture with those of its material aspects that F. Engels pointed out.

Housing. The construction of residential premises is one of the most ancient and universal labor processes for humanity. The first dwellings for humans were caves or simply rock overhangs, to which stone walls were attached. Until the middle of the 20th century. ethnographers were still able to discover in the forested mountains of Southeast Asia and in some other areas of the Earth a few tribes that continued to live in caves. Artificial cave dwellings are still used in some places by the agricultural rural population. In Turkey they are made in soft tuff rocks, in China - in the cliffs of loess plateaus.

In areas where natural conditions are different, just as ancient history, like cave dwellings, have huts, wind barriers, and in forest areas - floorings in the forks of trees. For some of the most backward tribes in Australia, Central and South Africa, and in some other places, such primitive structures serve as homes to this day.

From these simplest prototypes, a long evolution led to the creation of a great variety of forms of folk traditional housing, highly adapted to the needs of the economy and environmental conditions. Only with the spread of industrial construction methods, first in cities and then in rural areas, did a shift away from these traditional folk architectural forms that had developed over centuries begin.

Currently, only in rural areas sharply different types of housing have been preserved. In cities, industrial architecture, although it adapts to the climate and strives in some places to preserve national style architecture, generally erases local peculiarities in this element of culture between different historical and cultural areas.

Among the peoples of Europe, with all the diversity of traditional peasant housing that exists to this day, two main types can be distinguished. These are frame-and-post buildings with slanting console beams, the space between which is filled with material that does not bear a vertical load - the so-called half-timbered buildings. They are distributed from England, France and Scandinavia to Austria and the Balkans. The second type is a log house made of horizontal log crowns, characteristic of most nations of Eastern Europe(Poles, Belarusians, Russian, Finnish and Turkic peoples of the Volga and Urals), but also known in the Alps and Pyrenees.

At the same time, there are many variants of these two types among individual ethnographic groups (for example, the Russian hut of the Arkhangelsk Pomors has completely different sizes, proportions, and layout than the hut of the peasants of the Kursk or Saratov regions).

It is clear that in capitalist countries to this day there remain huge differences in size, layout, and quality of materials between the house of a wealthy person and the house of a poor peasant. Sometimes dwellings of different social strata even belong to different types (brick house and dugout), but more often they represent qualitatively different versions of the same type.

For the settled rural population of almost all of North Africa, certain arid and treeless regions of Southern Europe, most of South-West, Central and Central Asia up to northern India, it is typical (in a wide variety of designs and planning options) adobe, and sometimes stone or frame-and-post , but a dwelling coated with clay (often whitewashed), with a flat or domed roof.

Here, wood, despite its scarcity and high cost, is used very sparingly, primarily for ceilings, for doors, door and window frames, and sometimes also for internal and corner support pillars. The walls are erected either from stone (where it is in abundance), or more often from brick, usually from adobe or adobe (with an admixture of chopped straw), and among wealthy owners in many areas, from burnt brick.

But the most widely used technique is the adobe technique: clay is compacted between plank formwork, which is then transferred to construct the next section of the wall.

For almost all peoples who lead a nomadic lifestyle or at least retain elements of transhumance livestock farming, mobile dwellings are typical. Among the Turkic-speaking and Mongol-speaking peoples, this is predominantly a frame-felt yurt, and among the Bedouin Arabs, Berbers, Kurds, some other nomadic groups of South-West Asia and the Tibetans, it is a rectangular or elongated oval tent on many poles, usually covered with black woolen fabric . Some other nomadic peoples, such as the Tuaregs of the Sahara, have even more archaic tents with leather coverings.

Nowadays in North, Central and Central Asia, summer portable housing is often combined with winter stationary housing.

Most peoples of Siberia portable housing a conical tent has long been used, and in the extreme northeast - a yaranga with a warm fur inner canopy. Just like the yurt among the peoples of Central Asia, the tent and yaranga are now preserved only as seasonal housing for shepherding and fishing teams, while stationary multi-room houses serve as permanent housing.

In the past, the coastal sedentary groups of the Chukchi and Koryaks were characterized by stationary dwellings, outwardly similar to yaranga, and various dugouts, and for the polar Eskimos of the New World - unique “igloos” - dome-shaped rooms, built like a dugout, but from briquettes of dense snow.

Among the peoples of taiga Siberia, living between the zones of tundra reindeer herding and steppe nomadic cattle breeding, there were widespread various shapes permanent dwellings, which were built from vertically or obliquely placed logs, but retained some planning features of their portable prototypes - tents and frame yurts. Among the Yakuts, such “yurts” with an earthen roof with some features of a Russian log hut have survived in some places to this day. These forms of housing reflect the gradual transition from a nomadic or semi-nomadic lifestyle to a sedentary one.

The Hindustan Peninsula, which, as already mentioned, is a fairly clearly defined South Asian historical and cultural region, is distinguished by an extreme variety of types of housing. There are round and rectangular, wooden, wicker, stone and adobe, ground and pile buildings. This diversity reflects both the diversity of the ethnic composition of the peninsula and the diversity of its natural conditions, and the complexity of the social composition of the population. The same diversity of traditional types of housing is exhibited by the relatively small Caucasian historical and cultural region.

East and Southeast Asia are characterized by frame-and-post dwellings made of wood or bamboo - ground and pile. The first ones are typical for the Chinese, Vietnamese, and Javanese. In northern China and Korea, they have a heater-heated bed (“kan”) or a heated floor (“ondol”).

For most peoples of Southeast Asia and the Japanese, buildings on stilts are typical. In eastern Indonesia, the Philippines, Hainan Island, and some islands of Oceania, in addition to stilt houses, ground huts without walls, with hangar-shaped, low-hanging oval roofs are common.

These predominant building types are complemented by others. Thus, in the forested mountainous regions of the Himalayas and southwestern China, there are also log houses that are externally similar to Eastern European ones, but differ from them in that the roof does not rest on the log house, but on vertical pillars standing outside it.

Along with frame-post (pile and log) buildings, government-owned dwellings are being built in various, mainly mountainous, regions of Europe and Asia (Pyrenees, Alps, Caucasus, Pamir, Himalayas, etc.). Here in some places, especially among the wealthiest owners, two-story houses with a lower stone and upper wooden tiers are common. Such houses are characteristic, for example, of the Tyroleans, many groups of Swiss and Basques.

In sub-Saharan Africa, lightweight wicker or frame buildings with, and often without, clay lining predominate. Huts on stilts are found in coastal areas of West Africa. In the forest zone, dwellings that are rectangular in plan predominate, while in the savannah zone, round ones predominate.

Traditional dwellings Indian peoples of America were previously distinguished by great diversity and a certain similarity with the types characteristic of landscape zones of the Old World that were similar in nature - with the conical Siberian plagues, adobe, log and wicker dwellings of the peoples of North, South-West and South-East Asia and Africa.

Cloth. It is also very interesting to follow geographical distribution such an essential element of material culture as costume. Now almost everywhere (especially among men), its traditional forms are being replaced by Europeanized urban clothing of their own, home, or, more often, factory production. The degree of this repression is related to social status certain layers of society (however, this connection is not always clear-cut). However, still in late XIX V. traditional clothes prevailed almost everywhere in the world (except for the urban population), and to this day it persists, especially as a festive or ceremonial one.

Almost every nation and even individual ethnic groups there is a special version of the costume with unique details of cut or ornament. There are specific costumes that he wears

only one people (kimono - only Japanese, fur overalls-kerker - Chukchi, etc.). But, as a rule, the main types of costume have a wide distribution area, found in one form or another among many peoples.

The modern European suit - jacket and skirt, jacket, shirt and trousers - basically goes back, obviously, to Upper Paleolithic, when hunters in the northern zone of Europe and Asia dressed in fur or leather pants and jackets. IN medieval Europe this type of costume became part of the cultural heritage of Celtic, Germanic, Slavic and other tribes. IN different options it formed the basis for both traditional and non-ethnic “urban” clothing of various European peoples.

However, as we know, the ancient civilizations of Europe did not recognize jackets and pants, considering them barbaric clothing: in ancient Greece and Rome, tunics, chitons, himation and togas prevailed. This type did not survive in Europe, but spread widely to the south, apparently giving rise to different forms of unstitched clothing among many modern peoples Tropical Africa. In Europe itself, a tunic-like cut of a shirt without seams on the shoulders was common among the Finnish peoples, and unstitched forms of women's waist clothing in the form of a poneva were common among the southern Russians, and in the form of a plakhta and spare tire among the Ukrainians. Similar forms of waist clothing were characteristic of many peoples of the Danube basin and the Balkan Peninsula (Romanians, Bulgarians, Albanians, etc.). The combination of a skirt with a sleeveless shoulder vest led to the emergence of the Russian sundress.

As for the “hunting complex” of a jacket and trousers, it was preserved in the fur or suede clothing of many Indian tribes of the temperate and cold zones of North America. Adapting to the harsher Arctic conditions, it gave rise to various variants of the costumes of the indigenous peoples of the American Arctic and Siberia. At the same time, among the population of the coastal and tundra zones, who moved mainly on sledges or by boat (among the Nenets, Chukchi, Eskimos), deaf began to predominate. long jacket with a hood - malitsa, kukhlyanka, anorak. The foot hunters of the taiga developed swinging costumes that were more convenient for walking.

Throughout Central, Central and East Asia, they have long been and to this day exist as the predominant outerwear various versions of a swinging robe without buttons, tied at the waist with a sash, as well as men's and Women's pants. During the era of Mongolian and Manchu expansion, this form of robe among many peoples of East Asia was supplanted by the specific Manchu-Mongolian “deli” with the left half, which has a semicircular cutout at the top and wraps up to the right armpit, with a stand-up collar with small buttons. It formed the basis of various modern forms robe-like clothing from the Chinese, Vietnamese and some other peoples, except Koreans and Japanese. From their northern steppe neighbors, the Chinese and Vietnamese also borrowed pants

Of course, both the robe and trousers changed significantly in the process of spreading to the south: their material became lighter, and their cut became more open, adapted to a warmer climate. The original forms of robe-like clothing, which exist to this day among the Tibetans, Mongols and other peoples of Central Asia , serve people best in the continental, windy climate of this area

The spread of Islam led to the appearance in the East of such humiliating and extremely unhygienic elements women's clothing, like the veil and burqa. Currently, they are becoming obsolete almost everywhere

In the tropical regions of South and Southeast Asia, predominantly unstitched forms of waist clothing developed. Its simplest form, the loincloth, is found among almost all the peoples of the tropical zone of Africa, Asia, Oceania and America. From it come different forms of unstitched or stitched cylindrical women's and men's skirts of various lengths. In combination with a sweater or jacket, they represent the usual type of clothing among most peoples of Southeast Asia - Burmese longyi, Indonesian kain and sarong kebaya and other variants of this costume. A kind of unstitched trousers of different lengths - to the knees, like the Siamese-Khmer panung, or to the toes, like some forms of Indian dhoti - are also an unstitched skirt, the free end of which is passed between the legs.

Specific shape South Asian women's clothing is a sari (usually worn with a scarf and a short blouse-bodice); Basically it is an unstitched skirt, the free end of which is thrown over the shoulder like a shawl.

Another simple form of clothing, found in one form or another almost all over the world, is the poncho, a rectangular or diamond-shaped piece of fabric with a hole in the middle for the head, usually trimmed with fringe or border around the edges. Poncho is common in Southeast Asia, and even more widely among the Indians South America; it is also found in some other areas of the world.

Food.

Methods of preparation and the range of food products consumed are very persistent distinctive elements of a particular material and everyday culture. In addition, they are often in close connection with the spiritual superstructure - moral norms, religious prohibitions, etc. Therefore, acquaintance with what can be called the eating habits of humanity is of great interest.

Almost everywhere on Earth, the food balance is dominated by plant foods. Only among the peoples of the Arctic do meat and animal fat make up more than half of the diet (venison for reindeer herders, fish and seal for coastal fishermen and trappers). But they also widely use berries, stems and leaves of edible wild plants as seasonings. Nowadays, these areas also consume a lot of imported plant products, in particular flour products.

Among the peoples of the desert-steppe regions of Africa and Asia, including those who are purely pastoralists, the diet for most of the year consists not so much of meat as of dairy and store-bought flour and cereal products. Even among the now very rare and small tribes of hunters in the tropical and subtropical zones, for example among the Bushmen, game meat on average constitutes no more than 100% of the food consumed, the rest is obtained by gathering.

Thus, the vast majority of the world's population base their diet on carbohydrate agricultural products - starch and sugar. But they appear in the diets of different peoples in different forms.

Europe, South-West, South and Central Asia are areas of yeast bread made from wheat flour, and in northern Europe - from rye flour.

Bread was historically preceded everywhere by unleavened flatbread. And now this type of food is widespread on the outskirts of the indicated Eurasian area (Scandinavian knatbrot - “crisp bread”, Scottish oatcake, Caucasian churek, Indian chapati).

This large area is also characterized by boiled starchy dishes: porridge (in Western Europe- primarily oatmeal, less often barley, in the East - buckwheat and millet) and boiled dough, especially different types of dumplings, dumplings, noodles, pasta (in Southern Europe). In Southwestern and Central Asia in ancient times, porridges were made from different varieties millet These were the prototypes of today's pilafs. In the Middle Ages, rice replaced millet. Thick barley porridge (tsamba) is popular among the Mongols, Tibetans and the peoples of the Himalayan countries. In the Balkans and the Caucasus, mamalyga is cooked from corn flour, which replaced the more ancient fine millet, and in Italy - polenta. But in Africa, south of the Sahara, in the savannah zone, despite the spread of corn, and in some places rice, different kinds millet remains the main food. Usually, various thick stews and porridges are prepared from them.

In America, except for the Far North and South, since ancient times the main grain has been corn (maize). It is still widely consumed today in Canada and the USA along with wheat and rye bread, usually in the form of boiled cobs, corn flakes and other products. All kinds of corn dishes are also common in all Latin American countries. But there are many specifics in cereal consumption in each of these countries. Thus, among the peoples living on the shores Caribbean Sea, great place rice is used in food, and among the Indians of the Andean highlands - the grain of the local culture of quinoa, etc.

In most countries of South and East Asia, various types of ancient millet crops are almost replaced: in the northern regions by wheat, and in the southern regions by rice. This cereal was first introduced into culture in South Asia, and now serves as the main food for perhaps more than half of humanity. In South-West and Central Asia, Transcaucasia, rice is prepared in the form of pilaf, and in the countries of the Far East it is boiled in unsalted water or steamed (in some cases in the cavity of a green bamboo trunk or in a banana leaf wrapper). Pancakes and dumplings are also made from rice in East and Southeast Asia. Rice consumption area for last years greatly expanded, capturing both traditional “wheat” areas and areas where previously only root and tuber starch was consumed (for example, on the islands of Oceania). In Japan, Korea, China, Vietnam they eat many different noodle dishes. East Asia is the birthplace of buckwheat, but they don’t know buckwheat porridge here, but they eat flatbreads and noodles made from buckwheat flour.

In the northern part of East Asia, at the junction of the ancient Chinese agricultural and pastoral Turkic-Mongolian cultures, there is, obviously, the center of origin of many dishes made from dough boiled in water, steamed or in fat. From here they spread both to the east (to Korea, Japan) and far to the west, where the nomads reached. These are dishes such as Turkic-Mongolian bortsog and boz, Uighur-Uzbek manti and lagman, Caucasian khinkal, Tatar belyashi and chebureks, Siberian and Eastern European dumplings and dumplings

Root and tuber starchy foods are found almost everywhere (fried, baked and pureed). In temperate countries, they are prepared mainly from potatoes. Introduced from South America, they greatly displaced the more ancient turnips and rutabaga in Europe. In the tropics, starchy dishes are made from yams (sweet potatoes) and cassava (American origin), yams and taro (from Southeast Asia), which are now widespread throughout this climate zone. But still, wherever there is rice, roots and tubers are considered additional, second-class food. Legume products - an important source of vegetable protein - are used everywhere in combination with starchy foods: in Mexico, in the Balkans, in the Caucasus - these are boiled beans (lobio) and corn tortilla, in Brazil - beans and cassava flour (tapioca or “farinha de pau” ), in India there are many dishes made from different types of beans and peas with rice and chapatis. In Africa, peanuts are consumed in combination with millet; in the Far East, rice is eaten with soy products - sauces, pastes, soy curd. The starch-rich breadfruit (which spread from Africa and Southeast Asia throughout the tropical zone) and the pith of the sago palm are eaten in the form of flatbreads or porridges most of all in eastern Indonesia and in places in Oceania.

In many countries, sugary foods occupy a significant place in the diet. This is cane molasses in some areas of Brazil; dates in the oases of the Sahara and Arabia and especially in Iraq; juice and pulp of coconuts and bananas in Oceania and Southeast Asia.

Starchy food is bland. To make it more appetizing, sauces, gravies, and snacks with more intense flavors are used everywhere: soy sauce in the Far East, pickled fish sauce and pate in Southeast Asia, chili pepper sauce in Latin America, Indian curry. - gravy with many aromatic ingredients, spicy “adjika” paste in Western Transcaucasia, etc. A similar role in many countries is played by mustard, garlic, partly onion, dill, parsley, and celery.

Many peoples of Europe add spices such as cumin, poppy, and flaxseed to bread products.

Almost every cuisine in the world uses vegetable oils: in Europe, South-West and South Asia - olive, flaxseed, hemp, sunflower; in many parts of Asia - rapeseed and sesame, and more recently sunflower and partly cotton; in East Asia - soy; in South Asia and Oceania - coconut; in Africa - peanut and palm.

The areas where animal fats are consumed are significantly narrower: cow butter in Europe and India; lamb fat - in Central and South-West Asia; seal oil, as already mentioned, is in the Arctic.

A huge variety of vegetable, fish, meat, dairy dishes invented different peoples world, initially served in the menu of the working masses only as a very minor addition to the main starchy food or was used only as festive or ritual dishes. Only in the 20th century. In economically developed countries, there was a shift in the balance of food: the main place in it was occupied by complex, multi-component dishes rich in protein (in particular, animal) and vitamins, and bread, potatoes, and pasta were relegated to the position of a side dish. But even now in developed capitalist countries there is a large gap in the quality of nutrition between those strata of society that stand on the lower rungs of the social ladder and those that occupy its top.

In general, the national specifics of nutrition, varying greatly, are connected both with the natural environment - climate and the range of available products, and with the specific historical destinies of a particular people. At the same time, not a single national cuisine, for various reasons, uses all the potential opportunities provided by the natural resources of the respective countries.

Almost everywhere in East Asia - in the north east of the Mongolian People's Republic, in the south east of India - until recently, milk and dairy products were not consumed (or their consumption was viewed with disapproval). The Chinese, who are not accustomed to European cuisine, also do not eat almost anything that has not been heat-treated, even, say, raw salted herring or lightly salted salmon.

Related information.

Material culture and its types.

Culture is an integral system object with a complex structure. At the same time, the very existence of culture acts as a single process that can be divided into two spheres: material and spiritual. Material culture is divided into: - production and technological culture, which represents the material results of material production and methods of technological activity of a social person; - reproduction of the human race, which includes the entire sphere of intimate relationships between a man and a woman. It should be noted that material culture is usually understood not so much as the creation of the objective world of people, but rather the activity of shaping the “conditions of human existence.” The essence of material culture is the embodiment of various human needs, allowing people to adapt to biological and social conditions life.

Material culture - surrounding a person Wednesday. Material culture is created by all types of human labor. It creates the standard of living of society, the nature of its material needs and the possibility of satisfying them. The material culture of society falls into eight categories:

1) animal breeds;

2) plant varieties;

3) soil culture;

4) buildings and structures;

5) tools and equipment;

6) communication routes and means of transport;

7) communications and means of communication;

8) technology.

1. Breeds of animals constitute a special category of material culture, because this category does not include the number of animals of a given breed, but precisely the carriers of the breed.

This category of material culture includes not only animals for economic use, but also decorative breeds of dogs, pigeons, etc. The process of transferring wild animals into domestic ones through directed selection and crossing is accompanied by a change in their appearance, gene pool and behavior. But not all tame animals, for example, cheetahs used for hunting, belong to material culture, because did not undergo directed crossing processes.

Wild and domestic animals of the same species can coexist in time (as, for example, pigs and wild boars) or be only domestic.

2. Plant varieties are developed through selection and targeted education. The number of varieties is constantly increasing in each plant species. Unlike animal breeds, plants can be stored in seeds, which contain all the qualities of an adult plant. Seed storage allows you to collect collections of seeds and save them, systematize, classify, etc. conduct all types of activities characteristic of cultural work. Since different plant species different relationships between seeds and an adult plant, since many plants are propagated by layering and cuttings, crop-forming functions are combined with the distribution of varieties in a given area. This is done by nurseries and seed farms.

3. Soil culture is the most complex and vulnerable component of material culture. Soil is the upper productive layer of the earth, in which saprophytic viruses, bacteria, worms, fungi and other living elements of nature are concentrated between inorganic elements. The productive power of the soil depends on how much and in what combinations these living elements are found with inorganic elements and among themselves. It is important to note that to create a soil culture, it is processed to increase its fertility. Soil treatment includes: mechanical tillage (turning over the top layer, loosening and transferring the soil), fertilizing with humus of organic plant residues and animal waste, chemical fertilizers and microelements, the correct sequence of cultivation of different plants in the same area, water and air regime of the soil (reclamation, irrigation, etc.).

Thanks to cultivation, the soil layer increases in volume, life in it is activated (thanks to the combination of saprophytic living beings), and fertility increases. The soil, being in the same place thanks to human activity, improves. This is the culture of the soil.

Soils are classified according to their quality, location and their productive capacity. Soil maps are being compiled. Soils are rated by their productive power through comparison. A land cadastre is compiled that determines the quality and comparative value of the soil. Inventories have agricultural and economic uses.

4. Buildings and structures are the most visual elements of material culture (the German verb “bauen” means “to build” and “to cultivate the soil”, as well as “to engage in any culture-forming activity”; it well expresses the meaning of the combination of basic forms of material and cultural development of places - ness).

Buildings are the places where people live with all the diversity of their activities and life, and structures are the results of construction that change conditions economic activity. Buildings usually include housing, premises for monetary, administrative activities, entertainment, information, educational activities, and structures for land reclamation and water management systems, dams, bridges, and premises for production. The boundary between buildings and structures is mobile. Thus, the theater room is a building, and the stage mechanism is a structure. A warehouse can be called both a building and a structure. What they have in common is that they are the result of construction activities.

The culture of buildings and structures, as well as soils, is real estate that should not be destroyed in its functional qualities. This means that the culture of buildings and structures consists of maintaining and constantly improving their useful functions.

Authorities, especially local ones, monitor the maintenance and development of this culture. The role of chambers of commerce and industry, which, being public organizations, are directly involved in this work (of course, where they exist and where they function correctly) is especially great. Banks can play a significant role in this cultural creative work, which, however, do not always act correctly, forgetting that their future well-being is connected, first of all, with the correct exploitation of real estate.

5. Tools, devices and equipment - a category of material culture that provides all types of physical and mental labor. Οʜᴎ represent movable property and differ based on the type of activity they serve. The most complete list of various tools, devices and equipment is the trade nomenclature.

The peculiarity of correctly compiled trade nomenclatures is that they reflect the entire history of improvement of tools, devices and equipment. The principle of culture formation in the development and differentiation of functions and the preservation of early functional analogues.

The difference between tools, fixtures and equipment is that the tool directly affects the material being processed; fixtures serve as an addition to the tool, allowing them to operate with greater accuracy and productivity. Equipment - complexes of tools and devices located in one place of work and everyday life.

Material culture and its types. - concept and types. Classification and features of the category "Material culture and its types." 2017, 2018.

Material culture is based on a rational, reproductive type of activity, is expressed in an objective form, and satisfies the primary needs of a person.

Composition of material culture:

Work culture (equipment and tools, energy sources, production facilities, communication systems and energy infrastructure);

Everyday culture is the material side of human life (clothing, furniture, utensils, Appliances, utilities, food);

Culture of the topos or place of settlement (type of dwelling, structure and characteristics of settlements).

Material culture usually refers to artificially created objects that allow people to optimally adapt to natural and social conditions of life.

Objects of material culture are created to satisfy various human needs and are therefore considered as values. When speaking about the material culture of a particular people, they traditionally mean such specific items as clothing, weapons, utensils, food, jewelry, housing, and architectural structures. Modern science, by studying such artifacts, is able to reconstruct the lifestyle of even long-vanished peoples, of which there is no mention in written sources.

With a broader understanding of material culture, three main elements are seen in it.

The actual objective world created by man is buildings, roads, communications, instruments, objects of art and everyday life. The development of culture is manifested in the constant expansion and complexity of the world of artifacts, the “domestication” of the human environment. Life modern man It is difficult to imagine without the most complex artificial devices - computers, television, mobile phones, etc., which lie at the basis of modern information culture.

Technologies are means and technical algorithms for creating and using objects of the objective world. Technologies are material because they are embodied in specific practical methods of activity.

Technical culture is the specific skills, abilities, and abilities of a person. Culture preserves these skills and abilities along with knowledge, transmitting both theoretical and practical experience from generation to generation. However, unlike knowledge, skills and abilities are formed in practical activity, usually by example. At each stage of cultural development, along with the complexity of technology, skills also become more complex.

Culture and technology

Engineering and technology as terms and concepts. Technology and sociocultural values: the categorical imperative of culture in technical civilization. The essence and values ​​of technology-and-technology. The nature of the connection between technology and nature, society, and culture. Models further development technology. Assessments of technology as part of culture: optimism and pessimism. Model of a new type of person and technical culture.

The word technology (from ancient Greek - skill, art) denotes or defines a set of means created by people to optimize their activities.

According to the philosopher of technology F. Rappe, two types of definitions of the concept “technology” can be distinguished. Technology in the narrow sense of the word is engineering activity, in the broad sense it is any effective methodological human activity. It should be borne in mind that in the Western tradition the concept of technology is closer to the concept of technology or, according to F. Rappe, technology in the broad sense of the word. In the East, the word “technology” means a machine. For example, educational technology is a typical concept of Western culture, but in the East there may be a cultural protest about this: the formation of a person is likened to a machine conveyor belt?!

Why does technology-and-technology of Western culture take the place of technology in the sense of Greek culture? Equipment and technology have existed as long as humanity can remember. Among the diversity of ancient civilizations there is one type of technical toolkit; technology here is something from the periphery of culture. Only in recent centuries, within the framework of the Euro-Christian culture of the West, technique and technology have acquired special meaning. Technology is becoming a universal phenomenon of the modern world, significantly influencing changes in all human cultures. Supporters of technical civilization argue that the origins of modern global problems are not so much consequences last decades spontaneous development of technology, as much as the boundless faith of Christianity in human genius, the Christian idea of ​​a man-god, a co-creator of the God-man. Hence the optimistic opinion about the fundamental solvability of global problems of our time.

The modern understanding of technology suggests several characteristic points. Technology is of artificial origin, that is, it is created by people in the process of materialization ideal models. The technique is rational, that is, it can be reproduced quite quickly in a given community. It has a utilitarian character, that is, technology is related to the practical needs of people and serves to satisfy these needs.

Technology is a cultural phenomenon that exists on the border between nature and culture. Technology is a part of nature transformed by man to influence nature. The social character of technology is given by its dependence on the level of cultural development of society. Technical progress, expanding human capabilities to influence natural processes, entails sociocultural changes. The cultural assimilation of new technological achievements by a specific community is quite complex and time-consuming; the process of assimilation is determined by cultural traditions, including the sociocultural attitude towards the perception of innovation.

Technology is a set of methods for processing and producing objects and things. Technology is a systemic education; it is related to the technology and culture of a given community. Among the characteristics of technology are: rational methods of activity; promoting the development of society; subordination to the dominant values ​​of a given culture.

So, technology is the tools of human activity, and technology is a system of effective methods developed by man for his purposeful activities.

Technology and sociocultural values. In the conditions of modern technical civilization, the evolution of technology, primarily the introduction of new technologies, depends on the sociocultural factors of a given community. Thus, the traditional form of social competition between peoples (“if you want to live peacefully, prepare for war”) asserts the priority of the development of the military-industrial complex. There is sufficient basis for the statement: essential characteristics techniques most often become a reflection of the community's value system. The variability in the use of technology poses the leading moral problem of technical civilization - the responsibility of scientists for the possible application of their discoveries in technology. Hence the categorical imperative of culture in technical civilization: the principles of humanism and ecology are higher than economic efficiency, technical feasibility and political gain. It should be noted that in the known modern science traditional societies technology is always subordinated to the values ​​of life. It is possible that violations of this principle became one of the reasons (or the reason) for the disruption of ecological balance in the local region and the disappearance of civilizations and cultures.

The rapid development of technology, its transformation into a powerful component of modern planetary civilization, brought to life different interpretations essences and values ​​of technology-and-technology. The problem of the consequences of computerization of society and the creation artificial intelligence is one of the most popular in discussions. The controversy between supporters and opponents led to the realization of the need for new research into the nature of the mind, consciousness (spirit) of man. A special place in modern philosophical literature are occupied by works devoted to the evaluation of technology; before designing and financing innovative projects it is necessary to know the totality of consequences of the introduction of a particular innovation. Understanding the problems of axiology of technology at a philosophical level has acquired general cultural significance. In particular, it is noted that perfect planning of technical progress is impossible even in the conditions of a technocratic society, which, as is known, turns the individual into an element of a machine. The position has gained recognition that the criteria for the rationality of planning technical innovation should be developed outside of technical, economic or political factors. The fact is that the sociocultural problem of technology is its use, and technology is used, as a rule, in the interests of a group of people.

Among the leading philosophical problems techniques and technologies refer to the question of the origin of technology and the nature of its connection with nature, society, and culture. Thus, there are concepts about the merger of modern science and technology, in which the property of primacy is given to natural sciences or technology, respectively, technology or natural science is recognized as a consequence. This discussion has a fundamental basis: scientific and technological progress begins with large-scale theoretical understanding or random discoveries, which are then given the appearance of a solid justification. If the latter, then it is possible that after testing the next technical innovation created by inquisitive technology fans at random, there will be no one to justify it. Thus, the action of a life-threatening thing that falls into the hands of a child for whom the whole world is a toy can lead to a fatal result for many. The paradigm of technological progress as a conveyor belt for improving human existence, limitless in its capabilities, developed by European thinking a couple of centuries ago, was based on the ideas of unlimited natural resources and the perfection of man, existing autonomously from nature. These ideas have been refuted by life. Is there a future for a technical person? Is there a future for culture, society, civilization with or without technology? These and similar philosophical and worldview questions give different answers.

For the existence of culture, it is fundamentally important to pose fundamental questions on the problem, indicating that humanity is growing out of technical childhood. In this sense, the need to develop ideals (models) for further development is essential. This problem is normative and brings the philosophy of technology to the level of sociocultural forecast. The traditional model (the model of the scientific and technological revolution) is based on the principles of technological determinism, popular in the West. It is characterized by faith in the limitless possibilities of the human mind, which has solved and will solve any problems of development. General model, dominant in the West, is based on limiting technical projects for reasons of their possible harm. Technological progress is inevitable because it is vital, but technical, economic and political personnel must be educated and controlled by external institutions. This model focuses on the development of sociocultural methods for assessing technology. The constraint model is based on the need to limit human needs and the scope of technological innovation. The limitation criterion proposes a threshold beyond which the satisfaction of needs or the use of technology does more harm than good. Radical (not very popular among sensible people) variants of this model suggest a return to the way of life of our ancestors for all of humanity or the population of the so-called developing countries, where technology has not yet become a necessity of everyday culture.

Technology as a part of culture is viewed in a range of optimistic and pessimistic opinions. The concept of technical (technological) determinism includes opposing interpretations. Technocratic (power of technology) interpretations tend to be associated with optimistic views of the role of technology in culture. Technocratic thinking prefers to explain the negative sociocultural consequences of the introduction of scientific and technological progress by the inhibition of technological development on the part of culturally backward people or groups. Catastrophic changes in the life and culture of the peoples of entire continents, brought about by scientific and technological progress, are hushed up or interpreted differently. An essential component of an optimistic interpretation of the role of technology in society and culture is technocracy - a theory of power based on scientific and technical knowledge and foresight, and the scientific and technical competence of the political elite. The founder of the theory of industrial society, R. Aron, believes that the reality of the modern world is not a collection of different social systems, but a single industrial society with a variety of ideologies. As the industrial component develops, ideological differences will move to the periphery of culture. The contradictions of scientific and technological progress, the culturologist believes, are not an essential, but a temporary characteristic inherent in the initial stage of development. At the next stage of development, in the so-called information society, the negative aspects of the technical environment will be overcome. Pessimistic views, represented mainly by philosophers, writers, artists and leaders of religious organizations, view technology as a threat to humanity. Critics of technical civilization emphasize its mechanicalness, unnaturalness, and the suppression of personality, nature, and life by technology. Pessimists - supporters of views about negative impact technology on sociocultural processes - for centuries they have been calling for a return to traditional types of human economic activity with strict control of the life of the individual by the community. In the last century, a variant of active counteraction to technical culture appeared. Opponents of technical civilization called for organizing a counterculture to fight against the repressive mind of “power-knowledge” and the alienation of man.

Representatives of technocracy - scientists, economic and political leaders - joined in criticizing the negative aspects of technical civilization. They paid attention to ecological problems, to turn a person into a servant and hostage of the spontaneous development of the technical environment. According to scientists, the source of the problem is man’s inability to use technology for the benefit of humanity and nature. It is necessary to form a different interaction between man and technology, a different type of person, capable of integrating with people, existing in unity with technology and nature.

One of the components of the model of a new type of person is technical culture. The technical background of the existence of modern man is the same for all humanity. It assumes two normative parameters of people’s behavior: handling equipment according to the operating instructions and a certain tradition of using technical means. Abilities and attitudes towards work, technological discipline and labor discipline, forms of hard work and work skills are derived from the cultural traditions of society. The conscious inclusion of technical culture in the sociocultural characteristics of a particular community and individual allows us to understand and accept technology as an organic part of human interaction with humanity and nature.