What is included in the sphere of material culture. Spiritual and material culture

Socially transformative activities of people are carried out in two main spheres of human existence. These are:

Activities for the creation and transformation of material objects (material-transforming activities);

activities aimed at transforming, shaping spiritual world person (spiritually transformative activity).

In accordance with two main types of activity, two main interconnected structural parts of culture as an integral social formation are distinguished: material culture, spiritual culture.

Material culture characterizes the process of human activity in the material sphere of society. It is a measure of a person’s essential forces in material-transforming activities, which covers:

a) the sphere of material production;

b) the material sphere of life;

c) transformation of human physical nature.

The analysis of material culture as a social phenomenon is usually complicated by the fact that the difference between material and spiritual culture is always relative. There is no such thing as “pure” material or spiritual culture. Material culture always has a spiritual side, for not a single process in material culture occurs without the active participation of consciousness. On the other hand, spiritual culture always has its material side, material elements spiritual production.

But it is not legitimate to limit material culture only to material objects. Material culture is a characteristic of people's activities to change and transform material social relations.

Material culture is characterized by qualitative achievements, which mean the degree of human mastery of the forces of nature, the perfection of tools, the technical level of production, the skills and ability of people to use technology, the organization of labor, and servicing the material and everyday needs of people. The core of material culture is the tools of labor, which in the modern era are increasingly becoming the material embodiment of the achievements of science; in fact, material culture began with them. A special role belongs to engineering and technology, as well as the means of mass communication, or communication (print, radio, cinema, television, computer and laser technology).

In the broad sense of the word, technology represents the skills and techniques of any activity and coincides in meaning with skill, art (the term “technology” itself is of ancient Greek origin and once meant precisely art or skill). Technology permeates the entire culture and as a term is often used as a synonym for it, for example: sports equipment, construction equipment, musical technology etc. We can say that all material culture is organized or exists according to the principle of technology. However, spiritual culture is also organized according to a purely technical principle. This is also facilitated by the development of means of communication and mass communication, which are essentially means of influencing people’s consciousness, means of manipulating their psyche. Modern means of communication are so developed that they represent an artificial nervous system of the planet, and this makes it possible to manage countries and regions.

The level of culture is also characterized by the achieved skills and knowledge that are used in the process of material production. In this sense, people often talk about the “work culture” of different historical eras.

Thus, material culture can be divided depending on the sphere of manifestation into:

Spiritual culture.

Spiritual culture is the qualitative achievements and breadth of horizons achieved, the introduction into public life of ideas and knowledge characteristic of each era. The totality of spiritual values is usually called spiritual culture. Of course, the distinction in culture between material and spiritual forms of existence is conditional.

Spiritual culture includes all types, forms and levels of social consciousness. At the same time, it cannot be reduced to consciousness, because it functions in society through the assimilation and development of both the ideas themselves and the value-normative aspects of human activity. Raising a certain personality type - the main goal in the functioning of spiritual culture.

The functioning of all spiritual culture is based on the activity of production and reproduction of spiritual values, as well as the activity of mastering these values.

An indicator of the development of the spiritual culture of a particular society is, first of all, the availability of its products to the broad masses. This depends on the number of spiritual cultural values received for distribution, on the number of cultural institutions that organize their distribution and consumption, on the cost of cultural goods and the opportunity to use them.

Thus, it becomes obvious that the possibilities spiritual development human development are associated with material and technical development and vice versa - the level of perfection of material production depends on the capabilities of the spiritual potential of society. Spiritual culture includes, on the one hand, the totality of the results of spiritual activity, and on the other, spiritual activity itself. Artifacts of spiritual culture exist in various forms. These are customs, norms and patterns of human behavior that have developed in specific historical social conditions. These are also moral, aesthetic, religious or political ideals and values, various ideas and scientific knowledge. In general, these are always products of intellectual and spiritual activity. They, like the products of material production, are used as human life activity to satisfy his specific needs.

Sometimes spiritual culture is divided into two spheres:

1) spiritual qualities of a person and activities for their embodiment;

2) spiritual values that have acquired a kind of independent existence in the form of scientific theories, works of art, legal norms, etc.

In spiritual culture, those elements are usually distinguished that are usually called forms of social consciousness. In such cases, instead of the term “consciousness”, use

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 forested mountains South-East Asia and in some other areas of the Earth there were a few tribes who 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 places in 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, in highest degree expediently 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 the national style of 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, Russians, Finnish and Turkic peoples 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 the dwellings of different social classes even belong to different types(brick house and dugout), but more often they are qualitatively different versions of the same type.

For the settled rural population of almost all of North Africa, certain arid and treeless areas of Southern Europe, most of the South-Western, Central and Central Asia up to northern India, it is typical (in a wide variety of designs and layout options) to have adobe, and sometimes stone or frame-and-post, but clay-coated (often whitewashed) dwellings, 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.

For most of the peoples of Siberia, a conical tent has long served as a portable dwelling, 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, various forms of permanent dwellings were widespread, which were built from vertically or inclined 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 the diversity of the ethnic composition of the peninsula, 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.

The traditional dwellings of the Indian peoples of America were previously distinguished by great diversity and certain similarities 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 Southeast Asia and Africa .

Cloth. It is also very interesting to trace the geographical distribution of 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, at the end of the 19th century. 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 have 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 costume - jacket and skirt, jacket, shirt and trousers - basically dates back to the Upper Paleolithic, when hunters of the northern strip of Europe and Asia dressed in fur or leather pants and jackets. IN medieval Europe this type of suit came in as cultural heritage 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, ancient civilizations Europe did not recognize jackets and pants, considering them barbaric clothing: in ancient Greece and Rome, tunics, chitons, himations and togas prevailed. This type was not preserved in Europe, but spread widely to the south, apparently giving rise to different shapes many people have unstitched clothes 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 pants, it was preserved in the fur or suede clothing of many Indian tribes of the temperate and cold zones 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 for various modern forms of robe-like clothing among the Chinese, Vietnamese and some other peoples, except the 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 of women's clothing as 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.

A specific form of South Asian women's clothing is the 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 one simplest form A garment 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. The poncho is common in Southeast Asia, and even more widely among the Indians of 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.

The peoples of the desert-steppe regions of Africa and Asia, including those who are purely pastoralists, have a diet most year consists not so much of meat, but of dairy and purchased 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, various types of millet remain 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 of the Caribbean Sea, rice occupies a large place in their food, and among the Indians of the Andean highlands - grain local culture 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. The area of rice consumption has expanded greatly in recent years, covering 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, such starchy dishes are made from sweet potatoes (sweet potatoes) and cassava (American origin), yams and taro (from Southeast Asia), which have now spread 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 from different types beans and peas with rice and chapatis. In Africa, peanuts are consumed in combination with millet, 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 a more intense flavor range 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” - a gravy with many aromatic ingredients, spicy “adjika” paste in Western Transcaucasia, etc. Mustard, garlic, partly onion, dill, parsley, and celery play a similar role in many countries.

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 that provide Natural resources 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 - part common system culture, including the entire sphere of material activity and its results. The division of culture into spiritual and material corresponds to two main types of production - material and spiritual. The main part of material culture is considered to be housing, clothing, consumer goods, methods of nutrition and settlement, etc., which in their totality, development and use determines certain forms of life. K.m. can be considered as a way of adapting the society to biophysics. environment through its appropriate transformation. K.m. embodies the degree of practicality. man's mastery of the forces and riches of nature. K.m. - the material basis of culture, the achievements of which are inextricably linked with the level of development of K.m. The formation of science, philosophy, art in each era requires certain economics. prerequisites. Historical continuity in the development of K.m. forms the basis of continuity and culture as a whole. I.B. Orlova

Russian sociological encyclopedia. - M.: NORMA-INFRA-M. G.V. Osipov. 1999.

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XI. MATERIAL CULTURE.

If we list the realities that are meant by this concept, we can name tools, weapons, vehicles, clothing, housing, food, etc. This category also includes cultivated plants, domestic animals, methods of body care, tattoos, jewelry, etc. We can say that material culture is a set of things and objects (as well as related skills) that materially exist in space for certain periods of time. periods of time and aimed at meeting the vital needs of people.

The concept of “material culture” covers not only objects related to the sphere of production and consumption, but also the forms of human activity associated with them. The ethnographer does not simply describe a thing, but the research is primarily aimed at analyzing the circumstances related to its manufacture, functions (including ritual); and also - on the characteristics of ethnic specifics and social relations that influence the process of its use in everyday life. For example, an important component of ethnic culture is clothing (costume), which is a complex that also includes shoes, headdress, hairstyle, body care products, etc. The researcher is interested not just in material, color, cut, but, first of all, in the influence of the natural-geographical environment, religious and aesthetic ideas on the costume. Attention is also drawn to interethnic relations and possible borrowings. Finally, clothing acts as a sign. Ways of wearing, color, ornament, combination of jewelry not only made it possible to distinguish “us” from “stranger”, but also carried information about marital status, profession, social status, and tribal affiliation. According to the famous Soviet scientist S.A. Tokarev, “things are of interest to the ethnographer not in themselves, but in their relation to man.”

XII. SPIRITUAL CULTURE.

This conceptual block includes various forms of folklore, ritual activity (customs, rites), ethical norms, aesthetic ideas, knowledge, legal norms, etc. In other words, spiritual culture is information that exists in the collective memory of an ethnos (or part of it) , is passed down from generation to generation by telling or showing and is manifested in certain forms behavior. We emphasize that it must manifest itself materially or tangibly. For example, songs (or fairy tales, proverbs, sayings, etc.) must be performed, heard or recorded. Only in this case will information be preserved and passed on from generation to generation. Thus, in " pure form“The realities of spiritual culture cannot exist.

The thesis about the influence of the realities of spiritual culture on people’s behavior can be confirmed by turning to ritual practice. Even in modern society, rituals accompany all significant stages and events in people’s lives (marriage, birth of a child, labor activity, death, etc.). And the greater the role customs and rituals (see below) played in traditional and primitive societies. Unwritten rules, sanctified by myths, religion, the authority of ancestors or simply older members of the team, have regulated human actions for centuries. Even an involuntary violation of strict prohibitions, for example, eating taboo foods, could cause psychological shock and often even death!

The very division of culture into material and spiritual is conditional.

Firstly, rituals include material components: ritual food and clothing, religious objects, special places where the action takes place.

Secondly, such a distinction is incorrect when it comes to
works of art (for example, paintings, sculpture, etc.,
musical notations, musical instruments, etc.).

Thirdly, the grace and beauty of many folk items (bright festive clothes, ornamented ceramics, decorated spinning wheels, chests, caskets) often allows them to be considered as works of art, highlighting aesthetic rather than utilitarian functions.

Fourthly, objects traditionally classified as material culture in other situations themselves perform ritual functions. For example, a broom, pot, spoon, dough bowl are not just material household items, but also objects of ritual actions associated with fortune telling, spells, wedding and other rituals.

All of the above explains the need to use other classifications, which are also limited in nature, but make it possible to study the whole variety of ethnographic facts. The above-mentioned one is also used, in which the realities of ethnoculture are reduced into two conceptual blocks: material and spiritual culture.

XIII. CUSTOMS AND RITES. GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS.

In the life and culture of any nation there are many phenomena that are complex in their historical origin, the composition of their elements and the variety of functions performed. Customs and rituals are one of the brightest and illustrative examples this kind of phenomena.

According to the most widely accepted definition among researchers, custom- this is an inherited stereotypical way (rule) of behavior that is reproduced in a certain society or social group and is familiar to their members.

Customs as stereotypical ways of behavior are one of the cultural forms of preserving and transmitting traditions from generation to generation. The concept of "tradition" is often used as a synonym for the concept of "custom". But the concept of “tradition” covers a much larger range of phenomena; it includes objects social heritage(material and spiritual values), the process of social inheritance and its methods. Consequently, traditions are inherent in all spheres of social life and all cultures. The scope of custom is limited to certain areas public life(the sphere of behavior).

A rite (ritual, ceremony, ceremonial) is a stereotypical action that is predominantly symbolic in nature. If a custom is all kinds of repeated actions established by tradition, then a ritual consists of a set of conditional, symbolic traditional actions that are devoid of immediate practical expediency. These actions serve as a symbol of certain social relations, a form of their visual expression and consolidation.

Thus, it is a custom for women to button their clothes to the left, because for practical purposes it is necessary to fasten the clothes somehow. And the putting on of robes by judges is a ritual not determined by practical needs, which performs purely symbolic functions - to distinguish judges from the general mass of people in the courtroom, to show their belonging to a certain group.

The purpose of the ritual is not to achieve any material, material result, but to form certain thoughts, images, ideas, feelings and moods among its participants. Consequently, actions become ritual only if they are separated from ordinary material or social practice and acquire the meaning of symbolic actions (which embody certain social ideas, perceptions, images and evoke corresponding feelings).

Any ritual includes a number of symbols. A symbol is a type of sign. It acts as a kind of substitute for real objects, processes and phenomena. But, unlike all other signs, it has partial similarity with the designated object; the choice of this or that symbol is not entirely arbitrary. The perception of a symbol largely depends on specific circumstances, on a specific society and ethnic group. For example, for Christians, the cross is a symbol of Christianity; for a doctor - a symbol of medical care. For a Russian, shaking your head from side to side is a sign of denial; For a Bulgarian, this same action is a sign of consent.

But the symbols themselves do not yet create the ritual. A ritual arises only when the collective action itself acquires symbolic meaning. For example, a banner is a symbol of the valor of a military unit, but in itself does not create a ritual. Only the ceremonial removal of it becomes a central part of many military rites.

An important distinguishing feature of the ritual is that the ritual requires a strict stereotype of actions, strict adherence to the established order, i.e. the ritual is strictly regulated (“regulations” - a set of rules, order of conduct). It is conservative and resistant to external influences. This follows from its essence: actions can become ritual only when their symbolic meaning becomes generally accepted in a society or group. A ritual is impossible without firmly assigning certain symbolic content to certain actions, which is unambiguously perceived by all its participants, and this perception is confirmed by the authority of tradition and intergenerational experience.

That is why customs and, to a much greater extent, rituals have a pronounced ethnic coloring. Each ethnic community As a rule, they have specific rituals that are different from other communities. For example, the Serbs’ farewell to the war was preceded by the following ritual: as soon as it became known that there would be a war, nine old women gathered at midnight and until dawn, in complete silence, weaved linen and sewed one shirt from it, through which everyone who was leaving had to crawl to war. This was supposed to protect them from death. Scraps from this shirt were given to soldiers as amulets. Among other Slavic peoples, those leaving for war were given with them mistletoe, obtained in a certain way, as amulets and amulets (it had to be knocked down from a tree with a gun); or a needle that was bent into a ring so that its point entered the eye, etc. On the Kei Islands, after the warriors set out on a campaign, women return to the house and take out baskets with stones and fruits; They anoint the fruits and stones and place them on the table, saying: “Oh, lords of the sun and moon! Let the bullets bounce off our husbands, brothers, fiancés and other relatives like raindrops bounce off these oiled objects.”

Ritual differences exist even within the same ethnic group (for example, class, estate differences, differences in social groups). Thus, in peasant families in the central regions of Russia, at the birth of a child, parents set up “home” tables and prepared a special “beer” for treating guests. Mothers in labor received gifts from guests, most often money (gold) - for the happiness and wealth of the newborn. To a newborn in a Cossack family, all the father’s friends and acquaintances brought a cartridge of gunpowder, an arrow, a bow, a bullet as a gift; the grandfather gave a saber or a gun. Donated items were hung on the wall in the room where the mother lay. That. the military purpose of the child was emphasized.

The customs and rituals of the inhabitants are being ruined different areas within the same ethnic territory. So, in the Saratov province, on June 30, they celebrated Farewell to Spring: they made a straw doll, dressed it in a red sundress, and put a kokoshnik with flowers on its head. The doll was carried around the village with songs, then it was undressed and thrown into the river. In the Tula province, on the same day, the spell of spring took place at sunset - the villagers went out to the hills, danced in circles, sang songs. Then they sat in circles, exchanged eggs painted yellow, and treated themselves.

Thus, a ritual is a type of custom. Moreover, every ritual is a custom (i.e., a rule of behavior), but not every custom is a ritual. For example, wedding and funeral, Yuletide and Maslenitsa customs are established rituals, because carry rich and varied symbolism. These are ritual customs, or customs-rites. But there are a lot of customs in which there is nothing ritual: the custom of shaving the beard, washing hands before eating, neighborly mutual assistance, uniform inheritance, blood feud, etc.

But it should be noted that it is not always possible to clearly distinguish a ritual from any non-rite custom. Some researchers are inclined to believe that the separation of custom and ritual is purely arbitrary; there is no clear line between them. With this approach, ritual is often considered not as a type of custom, but as part of it, a narrower concept than custom. A ritual is a symbol of custom.

Sometimes the concept of “ritual” is allocated to a separate category, which in this case is defined as a complex (cycle) of customs and rituals extended over time (wedding ritual, funeral ritual, etc.).

XIV. COMPONENTS OF CUSTOMS AND RITES.

Ritual forms (i.e., customs and rituals) are a complex phenomenon, an action consisting of many components. These components can be grouped as follows:

Material component: location, clothing, food, etc.;

A system of certain body movements, actions, postures;

Verbal (verbal) component: prayers, spells, incantations, lamentations, proverbs

Psychological, emotional component - a certain internal mood must be present.

XV. FUNCTIONS OF CUSTOMS AND RITES.

Among the many functions of customs and rituals, researchers identify the following main functions:

1) Broadcast (transfer) of culture within one society and from society to society. The peculiarity of the custom is the denial of more or less significant and rapid innovations. This especially applies to primitive society. For example, as D. Bernau reports, “the Indians of British Guiana display amazing dexterity in the manufacture of certain objects: they, however, never improve them. They make them exactly the same way their ancestors did before them.” Inherited methods of activity include rational and irrational aspects in an undifferentiated form. In a once successful method of mastering reality, precisely those aspects that led to success are not highlighted. Therefore, the slightest deviation from previously repeated actions is considered as jeopardizing the achievement of current goals; The reason for the failure of any enterprise is explained not by the lack of correspondence of means to ends, but by insufficiently accurate adherence to custom. Long-term success of this kind of translation of social experience is possible only with the limited information of social life, with its extremely monotonous course, stability of external conditions that do not require flexibility of the system. But traces of such transmission can also be found in more dynamic societies.

2) A means of social control. The way of life of each people is governed by its prevailing customs. Customs form the value orientations and moral qualities of individuals; rituals act as norms of behavior. But the role of customs and rituals in different societies is different. IN primitive societies it is maximum. The behavior of an individual in such societies is strictly regulated by the social group to which he belongs. It falls to its share only to implement established stereotypes of behavior: in most cases, centuries-old custom has already regulated everything. Therefore, the specificity of custom as a means of social control here is the detailed regulation of the individual’s behavior: “The way in which a person should eat, dress in every circumstance, the gestures that he should make, the formulas that he should pronounce, are determined with precision” /E. Durkheim/ . Contemporaries are constantly oriented in their behavior by the precepts of their ancestors, which are standards for assessing current actions: control is exercised as if from the past. Thus, custom partly takes on the burden of responsibility for the actions taken: “Our ancestors always acted this way.” Echoes of this state of affairs are also found in those societies where the role of customs is not so great.

3) Socialization function. Custom is one of the means of introducing an individual to the culture of a community, educating and shaping his moral qualities in accordance with the requirements of the group. The objects of socialization are mainly children, but to some extent also adults, especially those recently accepted into society. Socialization occurs in two ways: through constant learning of inherited patterns and through special “socializing customs.” The most important stage of the socialization process was initiation - a system of initiation rites that marked the transition of adolescents to the rank of adults, full members of society. During initiation, initiates are visually or verbal form instilled the need to follow the norms of collective life. To enforce certain standards of behavior, initiation rites had to intimidate the teenagers, make a lasting impression, and also prepare them for the hardships to come.

4) Social integration. Customs and rituals support intra-group cohesion and solidarity. On the other hand, they distinguish this group from others. Therefore, this function can be called ethnic: customs and rituals are an ethnic symbol. In this sense, punishments following a violation of custom are a protective means that helps maintain the unity of the group.

Sacralization (sanctification). Customs sanctify various objects and social relationships, both real and imagined. The concept of the sacred refers to something that is an object of intense veneration, respect and is distinguished by inviolability, the violation of which causes severe negative sanctions. The prescriptions of custom can be sacred both in a positive sense and in a negative sense (taboo). The range of objects of sacralization is very wide: plants, animals, natural phenomena, ancestors, leaders, etc. In some respects, custom is an integral part religious systems. But the concept of religious characterizes only a certain degree of “sacredness.” If the sacredness of any precept is questioned, this is an expression of the fact that the custom is losing its force.

XVI. DYNAMICS OF CULTURE

In the consciousness of modern man there is an exaggerated idea of the stagnation of ethnic (traditional) culture. However, in practice it is a dynamic, changing system. It is influenced by various factors.

Thus, we can call the impact of the natural geographic environment. It is the environment that largely determines the characteristics of clothing, housing, the range of cultivated crops, hunting objects, etc. Landscape and soil influence the nature of labor activity, especially in agriculture, the type and layout of settlements, and natural boundaries (rivers, mountains) play the role of ethnic boundaries, influencing settlement and contacts between groups.

Even in the last century, many scientists, paying attention to the coincidence in the cultures of peoples distant from each other, tried to explain this by “cultural diffusion.” A whole direction has been preserved ■ “diffusionism”, which united different schools, between which there were scientific disputes. Despite all the differences, they were united by one thing: the recognition of the spread of basic cultural achievements from one or several centers in which, according to these scientists, unique first-complexes of culture existed. This explained the appearance of the bow and arrow, the wheel, the domestication of animals, etc. in different regions. Such diffusion implies a special role for relocations (migration) and various contacts. This could lead to incredible conclusions. For example, in the 20th century. There were theories according to which the ancestors of the Prairie Indians, proud Apaches, Cheyennes, Comanches, familiar to the reader from adventure novels and American films, were the Mongols, Jurchens and even Scythians known to us. They paid attention to similarities in the methods of caring for horses, in horse harnesses, driven hunting techniques, the layout of a nomadic camp, military techniques, etc. However, in reality, the listed groups had no contacts, and the coincidences are explained by similar levels of socio-economic development, similar economic trends and similar natural and geographical conditions (prairies of North America - steppes of Eurasia). In Ethnography there is the concept of economic-cultural type. It refers to a certain set of economic and cultural characteristics that develop among peoples who are at the same level of socio-economic development and in similar natural and geographical conditions. The Prairie Indians belonged to the economic and cultural type of horse hunters that developed in America in the 18th century. And those communities in which their ancestors were seen were also either horse hunters (in the Middle Ages the Jurchens, “forest” Mongols), or belonged to a similar type of pastoral nomads of the steppes and forest-steppes of a temperate climate. Also belonging to the same economic and cultural type were the Yahi Indians from California, the Bushmen of South-West Africa, and the aborigines of Australia. And without cultural contacts they developed common cultural characteristics. Let us once again emphasize the importance of natural-geographical factors in the formation of economic and cultural types.

Features of the environment influence certain aspects of spiritual culture and the psychological make-up of the ethnic group. This finds indirect expression in habits, customs, rituals in which the characteristics of folk life. Thus, climate-determined cycles of agricultural work in the temperate zone contributed to the emergence of specific customs and rituals unknown to the hunter-gatherer tribes of the tropics. Finally, the geographical environment finds expression in self-awareness, as discussed above.

Interaction ethnic culture and the natural environment has a mutual character. “External” impulses seem to be refracted through the protective mechanisms of culture. The higher its level, the more indirect the influence of the natural environment will be, and, conversely, the more actively the ethnic group itself can change it. Let us add that this is not always for the better: the environmental crisis is closely related to social progress. For comparison, it is enough to imagine the possibilities of influencing the nature of the aborigines of Australia and the environment that developed by the end of the 19th century. Australian (Anglo-Australian) nation.

The dynamics of ethnic culture are also influenced by the ethnonolytic (ethnosocial) environment. An ethnos develops surrounded by neighbors, having contacts with them. With all their diversity, general trends can be identified. Let's look at some of them. Thus, the influence of cultures is reciprocal nature. Even the culture of the Australian Aboriginals influenced the art, folklore, and forms of leisure (for example, boomerang throwing as a sport) of “white” Australians. The latter also borrowed methods of survival in hard-to-reach places, many words and names. To characterize such processes, the concept of acculturation is used. This is a process of interpenetration of cultures, as a result of which they change. IN scientific schools In the West, this term is interpreted as a synonym for Europeanization, meaning the spread of elements of “Western” culture among the peoples of Asia, Africa, and South America. Such a “narrow” understanding involuntarily implies the inequality of cultures.

Long-term interaction of ethnic groups living in the same territory under the same environmental conditions gives rise to similar cultural characteristics. For example, this explains the closeness in clothing, food, customs, and folklore among the peoples of the North Caucasus. This is despite the fact that they differ in origin, language, and religion. North Caucasus, as well as the Volga region, the Carpathians, the Baltic states are not just geographical concepts. These are historical-ethnographic areas, i.e. regions whose population, due to long-term contacts, mutual influences(i.e. acculturation), living in the same conditions, similar cultural characteristics are developed.

Finally, the dynamics of culture depend on the historical experience accumulated by the ethnic group. This is information that is stored in the collective memory of the people and manifests itself in behavioral stereotypes and habits of people. In its preservation, customs, folklore, various types of historical sources play an important role, and in more late time- organized education (for example, school), special forms of storage (museums, libraries, archives), media. The cumulative experience related to a particular field of activity is often called ethnic (cultural) traditions (from the Latin “traditio” - transmission, narration). And the forms listed above (customs, folklore, behavioral stereotypes, etc.) are cultural ways of preserving them and passing them on from generation to generation.

Innovation must be distinguished from tradition. This term denotes new elements (in the economy, material and spiritual culture, social life), which are either introduced from outside from other ethnic groups, or are born in the depths of the culture itself.

“Past” experience helps an ethnic group survive in changing external conditions. It is not without reason that in many traditional societies during difficult periods of history, the desire to more carefully observe the customs of their ancestors, preserve language, folklore, etc. increases. And, conversely, the weakening of cultural immunity contributes to the rapid penetration of destructive innovations. Contacts between ethnic groups are not always progressive, since peoples that differ in their level of development, numbers, and have different political status often interact on the historical stage. For American Indians, Tasmanians, aborigines of Australia and Tropical Africa, acquaintance with Europeans also had tragic results. This is not just about the physical destruction of entire tribes. Innovations penetrated into the Aboriginal culture and destroyed them. The consequence of contacts was the spread of alcoholism, prostitution, gambling and, finally, diseases that claimed hundreds of lives.

The development of ethnic culture is a constant interaction between the old (tradition) and the new (innovation).

Spiritual and material culture are two parts of one whole. Studying one area is almost impossible without studying another. Material culture implies any material achievements of mankind. For example, technical inventions, architecture, household items. Objects of material culture greatly help archaeologists in their work. Based on material finds, they can reconstruct the life of our ancestors, their way of life. Material culture is the most important part of life, which changes and improves every year, in accordance with the development of humanity.

Spiritual culture is also the main indicator of the civilization of people. What does this concept include? First of all, any ideas, discoveries, concepts. For example, spiritual culture includes psychology and various works of art. This definition includes everything that has been achieved by the power of human thought and talent.

Material culture is inextricably linked with the spiritual aspect. Before constructing any building or creating any other physical object, people's intellectual strength and their imagination were expended. At the same time, objects related to spiritual culture are also expressed through material objects. For example, a person created a philosophical work and introduced it to his readers through a book.

The spiritual aspect, like material culture, also helps to understand. First of all, this is the merit of archaeologists who study ancient works of art and achievements of thought. However, spiritual culture is studied not only by historians. For example, ancient beliefs, fairy tales, and legends were carefully analyzed in their works by the father of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, as well as his followers. Spiritual culture allows us to understand how our forefathers saw the world, what their psychology was, which is very valuable for a deep and thoughtful knowledge of history.

What more can be said about these two concepts? Material and spiritual culture existed, of course, in different versions of development, in almost all times. Even ancient people carved drawings on the walls of caves, symbolizing animals, some everyday actions, for example, hunting.

Material culture, like spiritual culture, has experienced ups and downs many times throughout the history of mankind. Priorities also changed. That is, one culture became more important than another. It is interesting to consider people's interest in the spiritual and material aspects using the example of the well-known concept. This famous concept helps to analyze why one aspect of culture becomes more important than another. A person deprived of basic material goods, that is, shelter, food and means to help protect himself, is unlikely to be interested in the spiritual side of life. A person who has satisfied all his basic needs is already drawn to such areas as art, philosophy, and religion.

Material culture clearly shows how much a person was able to adapt to natural conditions. Without this aspect, the existence of a state, and even a person, is practically impossible. However, spiritual culture is also very important for the entire society. Without it, man would have remained a barbarian. Spiritual culture sets certain standards of behavior, forms ideals, and develops a sense of beauty. Without it, no civilization is unimaginable. However, spiritual culture is not entertainment for the elite, because it includes education, cinema, and various books. The harmony of material objects and the achievements of human intelligence helps to achieve high level existence of both an entire state and an individual.