A blow to the genetic memory or language - the consciousness of the people. People's memory and power Historical memory and historical self-awareness

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From the story of a front-line soldier: “When you had to advance at night, so as not to stray from the direction, they lit fires behind their backs.

Discussing the topic requires answering a number of questions. What is the memory of the people in contrast to the memory of the individual? What is a nation and how is its memory formed? What is its role in creating the image of the desired future?

The answer to the first question is usually based on the concept accepted in psychology, according to which the memory of an individual is his ability to retain perceptions and ideas after the moment of experience, and also to be their repository. And if we accept the definition of a people as a set of individuals, then we need to understand how a collective memory is formed from a set of individuals.

From the above definition of memory, its central place in the life of both the individual and the people is obvious, and it is also clear that without the assistance of memory in the process of thinking, we cannot go beyond the objects directly given to us, as well as construct images of the desired future. In connection with the problem of longevity, we can talk about the indefinite preservation of the content of the historical memory of the people. However, to maintain it in a "working condition" requires the efforts of the individual, society or government.

The term "people" can be interpreted in several ways. In ethnic, the most simple, the people are called the socio-biological community of people. The cultural aspect implies the existence of people in a community in which it is customary to be guided by the developed culture and recognized meanings and values, patterns of behavior and habits. In this case, the people are spoken of as a cultural community, for example, superior to others in "civilization" - including the quality of life, degree of upbringing, traditions and behavioral patterns, education, etc. In the case when the people or the authorities consider themselves as a political unity, as citizens, they speak of a nation.

Individual self-consciousness (as opposed to collective) has its sources of personal knowledge and personal experience. Both become memory over time. Individual memory as part of a person's self-awareness is always subjective, primarily due to the inherently unique qualitative characteristics of people. In addition, all together and each individually, people live in the world of culture, are involved in it to a different extent. And here the cardinal question is hidden: how, on the basis of the individually diverse (variable), does that “uniformity” (invariant) arise, which we call collective memory?

The process of creating collective memory is both spontaneous and purposeful. In the case of spontaneity, the mutual “adjustment” and leveling of the memory of many individuals occurs due to the existence of people in the field of culture as part of communities, which implies their free dialogue, mutual influence on each other, as a result of which collective memory is developed.

But there is another way to create collective memory, when individual memory is purposefully transformed - for example, by power. This is a more complicated case: here freedom and chance are relegated to the background, but, on the contrary, a goal is set in accordance with which they try to give a strictly defined (sometimes even contradictory) content to the content of collective memory.

Let's turn to the concept of "power". There are many definitions for it. But if we single out the common in them, then to rule means to make a decision for another. In the case of the formation of a collective memory, the authorities may seek to change the memory of many individuals so that they become owners of a constructed collective memory with a unified content that best meets the goals of the authorities. However, goals may not necessarily be selfish. They are altruistic and kind. However, unlike the process of free formation of memory, in this case the scope of freedom is narrowed or even canceled altogether. What difficulties does the government face in this case?

First of all, this is the original (biological) diversity of people, which affects the content of their memory. Next, when we are talking about the emergence of personal memory on the basis of individual experience, people always deal with a part of some common object (case) and, with a reasonable approach, are aware of partial knowledge and, accordingly, partiality of their memory. They are also ready to correct their individual perceptions and ideas, to give personal experience a holistic and coherent, collective character. But people also, importantly, have the right and expect this to happen of their own free will and through free participation.

At the same time, in the process of transforming individual memory into a collective memory, individuals not only have a readiness to combine parts into a whole, but they are also included in a discussion and competitive process that is opposite in nature. Each individual desires the most complete acceptance of his private and, perhaps, greater adjustment (leveling) of someone else's. This is due to the fact that people are guided not only by individual perceptions or freely accepted leveling collective influence. Through upbringing and education, they are immersed in the world of culture, in the world of meanings and values. The meanings and values ​​of culture change the perception and those ideas through which the individual receives personal experience. And they also act as a support that prevents an individual from correcting his personal experience (personal memory) under the influence of the “averaging” action of other individuals in the process of developing an integral collective memory. That is, in the case of free coordination among themselves of their individual memory, people rely on their cultural potential, compete with it.

It is this natural readiness to harmonize individual parts for the sake of the whole that power uses when it sets the goal of creating a people's memory that is pleasing (convenient) to it. Power, as a group of managing individuals who intend to make decisions for others, seeks to give this process a character that corresponds to its own interests. Carrying out the work of preserving its imperious status quo with the help of the memory, the authorities go further, also solving the problem of developing a common image of the desired future for the community.

Pursuing its goals in the formation of people's memory, the authorities are making efforts to work in several directions. First of all, it needs to change the collective folk memory, which contains knowledge about the past culture. In this memory, it is necessary either to replace the content (perhaps, even partially destroying it), or to give new content to individual meanings and values ​​in culture, or to shift the emphasis, or, finally, to do everything together.

As an example of a partial change in people's memory through a change in cultural meaning, I will cite the case of "reformatting" the image of a famous character in the novel by A.S. Pushkin " Captain's daughter» nobleman Shvabrin. As we remember, when the rebels took the fortress, this officer changed his oath and went over to the side of Pugachev. For Pushkin, Shvabrin is a traitor. But in Stalin's Russia, his behavior was given a different interpretation. It was interpreted as the desire of the best part of the Russian aristocracy to support the people who rebelled against the autocracy. So, one well-known literary critic noted that “on the image of a rebellious officer-aristocrat - probably not without analogy with the heroes of December 14 - Pushkin wanted to substantiate his cherished thoughts about the proximity of the best Russian people not to the imperial throne, but to the masses of the people. "

Often, when creating the people's memory it needs, the authorities need to change people's individual perceptions and ideas, individual memory. Let us recall the story of the reworking of Alexander Fadeev's famous novel The Young Guard. Having got acquainted with real events, as they appeared in the stories of living witnesses of the Donbass underground, the writer created the first version of the novel. She, however, did not satisfy the then party leadership, and Fadeev, in order to please the task set, had to redo the novel, introducing into it the party leadership of the Young Guard that did not exist in reality. Unable to withstand the pressure of the powerful millstones, the writer in his suicide letter reported that he could no longer live his former life and that he did not trust the people of power, “because you can expect even worse from them than from the satrap Stalin. He was at least educated, but these were ignoramuses. My life, as a writer, loses all meaning, and with great joy, as a deliverance from this vile existence, where meanness, lies and slander fall upon you, I leave this life.

Through two procedures - changing cultural meanings and manipulating individual memory - the authorities create their own official history and takes another step towards achieving the main goal - reformatting the consciousness of the people. And not only today, but, more importantly, next generations. This problem is solved in the commemoration procedure. Commemoration is a way of strengthening an old or even creating a new community on new foundations, including the subordination of the people to power based on its needs and tasks, for which new versions (interpretations) of past events, images, personalities are used. That's in in general terms technology of imperious manipulation of the historical memory of the people.

Powerful manipulation of people's memory is one of the modern forms slavery: after all, a person is deprived of the right to make his own decision, to lead himself. This is a crime against freedom and morality.

However, the authorities do not always need to overcome the resistance of the people. Sometimes people voluntarily accept her willfulness. In this case, we are dealing not only with powerful violence, but also with the own immaturity of individuals. Immanuel Kant noticed this when he said that only with the help of enlightenment does a person get out of the state of immaturity, in which he is through his own fault. “Immaturity is the inability to use one's reason without guidance from someone else. Immaturity due to one's own fault is one that is not due to a lack of reason, but to a lack of determination and courage to use it without the guidance of someone else. Sapere aude! Have the courage to use your own mind! - such is, therefore, the motto of the Enlightenment.

Indolence and cowardice are the reasons why so many people, whom nature has long ago freed from foreign guidance (naturaliter maiorennes), still willingly remain minors for life; for the same reasons it is so easy for others to arrogate to themselves the right to be their guardians.

In the centuries that have passed since Kant, this has become evident. Not only education - the starting point of citizenship - is a condition for a person to exit from a state of minority. It must necessarily be accompanied by enlightened civic action.

In the context of what has been said, it is natural to think about the real situation in Russia. The creation of a people with a “new” consciousness and, accordingly, with a new collective memory is one of the long-standing and even traditional tasks solved in our country by legitimate autocratic power, by those who intend to seize it or actually established it. At the beginning of the 19th century, during the reign of Nicholas I, they tried to transform the consciousness of the people in accordance with the formula “Autocracy. Orthodoxy. Nationality". For this, philosophy, in particular, was expelled from universities - the main mentor of man in freedom of thought. The mouths of the daredevils who tried to speak were clogged with censorship gags. Pyotr Chaadaev, the author of "Philosophical Letters", was declared insane, Pushkin's creations were personally reviewed by the emperor. At the end of the 19th century, raznochintsy and revolutionary democrats predicted and actually worked to develop the consciousness of “new people”, with whom the high values ​​​​of culture were vulgarized or discarded. People "from the underground" crowded into the forefront of life, pushing aside the tenderness of the "little people" who had previously ousted the best of the nobles - people of honor and dignity. The Soviet government further labored with all its might to create a "communist man." However, even she failed to unite Makar Nagulnov and Stepan Kopenkin into a people's whole. Modern government does not shy away from such activities. The range of its actions is wide: from attempts to "moral" correction of Russian classical literature by eliminating the "lecherous" Katerina Kabanova and Anna Karenina from school courses to the idea of ​​tearing apart highly professional academic institutions into temporary creative teams.

What is common in attempts of this kind is the adaptation of culture to the momentary mercantile or status goals of power; ignoring the highest social goals - improving the quality of life and the quality of the person himself; absolutization of the role of the administrator-bureaucrat in the improvement of man; neglect and reduction to zero of personal freedom and self-organization of individuals.

Built into the context of cultural development, the memory of the people is the foundation of the desired future. First of all, this refers to spiritual culture as a complexly organized set of meanings, values, ideas and attitudes, developed and assimilated by members of the community. It is formed in common history and is transmitted from generation to generation through the upbringing of children, the education system, religious practices, the work of the media, in everyday relationships between people.

In transitional periods of development (this is exactly what our society is experiencing), it is necessary to understand that not only the state, but also the citizens themselves, recognizing the imperfection of the socio-political, economic and cultural life, designed to tune in to positive change. It is important to treat reality not aggressively and negatively, but creatively and constructively, focusing not so much on the question “Who is to blame?”, but on the question “What did we do wrong and how to redo the wrong?” The living collective memory of the people helps to quickly find the necessary images of the desired future.

The situation with culture and related folk memory in Russia is specific in comparison with other countries. Indeed, in themselves they are a huge wealth that would help spiritualize and help in building a better tomorrow for more than one nation. However, for many, due to negligence, laziness and lack of curiosity, this gold reserve, like fabulous city Kitezh, remains invisible. We are also hindered by innate self-confidence and complacency, which are the greater, the less we are involved in high cultural patterns. As a result, society in a vicious circle reproduces an archaic, extremely centralized, corrupt system of government and public life, and the memory of the people easily becomes the subject of selfish manipulations. Today the past has become a field of intellectual struggle. And often they try to solve the problem either by forcibly imposing the “only true” understanding of history, or by avoiding answers to questions that supposedly “injure” the public consciousness.

Such options for the formation of people's memory are not only flawed, but also dangerous. And not only because it is still impossible to leave vital questions unanswered for a long time. The cultural degradation of the people is more dangerous, since subterfuge and manipulation are impossible without taking the public consciousness beyond the limits of culture, without turning the mass consciousness of the people into a barbaric consciousness, in which we always have true knowledge and are always right “we are heroes”, and falsifiers and liars “they are villains” .

The work to activate the values ​​and meanings contained in the national culture and demanded by modernity should be considered as the most important technology for the creative construction of people's memory, an honest understanding of the present, and the formation of realistic and responsible ideas about the desired future. And this work can be done only through the solidarity efforts of the active part of the thinking people and the authorities equally capable of thinking.

RESOLUTION OF THE ACADEMIC COUNCIL OF THE INSTITUTE OF PHILOSOPHY OF THE RAS

dated 05/12/15 following the discussion of draft documents

“On the program of fundamental scientific research…”; "Plan of structuring scientific organizations"; "About approval guidelines on the distribution of subsidies"

Having discussed the texts of the drafts of these documents, the Scientific Council of the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences believes that they are aimed at a radical change in the organization of science and are unacceptable for two main reasons. First, it is assumed that now the tasks of scientists will be set by a bureaucratic body that is not directly related to science. What to investigate and what discoveries to make in the next year and in the next five years for physicists, chemists, biologists, what to do for sociologists, psychologists, philosophers, now officials, not scientists, should decide. Secondly, it is the staffing. According to the documents, the bureaucratic body-customer, representing the state, will recruit leading scientists every five years on the basis of purely formal, scientometric criteria that are not related either to the preservation of scientific schools or to the creation of points of growth and breakthrough directions in science.

procedural project new Program Fundamental Scientific Research (PFNI) is presented in violation of the current legislation: Federal Law No. 253 “On Russian academy sciences…”, according to Art. 17 of which the draft of such a Program should be submitted by the Russian Academy of Sciences, and not by the Ministry. The proposed structuring plan was created for the PFNI project, which has not yet been approved and, moreover, contradicts the approved and current Program of Fundamental Scientific Research of the State Academies of Sciences for 2013–2020.

The proposed changes, according to the authors of the document, are carried out "in order to develop interdisciplinary scientific research." However, the documents do not provide a clear idea of ​​the nature of interdisciplinary research and their place in the system of organization of science. Interdisciplinary research does not acquire the status of a new discipline, does not imply the formation of appropriate "interdisciplinary specialists" and exists within the framework of special forms of organization that do not cancel or duplicate the existing scientific and organizational forms in which the development of scientific disciplines takes place.

The new version of the PFNI and guidelines for the distribution of subsidies claim to fundamentally change the system of fundamental science management in the country by eliminating scientific self-government and ignoring scientific and disciplinary competencies. It is planned to create a new bureaucratic body with broad powers - a coordinating council for the program of fundamental research, which will determine the priority areas for the development of science, approve the rubricator, the amount of appropriations for the implementation of promising projects, etc. In paragraph "c" § 2 Ch. VIII of the Program directly states that the topics of scientific projects included in the state task will be determined "directively by the budget funds managers based on the significant tasks of socio-economic development."

The content of the Program is presented formally, in the form of a rubricator of areas and areas of available (modern) knowledge, but not key issues requiring research. So, in Appendix No. 1 (Rubricator), philosophy is represented by an arbitrary set of areas and areas of knowledge that do not reflect the entire spectrum of priority fundamental research in the field of philosophy and, in some cases, are poorly formulated. In particular, the enumeration of "philosophy in the socio-cultural and spiritual space of Russia, logic and philosophical languages, philosophical problems interdisciplinary research, issues of social philosophy, philosophy of religions, history of philosophy” demonstrates a purely formal approach to the formation of a rubricator, while in 2014 new rubricators adapted to modern research were proposed in a number of areas of knowledge. These rubricators have been subject to expert and public discussion and have been adopted in detailed and short versions. IN this case such major areas of research in the field of philosophy as epistemology, the philosophy of science and technology, ethics, aesthetics, political philosophy, complex problems of the study of man, etc., completely fall out of the rubricator proposed in the PFNI project. By the way, without taking into account the results of these areas, it is impossible to qualifiedly determine the main priorities in the philosophical and humanitarian sphere.

We are in solidarity with the assessment of the trade union of the Russian Academy of Sciences, according to which the transition to new system the formation of the state task according to the methodology recommended by the Ministry of Education and Science will lead to a reduction in the number of researchers by about 3-4 times (or to a hidden reduction - the transfer of employees to part-time work): within the framework of the state task, salary no more than 30% of employees. Paragraph 7 of the draft guidelines establishes that “the amount of financial support for leading researchers should be at least 15% of the total subsidy”, but this percentage has no rational justification.

Within the framework of the Structurization Plan project, as a “new image of the network of scientific organizations”, instead of intelligible institutions, poorly distinguishable “centers” are introduced - national, federal, regional, thematic, as well as research and scientific. For socio-humanitarian knowledge, ambiguous structures are proposed - “higher schools”. Firstly, we believe that it is categorically wrong to oppose the socio-humanitarian sciences to other types of fundamental research conducted within the natural and technical sciences. Secondly, we believe that the current system of academic institutions has not outlived itself; moreover, it can and should play a decisive role in the modernization of domestic science.

Noting the fundamental shortcomings of the documents submitted for discussion and speaking out against their adoption, the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences supports sound ideas about the need to develop the network organization of science. The institutes of the Russian Academy of Sciences actually play the role of coordinators, network hubs in established, constantly developing and restructuring network relations in the cultural and humanitarian field. No network is possible without reference points that play the role of network nodes. This role should be maintained, supported and strengthened in the light of the ideas and requirements of the documents submitted for discussion. It is and only the existing academic institutions, with appropriate internal reorganization, that can successfully play the role of such nodes. This follows from the gigantic personnel potential that they have accumulated and is confirmed by all recognized ratings and monitoring of publication activity. They are able to organize - and in fact have been doing this for a long time - scientific research at all levels, from the highest (world) academic to the level of popularization of science; play the role of a dessiminator (network distributor) of experience and knowledge through a wide network of horizontal links with universities and other academic institutions; conduct a wide popularization work, through lectures and other types of network work with a wide audience.

It is quite obvious that the implementation of the measures proposed in the documents will not only not bring any benefit to Russian science, the state and society, but will have extremely detrimental social and cultural consequences, seriously and for a long time will disrupt the work of academic institutions. The proposed changes are aimed at strengthening centralization and bureaucratic control where autonomy, self-management and minimization of administrative costs are required. The time has come to abandon administrative-command methods in the management of science and fundamentally change the very style of communication with scientists.

The resolution was adopted unanimously at a meeting of the Academic Council on May 12, 2015.

The end of the twentieth century provided the republics of the former USSR with a historic opportunity to gain freedom and restore national statehood. The reassessment of the value system, the growing interest in the past, the culture of peoples, in the formation and development of national self-consciousness led to the actualization of historical memory in the mass consciousness.

The need to study ethnosocial memory is largely due to the fact that this phenomenon itself is extremely ambiguous. On the one hand, it can be used to incite ethnic and group hostility, the emergence of interethnic tension, on the other hand, to strengthen good neighborliness and cooperation between peoples. The inconsistency of the manifestation of ethno-social memory is due to the bias of this phenomenon: power structures, various political, social groupings always strive to impose their own understanding of historical memory on society.

Appeal to the memory of the historical, social past is important need society, as it also contains a great educational potential. Historical memory ensures the connection of generations, their continuity, creates conditions for communication, mutual understanding and certain forms of cooperation between people in various spheres of social activity.

Social memory is a complex and multicomponent phenomenon (historical memory of the people, cultural memory, political memory, etc.), which is a prerequisite for the existence of society, is based on the accumulation, storage and transmission of socially significant information. Ethnosocial memory, as a subsystem of social memory, determines specific form accumulation and translation of socio-ethnic experience.

The ethnic factor is one of the determinants of social memory. The ethnic component of social memory can only be discussed in the case when ideas, knowledge, assessments of the historical past by an individual, group, society are based on events, phenomena that reflect their specific ethnic specificity.

The formative factor of ethnosocial memory is that the latter acts as a way of fixing, preserving and transmitting information from the accumulated experience of the national community both within the same generation and between successive generations. The factor of translation of ethnosocial memory is very significant, but the importance of the accumulative function , its role as a synthesizer of socio-cultural experience.

As an initial definition in the study of the ethnic determination of socio-memory, we use the following: the component of the content of ethno-social memory is facts, plots that characterize the originality of the historical path of the people, the totality of cultural and material values ​​that underlie ethnic identification.

The main functional characteristic of ethnosocial memory is the preservation and transmission of the self-identity of the national community. The information accumulated by ethno-social memory through the institution of upbringing and education, the mechanism of social inheritance is transmitted from one generation to another, and this is what ensures the self-identity of the national community.

Ethno-social memory is one of the most complex socio-psychological formations in the system of the spiritual image of the nation. Being deposited layer by layer in language, culture, customs, rituals, psychology, ethnosocial memory makes itself felt in ideas about native land, in the awareness of national interests, the attitude of the people to material and spiritual values. Ethno-social memory reflects both heroic and dramatic events in history as national pride and national grievances.

Ethno-social memory can be represented as the "core", the center of the spiritual image of the nation. In studies of complex evolutionary systems within the framework of synergetics, scientists noted that information about the system's past is usually stored in its central part. Ethno-social memory is a kind of "national genetic code" that stores information about the history, stages of development, conditions of existence and the ethnic potential of the nation. Encoding the cultural and social experience of an ethnic group in memory is a multifaceted process. It takes place both in the sphere of intellectual and spiritual, and in material and production activities. The components of culture, in order to become part of the core of the spiritual image of the nation - the cultural gene pool of the people - must pass the test of time, become values ​​for the community. In the event of the destruction of this "national genetic" code, similar to the processes of violation of human heredity, we can talk about the disappearance of the ethnic community

In turn, ethnosocial memory can be modeled as an integral two-component phenomenon, consisting of an ethnic core and a social belt. The first component contains the "original substrate" of the ethnos, i.e. those elements that laid the foundation for the ethnic community as a special integrity. The ethnic core is highly stable and has little variability. If the ethnic core includes both the memory of sociobiological and the memory of historical development, then the social belt is limited only by the memory of historical development. This social belt performs the function of an "information filter" of the national community, passing through itself numerous information flows, selects information that is significant and valuable for this community.

In other words, the ethnic core of ethnosocial memory stores a certain set of ethnic parameters, and their use serves as a means of self-identification, demonstrating one's belonging to a given ethnic group. Another thing is the social belt of this phenomenon, since for its existence it is not so much diachronic, but synchronous connections that are important.

The social memory of peoples is often limited by the personal experience of different generations. People usually are not able to remember as the most important those events that took place before the beginning of their lives.

The promotion of the ethnic component to the center of ethno-social memory does not indicate the primacy, relatively speaking, of ethnic memory over social memory in this phenomenon, but that the ethnic side of national memory is much more stable.

During periods of socio-cultural crises, the rise of national movements, historical experience and knowledge are updated, historical peoples. In ethno-social memory, social groups and social movements find substantiation and support for their national demands. However, the appeal to ethno-social memory is not due to the phenomenon of memory itself, but primarily to specific national interests. Different political and social forces see in historical memory what they want to see. National memory is always selective, because there is a subjective factor here, i.e. facts and events are reproduced through the prism of the interests of the individual, various social groups.

When considering the role and place of ethno-social memory in modern national processes, objective problems are exposed that have not yet received a specific interpretation. First of all, this is the problem of the “volume” of historical memory: what to “take” from the past, how to approach the assessment of critical events in the life of one or another ethnic community. There is, perhaps, no such people, whose fate developed safely and happily, in whose history there would be no interstate wars and interethnic conflicts, injustices and insults. Appeal to historical heritage puts an urgent need to restore the real equality of the rights of all peoples to manifest in various forms ah his historical memory. Analysis of the events of the past should be carried out from the standpoint of national tolerance. This means, first of all, determining what, in the course of historical contacts, enriched peoples, brought them closer, and not what separated and quarreled them. Apparently, the expedient path is the cultivation of a complete, truthful, concrete history not as the memory of only one people, but also as the memory of all peoples.

In recent years, the memory of historical events and phenomena of the past has become a powerful source for public sentiment, the expression of the national identity of peoples. The use of the potential of the ethno-social memory of each nation, accumulated by national self-consciousness, the activation of this potential for the benefit of progress is a complex and responsible task of society.

FOREWORD

The manual presents a picture of the evolution of historical knowledge, the formation of the latter as scientific discipline. Readers can get acquainted with various forms of knowledge and perception of the past in their historical development, enter the course of modern controversy about the place of history in society, focus on an in-depth study of key problems in the history of historical thought, features of various forms of historical writing, the emergence, distribution and change of research settings , formation and development of history as an academic science.

Today, ideas about the subject of the history of historiography, the model of historical and historiographical analysis, and the very status of the discipline have changed significantly. The so-called problematic historiography recedes into the background, the emphasis is shifted to the study of the functioning and transformation of historical knowledge in the sociocultural context. The manual shows how the forms of knowledge of the past changed in the course of the development of society, being in relationship with the fundamental features of a particular type of cultural and social organization of society.

The manual consists of nine chapters, each of which is devoted to a separate period in the development of historical knowledge - from the origins in the culture of ancient civilizations to the present (the turn of the 20th - 21st centuries). Particular attention is paid to the relationship of history with other areas of knowledge, the most common conceptual models of historical development, the principles of analysis of historical sources, the social functions of history, and the specific features of historical knowledge.

INTRODUCTION

This guide is based on training course"History of historical science", or - more precisely - "History of historical knowledge", the content of which is determined modern understanding nature and functions of historical knowledge.

The methodological foundations of the course are determined by a number of ideas put forward in the course of the controversy about the nature of humanitarian knowledge.

Firstly, it is a statement of the specifics of historical knowledge and the relativity of the criteria of truth and reliability in historical research. The relativity of historical knowledge is predetermined by a number of factors, primarily by the initial ambiguity of the three main components of historical research: historical fact, historical source, and method of historical research. Trying to find out the "objective truth" about the past, the researcher becomes a hostage of both his own subjectivity and the "subjectivity" of the evidence that he subjects to the rational analysis procedure. The limits and possibilities of historical knowledge are outlined both by the incompleteness of the surviving evidence, and the lack of guarantees that the reality reflected in these evidence is a reliable image of the era under study, and, finally, by the intellectual tools of the researcher. The historian always, voluntarily or involuntarily, turns out to be subjective in his interpretation of the past and its reconstruction: the researcher interprets it based on the conceptual and ideological constructions of his own era, guided by personal preferences and the subjective choice of certain intellectual models. Thus, historical knowledge and the image of the past it offers are always subjective, partial in their fullness, and relative in their truth. Recognition of one's own limitations, however, does not prevent historical scientific knowledge from being rational, having its own method, language and social significance 1 .

Secondly, the originality of the subject and methods of historical research, and hence of historical knowledge in general, is of fundamental importance. In the process of the formation of historical science, the understanding of the subject and tasks of research has undergone significant changes. Modern practice historical research recognizes not only the breadth of its field, but also the possibility of different approaches to the study of past phenomena and their interpretation. From empirical science, the main purpose of which was the study of events, primarily politically significant, fixing milestones in the development of state formations and causal relationships between individual facts, history has evolved into a discipline that studies society in its dynamics. In the historian's field of vision wide circle phenomena - from the economic and political life of the country to the problems of private existence, from climate change to the identification of people's ideas about the world. The subject of study is events, models of people's behavior, systems of their values ​​and motivations. Modern history is the history of events, processes and structures, the private life of a person. Such a diversification of the research field is due to the fact that, regardless of the preferences of specific research areas, the object of historical knowledge is a person whose nature and behavior are diverse in themselves and can be considered from different angles and relationships. History turned out to be the most universal and capacious of all the humanitarian disciplines of the new time, its development was not only accompanied by the emergence of new areas of scientific knowledge - sociology, psychology, economics, etc., but was associated with borrowing and adapting their methods and problems to their own tasks. The breadth of historical knowledge justifiably raises doubts among researchers about the legitimacy of the existence of history as a self-sufficient scientific discipline. History, both in content and in form, was born in integral interaction with other areas of the study of reality (geography, description of peoples, etc.) and literary genres; having been constituted as a special discipline, it was again included in the system of interdisciplinary interaction.

Thirdly, historical knowledge is not now, and never was before, from the moment of its formation, a purely academic or intellectual phenomenon 1 . Its functions are distinguished by a wide social coverage, one way or another, are reflected in critical areas social consciousness and social practices. Historical knowledge and interest in the past are always conditioned by problems relevant to society.

That is why the image of the past is not so much recreated as created by descendants, who, positively or negatively evaluating their predecessors, thus justify their own decisions and actions. One of the extreme forms of updating the past is the anachronistic transfer to previous eras of ideological constructions and schemes that dominate the political and social practice of the present. But not only the past becomes a victim of ideologies and anachronisms - the present is no less dependent on the image of its own history shown to it. Historical picture, offered to society as its "genealogy" and significant experience, is a powerful tool for influencing social consciousness. The attitude to one's own historical past, which dominates in society, determines its idea of ​​itself and knowledge of the tasks of further development. Thus, history, or a picture of the past, is part of social consciousness, an element of political and ideological ideas, and the source material for determining the strategy of social development. Without history, in other words, it is impossible to form a social identity and an idea of ​​one's prospects either for an individual community or for humanity as a whole.

Fourth, historical knowledge is a functionally important element of social memory, which in turn is a complex multi-level and historically changeable phenomenon. In particular, in addition to the rational tradition of preserving knowledge of the past, there is a collective social memory, as well as family and individual memory, to a large extent based on the subjective and emotional perception of the past. Despite the differences, all types of memory are closely related, their boundaries are conditional and permeable. Scientific knowledge influences the formation of collective ideas about the past and, in turn, is influenced by mass stereotypes. The historical experience of society was and in many respects remains the result of both a rational understanding of the past and its intuitive and emotional perception.

The didactic and pedagogical goals of the course are determined by a number of considerations.

Firstly, the need to introduce into the practice of specialized humanitarian education a course that updates the previously studied material. This actualization of the material not only emphasizes the most important information blocks, but also introduces its driving mechanism into the knowledge system - the method of studying the past. Acquaintance with the technique of historical knowledge provides a practical opportunity to understand and feel the most important immanent feature of historical knowledge - a paradoxical combination of objectivity and conventionality in it.

Secondly, this course, demonstrating the strength and weakness of historical knowledge, its multilevel nature and dependence on the cultural context, in fact, carries out desacralization " scientific picture historical past." It reflects the coordinates denoting the boundaries of historical research, its social functions and the possibility of influencing the public consciousness. It can be said that the main pedagogical goal of this course is the awakening of healthy skepticism and a critical attitude towards many seemingly obvious assessments of the past and definitions of the patterns of social development.

The construction of the course follows the logic of the historical development of the object of study - historical knowledge - from archaic antiquity to the present day, in the context of society and culture. The course examines the main forms and levels of historical knowledge: myth, mass perception of the past, rational knowledge (philosophy of history), academic historicism, historical sociology, cultural studies, and the latest trends in historical research. The objective of the course is to demonstrate the fact of the diversity and variability of the forms of cognition of the past in historical and civilizational perspectives. The perception and knowledge of the past, as well as the assessment of its significance for the present, were different among the people of ancient Rome, the inhabitants of medieval Europe and representatives of industrial society. Historical consciousness differs no less significantly in the cultural traditions of European and Eastern civilizations. A significant part of the course is devoted to the analysis of the formation of national historical knowledge and, above all, to a comparison of the development paths and mechanisms of interaction between Russian and European traditions.

In addition to the historical, the course has a structural component, focuses on the main categories and concepts of historical knowledge, such concepts as "history", "historical time", "historical source", "historical truth" and "historical pattern". The course shows the complex structure of historical knowledge, in particular, the differentiation of the scientific rational tradition and the mass irrational perception of the past, as well as their interaction. One of the most significant is the topic of formation historical myths and prejudices, their rooting in the mass consciousness and influence on political ideology.

Chapter 1. WHAT IS HISTORY

The arguments that a person comes up with on his own usually convince him more than those that come to the mind of others.

Blaise Pascal

Terms and issues

The word "history" in most European languages ​​has two main meanings: one of them refers to the past of mankind, the other - to the literary and narrative genre, a story, often fictional, about certain events. In the first sense, history means the past in the broadest sense - as a set of human deeds. In addition, the term "history" indicates knowledge about the past and denotes the totality of social ideas about the past. Synonyms of history in this case are the concepts of "historical memory", "historical consciousness", "historical knowledge" and " historical science».

The phenomena denoted by these concepts are interconnected, and it is often difficult, almost impossible, to draw a line between them. However, in general, the first two concepts are more indicative of a spontaneously formed image of the past, while the last two imply a predominantly purposeful and critical approach to its cognition and evaluation.

It is noteworthy that the term "history", which implies knowledge of the past, retains to a large extent its literary meaning. Knowledge of the past and the presentation of this knowledge in a coherent oral or written presentation always involves a story about certain events and phenomena, revealing their formation, development, internal drama and significance. History as a special form of human knowledge was formed within the framework of literary creativity and keeps in touch with him to this day.

historical sources diverse in nature: these are written monuments, oral traditions, works of material and artistic culture. For some eras, this evidence is extremely scarce, for others it is abundant and heterogeneous. However, in any case, they do not recreate the past as such, and their information is not direct. For posterity, these are only fragments of a lost forever picture of the past. To recreate historical events, information about the past must be identified, deciphered, analyzed and interpreted. Cognition of the past is connected with the procedure of its reconstruction. A scientist, as well as any person interested in history, does not simply investigate some object, but, in essence, recreates it. This is the difference between the subject of historical knowledge and the subject of exact sciences, where any phenomenon is perceived as an unconditional reality, even if it has not been studied and explained.

Historical knowledge was formed in antiquity in the process of development of society and social consciousness. The interest of the community of people in their past has become one of the manifestations of the tendency towards self-knowledge and self-determination. It was based on two interrelated motives - the desire to preserve the memory of oneself for posterity and the desire to understand one's own present by referring to the experience of ancestors. different eras and different civilizations throughout the history of mankind have shown interest in the past, not only in different forms, but also in different degrees. The general and fair judgment of modern science can be considered the assumption that only in European culture, which has its origins in Greco-Roman antiquity, did the knowledge of the past acquire exceptional social and political significance. All eras of the formation of the so-called Western civilization - antiquity, the Middle Ages, modern times - are marked by the interest of society, its individual groups and individuals in the past. The ways of preserving the past, studying it and telling about it changed in the process of social development, only the tradition to look in the past for answers to the pressing questions of the present remained unchanged. Historical knowledge was not just an element European culture, but one of the most important sources of its formation. Ideology, value system, social behavior developed in accordance with the way contemporaries understood and explained their own past.

From the 60s. 20th century historical science and historical knowledge as a whole are going through a turbulent period of breaking the traditions and stereotypes that were formed in the new European society during the 18th-19th centuries. During recent decades not only new approaches to the study of history appeared, but also the idea arose that the past could be interpreted endlessly. The idea of ​​the multi-layered past suggests that there is no single history, there are only many separate “stories”. A historical fact acquires reality only to the extent that it becomes part of human consciousness. The plurality of "stories" is generated not only by the complexity of the past, but also by the specifics of historical knowledge. The thesis that historical knowledge is unified and has a universal set of methods and tools for cognition was rejected by a significant part of the scientific community. The historian is recognized the right to personal choice, both the subject of research and intellectual tools.

Two questions are most essential to contemporary discussions about the meaning of history as a science. Is there a single past about which the historian must tell the truth, or does it break up into an infinite number of "stories" to be interpreted and studied? Does the researcher have the opportunity to comprehend the true meaning of the past and tell the truth about it? Both questions concern the cardinal problem of the social purpose of history and its "benefit" for society. Thinking about how historical research can be used by society in the modern, complex, changing world forces scientists to return again and again to the analysis of the mechanisms of historical consciousness, to seek an answer to the question: how and for what purpose did people of previous generations study the past. The subject of this course is history as a process of knowing the past.

historical consciousness and historical memory

History as a process of knowing the past, including the selection and preservation of information about it, is one of the manifestations of social memory, the ability of people to store and comprehend their own experience and the experience of previous generations.

Memory is considered as one of the most important qualities of a person, which distinguishes him from animals; it is a meaningful attitude to one's own past, the most important source of personal self-awareness and self-determination. A person deprived of memory loses the opportunity to understand himself, to determine his place among other people. Memory accumulates a person's knowledge of the world, various situations in which he may find himself, his experiences and emotional reactions, information about proper behavior in everyday and emergency conditions. Memory differs from abstract knowledge: it is knowledge personally experienced and felt by a person, his life experience. Historical consciousness - the preservation and comprehension of the historical experience of society - is its collective memory.

Historical consciousness, or the collective memory of society, is heterogeneous, just like the individual memory of a person. Three circumstances are important for the formation of historical memory: oblivion of the past; various ways interpretations of the same facts and events; the discovery in the past of those phenomena, the interest in which is caused by the actual problems of current life.

The article contains a brief insight into the history of Russia in the context of the formation of the spiritual values ​​of the people. affects the relationship between church and state. HISTORICAL MEMORY IS THE BASIS FOR THE FORMATION OF THE NATIONAL SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS OF THE PEOPLE

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Historical memory as a basis for preservation

Spiritual and cultural traditions of the people.

Who am I? What is the meaning of my life? Every person asks himself this question sooner or later. To get an answer to it, you need to look into the annals of historical memory, because the life of every person bears the imprint of the history of his people, his country.

What is "historical memory"? Currently, there is no unambiguous definition of this term.In general, historical memory can be defined as the ability of social actors to preserve and transmit from generation to generation knowledge about past historical events (about historical figures bygone eras, oh national heroes and apostates, about the traditions and collective experience of the development of the social and natural world, about the stages that this or that ethnic group, nation, people went through in its development.)

It is important that historical memory is the basis of the spiritual and cultural continuity of generations.

One of the main structural components of historical memory, contributing to the most complete inheritance of historical experience, are traditions. They define specific interpersonal relationships, performing an organizing function, expressed not only through the norms of behavior, rituals, customs, but also through the distribution system social roles, social stratification of society. This was especially pronounced during periods of social instability in Russian society, whether Time of Troubles or Perestroika, the Decembrist Revolt or the revolutionary upheavals of the early 20th century, when the shaken state foundations replaced folk traditions- they organized, rallied society, gave the government the ground for transformation. A striking example of this is the activities of the Second - Nizhny Novgorod militia, led by Kuzma Minin and Dmitry Pozharsky, who took responsibility for the fate of Russia during the difficult period of the Time of Troubles. The Council of All the Earth, created by them in Yaroslavl, became a de facto people's government in 1612, and the subsequent election of Mikhail Romanov, the first representative of the new ruling dynasty, Zemsky Sobor 1613 is nothing but a manifestation of the veche traditions of the Russian people.

The power of tradition is evident throughout the centuries-old history of Russia.

So, after the Decembrist uprising, which shook the foundations of autocracy and split the Russian elite, the state needed an idea that would unite society on the original Russian principles. This idea took shape in the so-called Theory of Official Nationality, developed by the Minister of Public Education, Count Sergei Semenovich Uvarov. “Autocracy, Orthodoxy, Nationality” - these three whales have become an expression of the essence of state ideology for almost a century Russian Empire, which reflected the unity of the tsar and the people, as well as the Orthodox faith as a guarantee of family and social happiness.

Today at Russian Federation in accordance with article 13, paragraph 2 of the Constitution, there is not and cannot be any single ideology. But Russian society cannot live without a unifying idea, and where there is no official, clearly defined idea, there is a ground for many unofficial destructive aggressive and even extremist ideologies. And today we see how this national idea, which is based on patriotism, as the eternal traditional true value of our national self-consciousness. Patriotism - thanks to which in 1380. the Horde hordes were defeated on the Kulikovo field, and in 1612 the interventionists were expelled from the Moscow Kremlin, in 1812 the army of “twelve languages” was destroyed, and, finally, the Wehrmacht troops were defeated near Moscow in December 1941, and in 1943 near Stalingrad and Kursk. For us, adults, all these victories have become the core basis for the formation of personality and citizenship. But how to make it so that in today's concrete historical conditions, when the Western media are making gross attempts to falsify history, in particular, belittling the role of the USSR in the victory over fascism, criticizing and denigrating the military actions of the Russian armed forces in Syria, there is propaganda of Western values ​​and direct their imposition on the younger generation, how to make sure that the consciousness of our children and their value world are formed under the influence of historical memory based on true values patriotism and citizenship? What forms of methods should be used for this? The answer is simple: it is necessary to have additional resources in order to acquaint children with the events of our history, not only in the classroom, but also outside of school hours. In our school, the museum of the history of the school, created by the hands of students and teachers in December 2011, has become such a resource center. The museum has two expositions. The first is dedicated to the harsh years of the Great Patriotic War, when evacuation hospital No. 5384 was located within the walls of the school, the second tells about postwar years, about the life and achievements of students, as well as the participation of our graduates in the Afghan and Chechen wars. On the Day of Aleksin's liberation from the Nazi invaders, the Day of the Internationalist Warrior and the Day of Victory, lectures are held in the museum. For this purpose, a lecture group was created. From lectures, students learn about the exploits of school graduates and teachers, about the achievements of children who study nearby, about the school, the walls of which are living history, because they keep traces of bomb explosions during the Great Patriotic War. And every time, peering into the faces of the children during lectures, seeing how the mischievous people quiet down and tears begin to shine in wide-open eyes, and during a minute of silence, heads drop as if on command, I want to believe that historical memory is doing its important job - helping to educate patriots.

For several years we have been participating in the Museum Marathon. Excursion trips have a strong impact on the emotional sphere of the children, allow you to directly come into contact with history, feel its spirit. So, we visited the village of Savino, Zaoksky district - the Museum of Vsevolod Fedorovich Rudnev - the commander of the legendary cruiser Varyag.

We visited the museum - the estate of the counts Bobrinsky in the city of Bogoroditsk, visited the legendary park created by the hands of the first Russian agronomist Andrei Timofeevich Bolotov.

The trip to Yasnaya Polyana, contact with the life of Leo Tolstoy also left an unforgettable impression on the guys.

In September of this year, the ninth-graders of our school made a sightseeing trip to Moscow at VDNKh, where they visited the Historical Park and one of its expositions - The Romanovs.

History is not only wars, upheavals and revolutions - it is, first of all, people who become participants in these events, who build and restore the country. Adults do this, and children absorb the spirit of the times, the attitude of parents to their work, understand what public and personal duty are. The post-perestroika years contributed to the formation of a deep gap in relations between the younger and older generations. Trying to narrow this gap and use the experience of the older generation, as part of the work of the Patriot school club, we hold meetings with members of the Council of Veterans of the city of Aleksin, soldiers-internationalists. On Mother's Day and March 8, we go out with concerts for labor veterans at the Center for Social Protection of the Population. Such meetings enrich spiritual world adolescents, give the opportunity to feel included in a common cause and elementary, tear them away from the virtual world of computer life, contribute to the socialization of the younger generation.

IN modern period development of Russian society, when its moral crisis is obvious, historical experience is in demand in the social practice of forming the value priorities of society. The transmission of historical experience occurs through traditional social institutions.

the only social institution The Russian Orthodox Church, which has passed through the severe trials of time, and has retained its foundations and its mission unchanged - to be a source of morality, goodness, love and justice in society, is the Russian Orthodox Church.

Made by Prince Vladimir in 988. the choice in favor of the adoption by Russia of the Christian faith according to the Greek model was not just a choice of religious worship, it was a civilizational choice that predetermined the development of Rus' as a powerful European power. Together with Christianity, European cultural achievements Key words: writing, architecture, painting, education. Nikolai Mikhailovich Karamzin writes about this event in his “History of the Russian State”: “Soon the signs of the Christian faith, accepted by the sovereign, his children, nobles and people, appeared on the ruins of gloomy paganism in Russia, and the altars of the true God took the place of idols…. But it is not so easy for the new to take root in Rus'. Many people, tied to the ancient law, rejected the new one, because paganism dominated in some countries of Russia until the 12th century. Vladimir did not seem to want to force his conscience, but he took the best and most reliable measures to exterminate pagan errors:he tried to enlighten the Russians. In order to establish faith on the knowledge of divine books, ... the Grand Duke started schools for youths, which were the first foundation of public education in Russia. This beneficence then seemed terrible news, and mothers whose children were taken to science mourned them as if they were dead, for they considered reading and writing a dangerous sorcery. Having begun his reign as an ardent pagan, Prince Vladimir at the end of his life becomes true christian, to whom the people will give the name Red Sun, and in the 13th century he will be canonized and canonized as a Saint. life path Prince Vladimir, as well as each of us, is a vivid example of the fact that everyone has their own road to God and their own way to the temple.

Millennium history of Russian Orthodox Church represented by a series of various events and phenomena that affected the position of the church in society: this is the establishment of the patriarchate in Rus' in 1589, and the Church schism caused by Nikon's reforms, and the Spiritual Regulations of Peter I, which subordinated the church to the state, and the Decree of Soviet power, which separated the church from state and school from the church. It is possible to issue a law, but one cannot force a person to renounce his convictions, change his worldview with one stroke of the pen, one cannot disregard the historical memory of the people. Religion is faith, and without faith a person cannot live. Belief in victory helped the Soviet people endure the severe trials of the Great Patriotic War. The holy war against the invaders received the blessing of the Russian Orthodox Church.

On September 4, 1943, in the Kremlin, JV Stalin received the patriarchal locum tenens Sergius, who on September 8 was elected Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus'. It was also allowed to form the Holy Synod.

The historical memory of the people turned out to be stronger than the ideological attitudes and persecution of the church; it retained the most important thing - faith in the triumph of justice.

And today, each of us, brought up in the spirit of atheism, goes on his way to the temple to celebrate Orthodox holidays: Christmas, Epiphany, Easter, Trinity and others, or on the occasion of any events in his personal life. Historical memory has preserved the need for spiritual communication and enrichment.

In our work, we try to familiarize our students with traditional values, to involve them in design and research activities. So, in the 2014-2015 academic year, our students developed the project “Where the Motherland Begins”, the purpose of which was to attract the attention of students to the problem of respect for those places in the city that keep the sacred memory of the Great Patriotic War: this is the Mound of Glory, and the square Victory, and the Exaltation of the Cross Church, and the native school. The meeting with Father Pavel, rector of the Exaltation of the Cross Church, enriched the children with knowledge about the patron saints of Rus'.

Cooperation with the club "Orthodox Aleksin" makes it possible to introduce students to the world of Orthodox values. Participation in interesting substantive discussions held by the clergy, all possible assistance in organizing and conducting Orthodox holidays, participation in round tables, Orthodox quizzes is nothing more than mastering the primordial traditions of the Russian people and familiarizing them with their historical memory. Therefore, we can say with all confidence that even today the church continues to fulfill its historical mission, which it has carried since the time of the Holy Equal-to-the-Apostles Prince Vladimir, the mission of enlightening the human soul through the education of kindness, mercy, humility and compassion in it.

Thus, historical memory shows that no matter how acute social upheavals leading to the oblivion of the original Russian principles, society experiences, the connection between generations is eventually restored. Society, at all times, feels the need to restore ties with the past, with its roots: any era is generated by the previous stage of historical development and it is impossible to overcome this connection, that is, it is not possible to start development from scratch.