The national character is in the dialogue of cultures. The Search for Russian National Identity

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The national character is the "spirit" of the people, its deepest manifestations that unite the people of a separate nation. It arises historically, as a result of certain stages that a separate mass of people goes through, and the influences that it has experienced.

The main reasons for the formation of a national character, or mentality, are the geographical position of the country, historical circumstances, social conditions, culture, and the peculiarities of the psychology of this people. According to scientists, G. Skovoroda, T. Shevchenko and M. Gogol were the brightest representatives of the national worldview. It is in their work that we will find the deepest understanding of it.

Ukraine is located on extremely fertile land, so each Ukrainian family could fully provide for itself and settle separately. Human destiny depended on the earth, so the connection with the earth was strengthened as a guarantee of happiness. The Ukrainian perceived the earth as a holy mother, as it was sanctified by the blood of ancestors and defenders. For the nations of farmers, the land was the breadwinner, and to beat it without the need was considered as terrible a sin as to beat a mother. Eating a lump of earth was considered the most sacred oath - a form of communion with the greatest treasure. Rejoicing at work on the ground, the Ukrainian sought closeness to nature more than communication with people. Large expanses of his land brought up in him the worship of life, the sun, the earth. Having nature as the main way of knowing God, man identified it with the Creator. Such a God united heaven and earth, and so, the Universe with the people and the individual.

The Ukrainian is an individualist; most of all he valued the freedom of the individual, and above all the freedom of himself. Therefore, he did not found cities and, in general, valued equality and democracy to the extreme: spontaneity (elections in the Zaporozhian Sich) and anarchy, even narrow selfishness. Obviously, the family and, more broadly, the clan is the main social unit of the Ukrainian. The rulers changed every day, today's power comes at the throat of yesterday's adherents, and the Ukrainian readily divided the whole world into “us” and “them”. In politics, nothing equally depends on me, but in the economy I do everything myself. Interestingly, the ideal of the farmers was not the father-hunter and warrior, but the mother-shore, so it was the mother who was the center of many families.

The Ukrainian individualist also established relationships with the environment personally; this is noted by the Cossack brotherhood. I am responsible for myself, my family, but no more. A Ukrainian perceived the world not with his mind, but with his heart. Feeling, intuition for him is more important than evidence. He does not think, but experiences life, that is why there is so much lyricism, tenderness, sadness in Ukrainian songs. Striving for their own happiness, Ukrainians create wonderful examples of love lyrics. On the example of folklore, we see that, unlike most states, love was almost the main factor in choosing a life partner.

What conclusion shall we draw from examining our national character? First, the special character of Ukrainians is a reality. It differs from the characters of all neighboring peoples. Secondly, our character is neither better nor worse than others. It just exists and has its drawbacks and advantages. Knowing it, researching it, respecting it and working to strengthen its strengths and overcome shortcomings is a deed worthy of a modern Ukrainian.

FEDERAL EDUCATIONAL AGENCY FEDERAL STATE EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTION

HIGHER PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION

"RUSSIAN STATE UNIVERSITY OF TOURISM AND SERVICE"

(FGOUVPO "RGUTiS")

DEPARTMENT OF PSYCHOLOGY

TEST

Russian national character

Part-time student(s)

Usanova Svetlana

Record book number Ps-19204-010

group PSZ 04-1

Specialty Psychology

Completed by ____________________

1. National identity of Russian culture

2. National character

3. Features of the Russian national character

Bibliography

1. National identity of Russian culture

Demythologization is necessary to study, understand and measure. And for this it is required to separate from each other two phenomena of different orders, but closely intertwined, the joint silhouette of which looks so strange.

As a rule, the main explanations come down to the border position of Russia between East and West, Europe and Asia - from "Eurasianism" to "Aziopism" (the latter term is by no means an invention of the author). At the same time, they forget that almost all cultures that formed in the zone of contact of civilizations have such a Euro-Eastern binarity - Spanish, Portuguese, Greek, Bulgarian, Serbian, Turkish and others belonging to the Mediterranean, not to mention Latin American or Christian cultures. Caucasus. It turns out that the binarity of Russian culture is a typical phenomenon, therefore it does little to explain the uniqueness of the “Russian centaur” and to clarify its real origin.

When characterizing Russia and the Russian people, reference to their youth quickly became common place. Young Russia and the aged, decrepit West were conjugated and opposed by a variety of currents in culture and social thought. A list of just high-profile names of authors who paid tribute to Russian youth and the old age of the West would be very long. It is clear that the feeling by a Russian of his belonging to a young people is not accidental. But something else is just as obvious: our people do not differ significantly from other Western peoples in their age. If there are differences, they are always in favor of our youth. A Russian person's feeling of the importance of his people cannot be understood literally chronologically. Behind such a concept is something other than the age of the ethnic community.

Not only the dialectics of the Russian/Russian is contradictory, but also the polar - from nihilism to apology - interpretation of the Russian people from the point of view of understanding it as a cultural and historical subject, the creator of spiritual values. “Russia,” Berdyaev wrote, “least of all is a country of average fortunes, average culture ... At its bottom, Russia is full of savagery and barbarism. At its peaks, Russia is super-cultural, the historical task of Russian self-consciousness - to distinguish and separate Russian super-culturalism and Russian pre-culturalism, the logos of culture in Russian peaks and wild chaos in Russian lowlands. Such is the elite version of Russian culture - its identification with the logos of superculture as opposed to pre-cultural chaos, in essence, not of the people, but of the human mass. At the same time, it is necessary to distinguish between the ancient Russian nationality and the people of Russia of the New Age - the era of the formation of the Russian nation - the state.

The fact that Russian culture has its own periodization and typology, which is not covered by the general Western periodization and typology, is not at all connected with some kind of our national identity and uniqueness of Russia. At one time, Russia successfully entered one of these communities and successfully developed in its composition. The baptism of Russia in 989 became such an entry. It is well known that Russia adopted Christianity from Byzantium. As a result of baptism, in ecclesiastical terms, it became one of the numerous, albeit the largest in terms of population, not to mention territory, metropolis of the Patriarchate of Constantinople. Russia found itself in a position not tested by any Western national culture. This situation can be called cultural loneliness. Of course, it was not as complete as Robinson Crusoe on a desert island. But loneliness in this case is not a metaphor or an exaggeration. The remaining Orthodox cultures did not disappear from the face of the earth after the conquest of Orthodox countries. However, they could not develop in a normal rhythm. Lazarev notes that Ancient Russia “immediately adopted the Byzantine technique of stone construction with a complex system of domed and cross vaults, as well as a new Christian iconography for it, embodied by means of mosaics, frescoes and icon painting. This distinguishes its development from the Romanesque West, where the formation of stone architecture proceeded along a different path - the path of gradual internal evolution.

The Renaissance is undoubtedly a purely urban phenomenon. Speaking about the Russian pre-revival, Likhachev also connects it with the city: “The best currents of the pre-revival movement captured all of Western Europe, Byzantium, but also Pskov, Novgorod, Moscow, Tver, the entire Caucasus and part of Asia Minor. Throughout this colossal territory, we encounter homogeneous phenomena caused by the development of democratic life in the cities and the intensified cultural communication of countries. Many features of this pre-revival movement affected Russia with greater force than anywhere else" Likhachev, 1962, p. 35. At the time of the independence of the Russian Slavs, civil justice was based on the conscience and ancient customs of each tribe in particular; but the Varangians brought with them common civil laws to Russia, known to us from the treaties of the great princes with the Greeks and in everything in agreement with the ancient Scandinavian laws” Karamzin, 1990, p. 173.

One of the features of the development of Russian medieval culture was that Byzantium served for Russia at the same time as antiquity and a modern model. Likhachev notes that ““his own antiquity” - the period of the pre-Mongol heyday of ancient Russian culture - for all its attractiveness for Russia at the end of the 14th-15th centuries, could not replace real antiquity - the antiquity of Greece and Rome with their high culture of the slave-owning formation. If Western Europe had to go through the millennium of the Middle Ages through such milestones as the Great Migration, the formation of barbarian states, the rise of feudalism and the liberation of cities, and if Western culture was to "survive" the "Carolingian Renaissance", the Romanesque style, Gothic and complete it Renaissance, Russia, being a younger state, avoided such a long path of “gradual internal evolution” and cultural and historical “maturation”, using the ready-made Byzantine model, which served both antiquity and modernity. “The charm of Byzantine culture, Byzantine art was so great that it was hard not to succumb to it. This explains the widespread penetration of Byzantine culture into Russian feudal society ”(Lazarev, 1970, p. 218). N. Berdyaev also spoke in the article about the fact that Byzantinism predetermined the“ Eastern ”priorities in the historical choice of the path of development of Russia and its immanent opposition to the West. dedicated to Leontiev: “Russia, in all its originality and greatness, is held together not by a national bond, not by Russian national self-determination, but by Byzantine Orthodoxy and autocracy, objective church and state ideas. These beginnings organized Russia into a great and unique world - the world of the East, opposite to the West” (Berdyaev, 1995, p. 133).

Byzantinism opposed any form of democratic change in Russian society. The Western concepts of a free individual, individualism and democracy remained alien and unacceptable for the vast majority of Russian society - "Western contagion" - and therefore harmful and dangerous. About the dangers threatening Russia with the introduction of Western values, Leontiev said: “I even dare, without hesitation, to say that no Polish uprising and no Pugachevism can harm Russia in the way that a very peaceful, very legitimate democratic constitution could harm it.” And this is because “Russian people are not created for freedom. Without fear and violence, everything will go to dust for them ”(quoted from:). He obviously had no illusions about the myth of Russia's "special historical mission", widely promoted by a certain part of the Russian intelligentsia of the 19th century. Speaking of Leontiev, Berdyaev argued that “he believed not in Russia and not in the Russian people, but in Byzantine principles, church and state. If he believed in any mission, then in the mission of Byzantium, and not Russia ”(quoted from:).

There are many concepts that consider the development of culture and history from the point of view of one fundamental factor, from the position of a single substantial foundation. And then, taken in its foundations, the history of culture appears as a monologue of a single beginning, whether it be the world spirit or matter. And very few thinkers reveal the dialogical nature of the life of the spirit and culture. Among these thinkers, one should first of all name N.A. Berdyaev (Berdyaev N.A. The meaning of history. M., 1990. S. 30; Berdyaev N.A. Philosophy of a free spirit. M., 1994. S. 370,458) and M. Buber (Buber M.Ya and Ty. M ., 1993). Toynbee's merit lies in the fact that he revealed the dialogic essence of the development of culture in his concept of "Challenge and Response" (See: Toynbee A.J. Comprehension of History: Collection. M., 1991. S. 106-142).

If we ignore the figurative style of presentation, then Toynbee's concept provides the key to understanding the creative nature and the possible alternativeness of the cultural-historical process. The development of culture is carried out as a series of Answers given by the creative human spirit to the Challenges that nature, society and the inner infinity of man himself throws to him. At the same time, different development options are always possible, because different responses to the same challenge are possible. It is in the realization of this fundamental circumstance that the enduring significance of Toynbee's concept lies. A unique concept of culture was developed by Pitirim Alexandrovich Sorokin (1899-1968), the largest Russian sociologist and culturologist who lived most of his life in exile in the United States. In methodological terms, the concept of P.A. Sorokin echoes the doctrine of the cultural-historical types of O. Spengler and A. Toynbee. However, the theory of cultural-historical types of P. A. Sorokin fundamentally differs from the theory of O. Spengler and A. Toynbee in that Sorokin allowed progress in social development. Recognizing the presence of a deep crisis that Western culture is currently experiencing, he assessed this crisis not as the "Decline of Europe", but as a necessary phase in the formation of a new emerging civilization that unites all of humanity.

In accordance with his methodological guidelines, P. Sorokin presented the historical process as a process of cultural development. According to Sorokin, culture in the broadest sense of the word is the totality of everything created or recognized by a given society at one stage or another of its development. In the course of this development, society creates various cultural systems: cognitive, religious, ethical, aesthetic, legal, etc. The main feature of all these cultural systems is the tendency to combine them into a system of higher ranks. As a result of the development of this trend, cultural supersystems are formed. Each of these cultural supersystems, according to Sorokin, “has its own mentality, its own system of truth and knowledge, its own philosophy and worldview, its own religion and model of “holiness”, its own ideas of right and proper, its own forms of fine literature and art, its own rights. laws, codes of conduct.

2. National character

The Russian people are the recognized creator of one of the "axial" cultures. In the conditions of the great "change of milestones" and the formation of the Russian civilization of the 21st century, the solution of the problem of continuity with the cultural heritage and its renewal has become a condition for the spiritual revival of Russia. “Do not divide, do not split up Russian history, follow the connection of phenomena, do not separate the beginnings, but consider them in interaction.”

The grandiosity of these problems is due to the enduring uniqueness, stable stereotype of their mystical, irrational nature. For many representatives of the West, the soul of a Russian person remains a mystery. To determine the character, the soul of a Russian person, consider the mentality. So what is the mentality? Mentality is a deep layer of social consciousness. M.A. Borg writes that mentality is “a set of symbols that are necessarily formed within the framework of each given cultural and historical era and fixed in the minds of people in the process of communicating with their own kind, i.e. repetitions."

The basic characteristics of the mentality are its collectivity, unconsciousness, stability. Since the mentality expresses the everyday appearance of the collective consciousness of a certain socio-cultural community, its "hidden" layer, independent of the individual's own life, it appears as a reality of the collective order. Mentality as a way of expressing knowledge about the world and the person in it serves as an ontological and functional explanation in everyday life and contains answers to the questions What is it? How? Why is this?

The structure of the mentality is a stable system of hidden deep attitudes and value orientations of consciousness, its automatic skills that determine stable stereotypes of consciousness.

Reasons that contribute to the formation of the mentality: 1) racial and ethnic qualities of the community; 2) natural geographical conditions of its existence; 3) the results of the interaction of this community and the sociocultural conditions of its residence. Among the racial and ethnic differences of the socio-cultural community affecting the mentality, it should be noted its size, temperament, level of development.

The basic features of the mentality of Russians are: the predominance of moral components. And, above all, a sense of responsibility and conscience, as well as a special understanding of the relationship between the individual and society. This is due to a number of reasons, primarily the fact that “from century to century our concern was not about how to get better or how to live easier, but only about somehow living somehow, holding out, getting out of another trouble, overcoming another danger,” writes Ilyin I.A. So the question is: why live? is more important than the question of daily bread, wrote F.M. Dostoevsky.

The influence of the religious factor is also significant, especially Orthodoxy as one of the sources of the Russian mentality. The specifics of the Russian mentality are influenced by the social organization of society, which manifests itself in the active role of the state, the result is the dominance in the mentality of Russians of the belief in the need for strong power. As mentioned above, the Russian mentality leaves a significant imprint on the character of the Russian community and changes along with it. As Rozanov wrote: “If there is a nation, there is also culture, because culture is the answer of the nation, there is the aroma of its character, heart system, mind. The Russian spirit, no matter how you bury it or make fun of it, still exists. This is not necessarily a genius, poetry, poetry, prose, mind-blowing philosophy. No, this is a way of life, i.e. something much simpler and, perhaps, the wisest.”

The Russian people are characterized by a thirst for justice and distrust of the legal means of achieving it, an indispensable love for the distant and selective love for the near, faith in absolute good without evil and the dubious value of relative good, passive expectation of the latter and passionate activism of the “decisive battle” for the final triumph of good, loftiness in goals and promiscuity in their achievements, etc.

According to Yu. Lotman, Russian culture is characterized by a binary structure. The binary nature of the Russian soul is not its unique feature. It is in one way or another inherent in the mentality of other peoples. The main problem is the immensity of the Russian character.

According to G. Florovsky: “The history of Russian culture is all in interruptions, in attacks. There is less of everything in it of immediate integrity. Incommensurable and different spiritual formations somehow combine and grow together by themselves. But splicing is not synthesis. It was the synthesis that failed.”

Therefore, from here - the comprehension of the deep foundations of Russian life takes place on intuition, i.e. there is a reproduction of the irrational archetype, and not the rational one, which is clearly expressed in the Western mentality.

3. Features of the Russian national character

According to the definition of some studies: the national character is the genotype plus culture.

Since the genotype is what each person receives from nature, culture is what a person joins from birth, therefore, the national character, in addition to unconscious cultural archetypes, includes the natural ethnopsychological traits of individuals.

When Dostoevsky's character recognizes "real Russian life", he concludes that "the whole of Russia is the play of nature." According to F. Tyutchev, “Russia cannot be understood with the mind, // cannot be measured with a common yardstick. // She has a special stature. // One can only believe in Russia.” B. Pascal noted: "Nothing is so inconsistent with reason as its distrust of itself." In the realization of the originality, uniqueness, the impossibility of measuring Russia with a "common yardstick" - the key to comprehending both the obvious - with the mind, and the hidden - with faith in Russia.

As mentioned above, the national character of a Russian person includes unconscious cultural archetypes and natural ethnopsychological traits of individuals.

The period of paganism of the East Slavic tribes is not included in the history of culture. Rather, it is the prehistory of Russian culture, some of its initial state, which continued and could continue for a very long time, without undergoing significant changes, without experiencing any significant events.

Since the times marked by constant contacts and confrontations with neighboring nomadic peoples, the factor of chance, unpredictability has been deeply rooted in Russian culture and national self-consciousness (hence the famous Russian “maybe yes” and other similar judgments of ordinary people's consciousness). This factor largely predetermined the properties of the Russian national character - recklessness, daring, desperate courage, recklessness, spontaneity, arbitrariness, etc., which are associated with a special ideological role of riddles in ancient Russian folklore and divination in everyday life; the tendency to make fateful decisions by casting lots, and other characteristic features of the mentality based on an unstable balance of mutually exclusive tendencies, where any uncontrollable combination of circumstances can be decisive. This is the origin of the tradition of making difficult decisions in the face of a tough and sometimes cruel choice between extremes, when “there is no third way” (and it is impossible), when the very choice between mutually exclusive poles is sometimes unrealistic or impossible, or equally destructive for the “voter” , - the choice that takes place literally at the civilizational crossroads of forces beyond its control (fate, fate, happiness), about the reality and certainty of the past (traditions, "traditions") - in comparison with the unreal and uncertain, dramatically variable and unpredictable future. As a rule, a worldview that develops with an orientation towards the factors of chance and spontaneity is gradually imbued with pessimism, fatalism, uncertainty (including in the proper religious sense - as unbelief, constantly tempting faith).

In such or similar conditions, other qualities of the Russian people were formed, which became its distinctive features, fused with the national and cultural mentality - patience, passivity in relation to circumstances, which are thus recognized as the leading role in the development of events, resilience in enduring the hardships and hardships of life. suffering, reconciliation with losses and losses as inevitable or even predetermined from above, perseverance in resisting fate.

Dependence on the "whims" of harsh nature and climatic instability, on the unbridled aggressiveness of nomadic peoples that make up the immediate environment, uncertainty about the future (harvest or crop failure, war or peace, home or campaign in foreign lands, will or bondage, rebellion or humility, hunting or bondage, etc.) - all this accumulated in popular ideas about the constancy of variability.

As we know, the formation of the Russian cultural archetype was greatly influenced by the adoption in the 10th century. Christianity, which came to Russia from Byzantium in the Orthodox form. Russian people were initially prepared for the perception of Orthodoxy (by the whole course of their own development).

Orthodoxy, although it included the whole of society, did not capture the whole person. Orthodoxy led only the religious and moral life of the Russian people, that is, it regulated church holidays, family relations, pastime, while the ordinary everyday life of a Russian person was not affected by him. This state of affairs provided free scope for original national creativity.

In Eastern Christian culture, the earthly existence of a person had no value, so the main task was to prepare a person for death, and life was seen as a small segment on the path to eternity. Spiritual aspirations for humility and piety, asceticism and a sense of one's own sinfulness were recognized as the meaning of earthly existence.

Hence, in the Orthodox culture, a disdain for earthly goods appeared, since they are fleeting and insignificant, the attitude towards work not as a creative process, but as a way of self-abasement. Hence the different expressions. You won’t earn all the money, you won’t take it with you to the grave, etc.

Vl. Solovyov was especially fond of such a trait of a Russian person as the awareness of his sinfulness - imperfection, incompleteness in achieving the ideal.

Bibliography

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We are Russians...
What a delight!
A.V. Suvorov

Reflections on the character of the Russian people lead us to the conclusion that the character of the people and the character of the individual do not have a direct correlation. The people are a conciliar, symphonic personality, therefore it is hardly possible to find in every Russian person all the features and properties of the Russian national character. In general, in the Russian character one can see the qualities of Peter the Great, Prince Myshkin, Oblomov and Khlestakov, i.e. both positive and negative properties. There are no peoples on earth that have only positive or only negative character traits. In reality, there is a known ratio of both. Only in the assessment of some peoples by others does a false idea arise, giving rise to stereotypes and myths, that another (not ours) people has, basically, negative character traits. And, on the contrary, there is a desire to attribute all sorts of positive characteristics in a superlative degree to their own people.

In the character of the Russian people, such properties as patience, national fortitude, catholicity, generosity, immensity (breadth of the soul), and talent are often noted. BUT. Lossky in his book "The Character of the Russian People" begins the study with such a feature of the Russian character as religiosity. “The main, deepest feature of the character of the Russian people is its religiosity, and the search for absolute good associated with it .., which is feasible only in the Kingdom of God,” he writes. “Perfect goodness without any admixture of evil and imperfections exists in the Kingdom of God because it consists of individuals who fully realize in their behavior the two commandments of Jesus Christ: to love God more than yourself, and your neighbor as yourself.Members of the Kingdom of God are completely free from selfishness and therefore they create only absolute values - moral goodness, beauty, knowledge of the truth, goods indivisible and indestructible, serving the whole world" [ 1 ].

Lossky puts emphasis on the word "search" for absolute good, thus he does not absolutize the properties of the Russian people, but seeks to designate their spiritual aspirations. Therefore, in the history of Russia, thanks to the influence of the great holy ascetics, not the mighty, not rich, but "Holy Russia" became the ideal of the people. Lossky cites an insightful remark by I.V. Kireevsky, which, in comparison with the businesslike, almost theatrical behavior of Europeans, surprises the humility, calmness, restraint, dignity and inner harmony of people who grew up in the traditions of the Russian Orthodox Church. Even many generations of Russian atheists, instead of Christian religiosity, showed formal religiosity, a fanatical desire to realize on earth a kind of kingdom of God without God, on the basis of scientific knowledge and universal equality. “Considering Christian religiosity and the search for absolute good associated with it as the main property of the Russian people,” wrote Lossky, “I will try in the following chapters to explain some other properties of the Russian people in connection with this essential feature of their character” [ 2 ].

Such derivative features of the Russian character Lossky calls the ability to higher forms of experience, feeling and will (powerful willpower, passion, maximalism), love of freedom, kindness, talent, messianism and missionism. At the same time, he also names negative features associated with the lack of an average area of culture - fanaticism, extremism, which manifested itself in the Old Believers, nihilism and hooliganism. It should be noted that Lossky, analyzing the features of the Russian national character, has in mind the thousand-year experience of the existence of the Russian people and in fact does not give estimates related to the trends inherent in the Russian character in the 20th century. For us, in the works of Lossky, the basic feature of the national character is important, the dominant that determines all other properties and sets the vector for analyzing the problem posed.

Modern researchers of this topic take into account tendencies in the development of the Russian national character of the 20th century to a greater extent, without denying the tradition that has shaped these properties throughout the thousand-year history of Russia and the Russian people. So, V.K. Trofimov in the book "The Soul of the Russian People" writes: "Familiarity with the national-bodily and spiritual determinants of the psychological properties of the Russian people allows us to highlight the fundamental internal qualities of the national psychology. These fundamental qualities that make up the essence of the national psychology and national character of the Russian people can be designated as the essential forces of the Russian souls" [ 3 ].

He refers to the essential forces the paradoxical manifestations of the soul (the inconsistency of the Russian soul), contemplation with the heart (the primacy of feeling and contemplation over reason and reason), the immensity of the vital impulse (the breadth of the Russian soul), the religious striving for the absolute, national stamina, "We are psychology" and love for freedom. "The essential forces inherent in the deep foundations of the Russian soul are extremely contradictory in terms of the possible consequences of their practical implementation. They can become a source of creation in the economy, politics and culture. In the hands of the wise national elite, the emerging features of national psychology for centuries have served prosperity, strengthening power and Russia's authority in the world" [ 4 ].

F.M. Dostoevsky, long before Berdyaev and Lossky, showed how the character of the Russian people combines the base and the sublime, the holy and the sinful, the "ideal of the Madonna" and the "ideal of Sodom", and the human heart is the battlefield of these principles. In the monologue of Dmitry Karamazov, the extremes, the boundless breadth of the Russian soul are expressed with exceptional force: the ideal of Sodom in his soul does not deny the ideal of the Madonna, and his heart burns from him and truly, truly burns, as in his young blameless years. No, a man is wide, even too wide, I would narrow it down "[ 5 ].

The consciousness of one's sinfulness gives the Russian people the ideal of spiritual ascent. Describing Russian literature, Dostoevsky emphasizes that all the age-old and beautiful images in the works of Pushkin, Goncharov and Turgenev are borrowed from the Russian people. They took from him innocence, purity, meekness, intelligence and gentleness, in contrast to everything broken, false, superficial and slavishly borrowed. And this contact with the people gave them extraordinary strength.

Dostoevsky identifies another fundamental need of the Russian people - the need for constant and insatiable suffering, everywhere and in everything. He is infected from the beginning with this thirst for suffering; a stream of suffering runs through its entire history, not only from external misfortunes and disasters, but bubbles up from the very heart of the people. The Russian people, even in happiness, certainly have a part of suffering, otherwise happiness for them is incomplete. Never, even in the most solemn moments of his history, does he have a proud and triumphant look, and only a look touched to the point of suffering; he sighs and lifts up his glory to the mercy of the Lord. This idea of Dostoevsky found a precise expression in his formula: "He who does not understand Orthodoxy will never understand Russia."

Indeed, our shortcomings are an extension of our virtues. The polarities of the Russian national character can be represented as a whole series of antinomies expressing positive and negative properties.

1. the breadth of the soul - the absence of form;
2. generosity - wastefulness;
3. love of freedom - weak discipline (anarchism);
4. prowess - revelry;
5. patriotism - national egoism.

These parallels can be multiplied many times over. I.A. Bunin cites a significant parable in Cursed Days. The peasant says: the people are like a tree, you can make both an icon and a club out of it, depending on who processes this tree - Sergius of Radonezh or Emelka Pugachev [ 6 ].

Many Russian poets tried to express the total immensity of the Russian national character, but A.K. Tolstoy:

If you love, so without reason,
If you threaten, it's not a joke,
If you scold, so rashly,
If you chop, it's so sloppy!

If you argue, it's so bold
Kohl to punish, so for the cause,
If you forgive, so with all your heart,
If there is a feast, then a feast is a mountain!

I.A. Ilyin focuses attention on the fact that for the Russian man immensity is a living, concrete reality, his object, his starting point, his task. "Such is the Russian soul: it has been given passion and power; form, character, and transformation are its historical tasks in life." Among Western analysts of the Russian national character, the German thinker W. Schubart managed to express these features to a greater extent. Of greatest interest in opposing two diametrically opposed types of attitude - Western (Promethean) and Russian (Joannic) - is a series of positions proposed by Schubart for comparison, which are saturated with diverse concrete material. Let's play one of them. The culture of the middle and the culture of the end. Western culture is the culture of the middle. Socially it rests on the middle class, psychologically on the state of mind of the middle class, of equilibrium. Her virtues are self-control, good breeding, efficiency, discipline. "The European is a decent and diligent, skilled worker, an impeccably functioning cog in a large machine. Outside his profession, he is hardly taken into account. He prefers the path of the golden mean, and this is usually the path to gold." Materialism and philistinism are the goal and result of Western culture.

The Russian moves within the framework of the outlying culture. Hence - the breadth and immensity of the Russian soul, the feeling of freedom up to anarchism and nihilism; feelings of guilt and sinfulness; apocalyptic attitude and, finally, sacrifice as the central idea of Russian religious morality. “Foreigners who first came to Russia,” Schubart wrote, “could not get rid of the impression that they found themselves in a sacred place, set foot on holy land ... The expression “Holy Russia” is not an empty phrase. A traveler in Europe is immediately carried away by the noisy rhythm its active forces; the high melody of labor reaches his ears, but this - with all its greatness and power - is a song about the earth "[ 7 ].

Nevertheless, a simple enumeration of certain qualities of the Russian national character would be very incomplete or haphazardly redundant. Therefore, in further analysis, one should take a different path: to determine sufficient grounds (criteria) according to which it is possible to sum up the features of the Russian character. In modern scientific literature, there has long been a discussion about what is the defining principle in the study of national identity: "blood and soil", or "language and culture". And, although most researchers pay attention to language and culture, nevertheless, the national genotype and natural and climatic conditions are directly related to the formation of the qualities and properties of the national character.

In my opinion, the following basic factors should be attributed as the initial formative foundations of the Russian national character:

1. Nature and climate;
2. Ethnic origins;
3. The historical existence of the people and the geopolitical position of Russia;
4. Social factors (monarchy, community, polyethnicity);
5. Russian language and Russian culture;
6. Orthodoxy.

Such an order is not at all random. The analysis of factors should be conducted from external, material, physical and climatic factors, and finish with spiritual, deep, defining the dominant of the national character. It is the religiosity of the Russian people (N.O. Lossky), rooted in Orthodox Christianity, that is considered by most researchers of this issue as the deep foundation of the Russian character. Consequently, the order of significance of these factors is built in an ascending line.

Threats and challenges to the existence of national identity and the Russian character undoubtedly exist. As a rule, they have an objective and subjective content and multiply their negative impact during periods of unrest, revolutions, social breakdowns and crisis situations. The first objective trend leading to a threat to the existence of Russian national identity is associated with the collapse of the USSR (historical Russia) at the end of the 20th century, it was she who called into question the very existence of the Russian people, and, consequently, their national identity. The second objective trend is related to the "reform" of the economy, which, in fact, was a complete collapse of the economy of the entire country, the destruction of the military-industrial complex, a huge number of research institutes that provided priority areas for the country's development for several decades. As a result, the economy of post-Soviet Russia has acquired an ugly, one-sided character - it is entirely based on the extraction and export of hydrocarbons (oil and gas), as well as on the export of other types of raw materials - ferrous and non-ferrous metals, wood, etc.

The third objective trend is the depopulation of the Russian people, associated with a low birth rate, a large number of abortions, low life expectancy, high mortality from traffic accidents, alcoholism, drug addiction, suicide and other accidents. Over the past 15 years, the population of Russia has been declining by 700-800 thousand people annually. The depopulation of the Russian people is a consequence of the above objective trends and leads to a sharp increase in migration flows, often not controlled in any way, from the Caucasus, Central Asia and China. Already today, 12.5% of students in Moscow schools are Azerbaijanis. If the migration policy is not tightly controlled, then in the future this process will lead to the replacement of the Russian people by migrants, to the displacement and extinction of Russian national identity. Depopulation is largely a consequence of the crisis processes of the 1990s. XX century.

Subjective tendencies leading to threats to the existence of Russian national self-consciousness can be summarized as a loss of identity. However, this provision requires deciphering and detailing. The loss of identity is associated with the intrusion into the world of Russian national self-consciousness by external influences alien to a Russian person, aimed at transforming national self-consciousness and Russian character according to the Western model: in the field of education - accession to the Bologna Charter; in the field of culture - the replacement of traditional samples of Russian culture with pop culture, pseudo-culture; in the field of religion - the introduction of various sectarian movements associated with Protestantism, with occult and other anti-Christian sects; in the field of art - the invasion of various avant-garde trends, emasculating the content of art; in the field of philosophy - the frontal offensive of postmodernism, which denies the originality and specificity of national thinking and tradition.

How diverse are the ways of denying national self-consciousness that we daily see in various media programs. The most dangerous among them is Russophobia - denial and contempt for Russian culture, for national identity and for the Russian people themselves. It can be assumed that if the Russian national identity is replaced by the Western mentality that has been introduced in our country for a decade and a half, then the Russian people will turn into a "population", into ethnographic material, and the Russian language and Russian culture, in the future, may share the fate of dead languages ( ancient Greek and Latin). The denationalization of culture, the suppression of national consciousness, its transformation into a comic-clip consciousness, the perversion of the history of Russia, the desecration of our Victory, the lulling of defense consciousness, are becoming an everyday phenomenon.

The country's unfavorable economic situation, the permanent political crisis at the end of the 20th century, and the criminogenic situation led to a "brain drain" - the mass emigration of scientists to other, more prosperous countries. The scientists who left abroad filled the research centers and universities of the USA, Canada, Germany and other Western countries. According to the estimates of the Russian Academy of Sciences, about 200,000 scientists left the country in 15 years, including 130,000 candidates of sciences and about 20,000 doctors of sciences. In essence, this is a catastrophe, the almost complete loss of the country's intellectual property. Talented graduates of the best universities in Russia tend to go to rich business corporations or go abroad. This led to the loss of the middle, by age, link of RAS scientists. Today, the average age of doctors of sciences in the Russian Academy of Sciences is 61 years. There is a "brain drain", steady aging and the impossibility of replenishing scientific personnel, the disappearance of a number of leading scientific schools, the degradation of research topics [ 8 ].

How to resist, what can be opposed to these negative trends, leading to the erosion of Russian national identity?

Firstly, a balanced program (ideology) is needed for a long-term historical perspective, which should correspond to the national interests of Russia, take into account the limits of national security in the development of Russian culture, school and university education, science, and the protection of moral, religious, ethnic values of the people. At the same time, such an ideological program should outline the prospects for the development of the economy, agriculture, the military-industrial complex and other areas of production that could ensure the independence of our country at the proper level. The so-called "national projects" developed and implemented by the administration of President D.A. Medvedev, are very fragmented and do not have the character of a universal national program. As I.A. Ilyin, Russia does not need class hatred and party struggle, tearing apart its single body, it needs a responsible idea for the long term. Moreover, the idea is not destructive, but positive, state. This is the idea of cultivating a national spiritual character in the Russian people. "This idea should be state-historical, state-national, state-patriotic, state-religious. This idea should come from the very fabric of the Russian soul and Russian history, from their spiritual smoothness. This idea should speak about the main thing in Russian destinies - and past and future; it should shine on entire generations of Russian people, making sense of their lives, infusing them with vigor" [ 9 ]. Today, there is already experience in developing such promising programs [ 10 ].

Secondly, it is necessary to educate the Russian national elite, whose aspirations would correspond to the national interests of Russia and the Russian people. The non-ethnic and heterodox elite will always push the country either to the next revolution (in fact, to the redistribution of power and property), or, in the words of F.M. Dostoevsky, will once in several decades "let a spasm", i.e. handle the next crisis. As the experience of the tragic 90s for Russia shows. XX century, such an elite - "Chicago boys" - was directed and controlled by external forces hostile to Russia, contrary to the national interests of the country.

Thirdly, it is necessary to educate new generations of Russian people in the spirit of love for the Motherland, in the spirit of patriotism, and this requires a fundamental restructuring of the entire system of education and upbringing. Only in this case it is possible to overcome the negative consequences of modern national nihilism and Russophobia. "Pepsi Generation", brought up under the motto - "Take everything from life!" is a social product of the destructive processes of the 1990s.

Fourthly, it is necessary to fight against the negative features of the Russian national character - anarchism and extremism, disorganization and "hope for a chance", lack of formality and hooliganism, apathy and loss of the habit of systematic work, which was largely the result of the crisis phenomena of the last one and a half years. decades. This struggle must be waged not on "outbursts of the revolutionary spirit," but by developing stubborn self-discipline, uninterrupted self-control, patience and endurance, spiritual sobriety and obedience. S.N. Bulgakov spoke about Christian asceticism, which is continuous self-control, struggle with the lower sinful sides of one's "I", asceticism of the spirit. Only on this path can the negative tendencies of the Russian national character be neutralized to some extent, which in an era of historical turmoil lead to the destruction of the essential forces of the people, when the "underground of the human soul" comes to the fore. When a people is on the verge (and even beyond) of physical existence, it is difficult to demand high moral behavior from it. This requires measures of a social, political, economic nature, but, above all, of a spiritual nature. Only in this case is there hope for a prosperous, positive result in the development of Russia, the Russian people and their national identity.

If the Russian people have sufficient national and social immunity, they will return to their own national identity again. Historical experience gives us enough grounds for an optimistic scenario. Russia and the Russian people overcame the most difficult situations, found a worthy answer to the challenge of history. Such an analysis of the Russian national character by Dostoevsky, who revealed the deepest contradictions, gives hope that the abyss of falling in which the Russian people find themselves today will sober them up, and they will overcome the stage of yet another self-destruction, having gone through repentance and suffering.

Here the question involuntarily arises: how did the Russian people, having along with negative and positive qualities, be tempted at the beginning of the 20th century. the ideas of the revolutionary reorganization of Russia and atheism, which resulted in regicide, the destruction of temples, the renunciation of the faith of their ancestors and the impoverishment of the people's soul. We find the answer to this question in Dostoevsky. For a Russian person, in his opinion, oblivion of every measure in everything is characteristic. Whether love, wine, revelry, pride, envy - here a different Russian person gives himself almost selflessly, is ready to break everything, renounce everything, from family, custom, God. This is the need to go over the edge, the need for a fading sensation, having reached the abyss, to hang halfway into it, to look into the very abyss and - in particular cases, but not uncommon - to throw yourself into it like a dazed man upside down.

This is the need for denial in a person, sometimes the most non-denying and reverent, the denial of everything, the most important shrine of his heart, his most complete ideal, all the people's shrine in all its fullness, before which he now only revered and which suddenly seemed to become unbearable to him somehow. burden, - this is how Dostoevsky characterizes the features of self-denial and self-destruction inherent in the Russian folk character. - But on the other hand, with the same strength, the same swiftness, with the same thirst for self-preservation and repentance, the Russian person, like the whole people, saves himself, and usually, when he reaches the last line, that is, when there is nowhere else to go. But what is especially characteristic is that the reverse push, the push of self-restoration and self-salvation, is always more serious than the previous impulse - the impulse of self-denial and self-destruction. That is, it always happens on the account of, as it were, petty cowardice; while the Russian man goes into his restoration with the greatest and most serious effort, and looks at the negative former movement with contempt for himself. 11 ].

In conclusion, let us once again turn to the enumeration of the main features of the Russian national character. The natural and climatic conditions of Russia formed in the character of the Russian people such traits as patience, endurance, breadth of nature, hard work. Hence the passionarity and the "native" character of the people. Polyethnicity and polyconfessionality of Russia brought up brotherhood, patience (tolerance) to other languages and cultures, disinterestedness, lack of violence in the Russian people. The historical existence of the Russian people and the geopolitical position of Russia forged in its character such properties as national fortitude, love of freedom, sacrifice, patriotism. The social conditions of the existence of the Russian people - the monarchy, the community - contributed to the formation of monarchical legal consciousness, catholicity, collectivism, and mutual assistance. Orthodoxy, as the main dominant of Russian national self-consciousness, has formed in the Russian people religiosity, the desire for absolute goodness, love for one's neighbor (brotherhood), humility, meekness, consciousness of one's sinfulness and imperfection, sacrifice (willingness to give one's life for one's friends), catholicity and patriotism. These qualities were formed in accordance with the gospel ideals of goodness, truth, mercy and compassion. This must be seen as a religious source of Russian fortitude and patience, endurance and strength of sacrifice of the Russian people.

Every Russian person should clearly know the negative properties of his national character. The breadth, immensity of the Russian soul is often associated with maximalism - either all or nothing. Weak discipline leads to revelry and anarchism; from here lies a dangerous path to extremism, rebellion, hooliganism, and terrorism. The immensity of the soul becomes the source of a daring test of values - atheism, the rejection of tradition, national nihilism. The absence of ethnic solidarity in everyday life, the weakness of the "tribal instinct", disunity in the face of "strangers" makes the Russian person defenseless in relation to migrants, who are characterized by solidarity, arrogance, and cruelty. Therefore, migrants in Russia today feel more like masters than Russians. The lack of self-discipline often leads to the inability to work systematically and achieve the goal. The shortcomings mentioned above increase many times during periods of unrest, revolutions and other crisis social phenomena. Credulity, a tendency to temptation, makes the Russian people a toy in the hands of political adventurers and impostors of all stripes, leads to the loss of the immune forces of sovereignty, turns it into a mob, into an electorate, into a crowd led by a herd consciousness. This is the root of all social unrest and catastrophes.

However, the negative qualities are not the fundamental, dominant features of the Russian character, but rather, they are the reverse side of the positive qualities, their perversion. A clear vision of the weak features of the national character will allow every Russian person to fight them, to eradicate or neutralize their influence in himself.

Today, the topic related to the study of the Russian national character is extremely relevant. In the conditions of a permanent social crisis of the late 20th - early 21st centuries, when the Russian people are humiliated, slandered, and have largely lost their vital strength, they need to confirm their merits, including at the level of studying the Russian national character. Only on this path can the connection of times be made by referring to tradition, to the deeds of our great ancestors - heroes, leaders, prophets, scientists and thinkers, to our national shrines, values and symbols. Turning to the national tradition is like touching a healing source from which everyone can draw faith, hope, love, a strong-willed beginning and an example for serving the Motherland - Holy Russia.
Kopalov Vitaly Ilyich, Professor of the Department of Philosophy of the IPPK at the Ural State University. A.M. Gorky, Doctor of Philosophy

Notes:

1 - Lossky N.O. Character of the Russian people. Sowing. 1957. Book. 1. C.5.
2 - Ibid. P.21.
3 - Trofimov V.K. Soul of the Russian people: Natural-historical conditioning and essential forces. - Yekaterinburg, 1998. P. 90.
4 - Ibid. pp.134-135.
5 - Dostoevsky F.M. Brothers Karamazov // Dostoevsky F.M. Full coll. op. In 30 tons. T. XIV. - L., 1976. P. 100.
6 - Bunin I.A. Cursed days. - M., 1991. P.54.
7 - Schubart V. Europe and the soul of the East. - M., 1997. P.78.
8 - Fourteen knives in the body of Russia // Tomorrow. - 2007. - No. 18 (702).
9 - Ilyin I.A. Creative idea of our future // Ilyin I.A. Sobr. op. in. 10 vol. T. 7. - M., 1998. S. 457-458.
10 - See: Russian doctrine ("Sergius project"). Under the general editorship. A.B. Kobyakova and V.V. Averyanov. - M., 2005. - 363 p.
11 - Dostoevsky F.M. Writer's diary. Featured Pages. - M., 1989. S.60-61.

Russian people have always been proud and proud of their culture, which is truly unique.
When culturology took shape as an independent science, then the doctrine of Russian national culture was substantiated as original and unique, unlike all other cultures.
Russian national culture began to manifest itself in the 11th century, when the formation of the Russian independent state began. The Eastern Slavs began to separate into an independent cultural and ethnic community. All spheres of life underwent changes - from the political system. It has just begun to take shape, before the language, way of life, traditions. An irreversible process has begun.
The era of paganism, as one of the religions, was ending, the Slavs began to gradually join Orthodoxy, which came from Byzantium under certain circumstances.
Finding itself in a position between East and West, Russian culture began to absorb elements of both cultures. Therefore, Old Russian culture gradually synthesized in itself both European civilizational values, and Byzantine mystical ideas, and the Asian principle of mutual coexistence. However, not all features were taken as a basis in Russian life. These were just elements.
The geopolitical situation of Russia developed in such a way that gradually the country was divided into parts in accordance with the cardinal points. This is how special subcultures were formed.
Representatives of the southern subculture lived in the southern part of Russia, in the steppes. These were former Turkic nomads, the remnants of the Pecheneg troops who submitted to the Russian prince.
The inhabitants of Novgorod and its environs represented the northern and northeastern culture. These were the so-called trade zones with Europe. Accordingly, the Novgorod lands had a somewhat Europeanized lifestyle.
When the Russian lands were unified around Moscow, Novgorod gradually began to lose its original European identity, which it managed to maintain in the era of the Tatar-Mongol yoke that dominated Russia for a long time.
Russian national culture at the present stage has specific features.
The strong dominance of the Orthodox faith qualitatively distinguishes Russian culture from other types of cultures. A powerful means of its formation was the mass construction of Orthodox churches. Russian education always began with the church, the parishioners comprehended art, literature, history from church books and records. According to the Slavophile A. Khomyakov of the 19th century, Russian culture heeded all the trends - both Eastern and Western cultures, but remained unlike the others. Russian Orthodoxy has outgrown the established dogmas of classical Orthodoxy. Thus, the former Eastern Slavs (Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians) have somewhat different beliefs from the southern and western Slavic peoples.
In addition to religion, Russians acquired a special Russian national character. This is how the Russian idea was formed about a daring peasant who sacredly believes in his god, loves his Fatherland and reveres the Tsar. The glory of unusual people has been fixed for the Russians.
The Russian ethnos is a special nation, with a strong and powerful cultural archetype based on a collective community, characterized by unconsciousness and stability. Thus, a unique genetic code is transmitted from generation to generation: the same habits, moral attitudes and specific norms of behavior are formed.
The Russian mentality is also special. This is a collection of certain symbols that are formed within a certain era and then transferred to their descendants. Also important is such a concept as national identity - the ability to endow any phenomena, realities, concepts with the same meaning.
The most complex concept seems to be the national character, which includes all of the above - national identity, mentality, ethnicity, and adds a certain gene pool to the entire nation. So it turns out that all Russian people are similar in their characters to their ancestors, even for several centuries.
National cultural archetypes are peculiar elements of a symbolic nature, they include value, moral, semantic orientations. Comprehension occurs through the area of the symbolic.
Of course, Russian national culture has never experienced stagnation in its development. It is still developing, and actively, copying elements of other cultures. This is how a “dialogue of cultures” arises, which is always positive for Russian culture, whether it is participation in a bloody war, or diplomatic relations with representatives of other cultures. At the same time, a Russian person will never drop himself, will not disgrace his Motherland.

FEDERAL EDUCATIONAL AGENCY FEDERAL STATE EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTION

HIGHER PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION

"RUSSIAN STATE UNIVERSITY OF TOURISM AND SERVICE"

(FGOUVPO "RGUTiS")

DEPARTMENT OF PSYCHOLOGY

TEST

Russian national character

Part-time student(s)

Usanova Svetlana

Record book number Ps-19204-010

group PSZ 04-1

Specialty Psychology

Completed by ____________________

1. National identity of Russian culture

2. National character

3. Features of the Russian national character

Bibliography

1. National identity of Russian culture

Not only the dialectics of the Russian/Russian is contradictory, but also the polar - from nihilism to apology - interpretation of the Russian people from the point of view of understanding it as a cultural and historical subject, the creator of spiritual values. “Russia,” Berdyaev wrote, “least of all is a country of average wealth, average culture ... In its lower ranks, Russia is full of savagery and barbarism. At its peaks, Russia is super-cultural, the historical task of Russian self-consciousness - to distinguish and separate Russian super-culturalism and Russian pre-culturalism, the logos of culture in Russian peaks and wild chaos in Russian lowlands. Such is the elite version of Russian culture - its identification with the logos of superculture as opposed to pre-cultural chaos, in essence, not of the people, but of the human mass. At the same time, it is necessary to distinguish between the ancient Russian nationality and the people of Russia of the New Age - the era of the formation of the Russian nation - the state.