The article examines the situation associated with the spread of social networks, which brought not only new communication opportunities, but also the risks of blurring the boundaries between privacy and publicity. People voluntarily share personal data in exchange for public acceptance. This information is recorded and studied by various government and commercial institutions. The danger to information privacy as a right to control access to personal information is aggravated by the peculiarities of online communication, which is characterized by “context collapse”: (...) the merging of different audiences with different norms and values. Content posted on social media is searchable beyond a specific point in time and situation. If offline communication involves a foreseeable number of interlocutors, there is an “invisible audience” on social networks, which leads to information asymmetry. However, despite the fact that most users are aware of the potential dangers of privacy breaches, they share personal information on social networks. This phenomenon is called the privacy paradox. The reasons for this behavior are a lack of technical and social skills, a reluctance to spend time and energy on measures to minimize risks, a desire to have wide social connections and skepticism about the effectiveness of the efforts being made. The behavior of users on social networks is influenced primarily by factors such as age and education. The most concerned about the preservation of privacy are young people and middle-aged people, as they have to manage the most complex social relations. (shrink)

_Purpose._ The article presents exploring the cultural and anthropological traits of consumers and producers of cultural services and products in the digital epoch. There have been singled out two types of cultural subjectivity according to the aim of a person’s activity in the virtual net: either production of things, services, and technologies or the consumption and creative use of all mentioned innovations. So these sociocultural formations are called "geek" and "chic" subcultures. _Theoretical basis._ The historical genealogy of the definitions was (...) analyzed, so as the changes in social esteem of the contribution of geeky persons to modern art and design practices. Social and cultural identities of those who belong to the modern youth-subcultural communities have been formed according to the topology and temporality of digital trends. To explain the worldview characteristics of the members of those subcultures the concept of "the New Middle Ages" was used to discover the values and pursuits of those who represent geek and chic subcultures. The study is based on the theoretical works of such classical authors as A. Toffler, and Z. Bauman, as well as current investigators of youth cultures. They are Calum Finister, Thomas V. Pollet, Nick Neave, Jessica McCain, Billy Wong. The chic subculture is oriented toward the imitation of visual images, consumer habits, and the way of life of successful (or seemed to be such) people. Glamorous followers need to receive approvals and likes from like-minded people. The geek subculture is more inner-sense-oriented. It unites intellectuals and activists who have common creative intentions. _Originality._ There have been analyzed the main attributes and features of such modern subcultures were conditionally named chic and geek. They were analyzed in the context of the concept of the New Middle Ages. _Conclusions._ The virtual user’s life world seems to be diverse only quantitatively, but qualitatively it is as narrow, mythopoetic, and esoterically uncritical as the world of the Medieval person, who used to live the whole life in the same place, mai in one’s village. But thanks to the merger of the IT industry with effective social management, the geek culture becomes a powerful super-subculture that defends values of social good, industrial productivity, and cultural creativity. Chic subculture creates new trends in fashion and art discourse. It develops modern lifestyles, its visual images with which our era will be associated in the future. (shrink)

The shaping of a personality occurs in a given social environment, of which the intellectual, moral, and social-psychological climate characteristic of the given society is an inseparable component. This state of society is created by virtue of the cultural values society has at its disposal, the totality of the social norms regulating the social and interpersonal relationships among human beings and their social behavior, and by virtue of the entire spectrum of social feelings, attitudes, emotions, and value orientations of the (...) members of society. (shrink)

The article is dedicated to the early, Paris period of life and literary work of Nikolay Gumilyov (1906–1908), which is still insufficiently studied and understood by scholars. The paper aims to study the influence of this period on shaping Gumilyov’s personality and his spiritual values and aspirations, polishing of his literary taste, gradual gaining of an independent ideological and aesthetic platform and development of his inimitable poetic style. – The research for the paper was based on the comprehensive historical and (...) cultural approach, with application of literary and historical analysis techniques. This approach was used to consider the memoirs of his contemporaries, Gumilyov’s letters to Valery Bryusov, as well as his poetry, prose and art criticism during that period. Particular attention is paid to the history of publishing Sirius magazine and to such poorly studied aspects as the symbolic meaning of the magazine name and the first manifestations of acmeism in its aesthetic platform. The authors emphasize the fruitful and creative character of Gumilyov’s friendship with Sirius co-editor, artist and art critic M.V. Farmakovsky, whose name is unfairly forgotten. – They come to the conclusion that the “first Paris period” was not only the novice time for Gumilyov but also the start of his personal and creative self-identity. It was in Paris that the strong and persistent character of the poet was formed, his skills honed and his inimitable style created, with the colour-sound synthesis of the striking romantic picturesqueness and a clear strong word. Paris was the place of polishing the artistic taste, developing a comprehensive system of views, finding main poetic motifs and setting life goals of Gumilyov, a rising star of the Silver Age. (shrink)

Ancient Rus church music is one of the brightest pages of spiritual and artistic culture. It is included in the synthesis of arts along with construction, monumental and fresco painting, icon painting, fine plastics, applied art, literature.

He work of the Russian nationwide conference ‘National identity through language and literature. Characteristics of conceptoshere of national culture‘ is analyzed in the article. Previous theoretical sources on the issue in question are summarized. The matters represented in the considered scientific forum are generalized. Diachronic analysis of national cultural consciousness as well as complex cognitive-based approach are used to investigate the issue. Special attention is paid to the study of linguistic world-image as exemplified in fiction, folklore, religious texts, business papers, (...) scholarly works and media texts, as well as to the research of intercultural communication in the era of multiculturalism and globalization. As long as terms ‘cultural code‘, ‘national code‘, and ‘fictional code‘ are not precisely defined, the problem of terminological field was noted, as well as the issue of linguo-cognitive interpretation of methods for representing country image in linguistic consciousness. The attention was paid to Russian as a foreign language, to perception and transforming of European cultural codes by American and western European writers in synchronous and diachronic ways. Geopolitical factor of North and South that matters both in global and local context was noted, particularly the issue of German distinction of the modern European mindset was reviewed. Lots of speaker papers mirrored interdisciplinary links that is of importance for contemporary scholarship in the context of globalization and multicultural society. Up-to-date schools of thought in the field of linguistics, literary studies and journalism were represented. (shrink)

Because of the outward openness of Platonov's world, and the existence in it of recognizable, seemingly deliberately enhanced motifs, one can easily be misled or in any event confused, never getting to the source of this diversity of meanings which, however, by being repeated over and over again, becomes a kind of monotone calling upon us to make sense of it as well. Something similar may also be identified in Dostoevsky: one and the same element, repeated incessantly, creates an "emblematic (...) theme" or an "ontological schema" the contours of which are discernible in almost all his major writings. (shrink)

Konstantin Leont'ev is one of those Russian thinkers about whom much has been said and written both in Russia and abroad. Interest in his works has increased steadily in the past five years: collections of his works are being published, special conferences are being held, and articles and monographs are being written. In the process it turns out that a thinker who died a hundred years ago is perceived in Russia as "our contemporary," as a clairvoyant and a prophet, but (...) also in large measure as a teacher to whom many are inclined to turn in their searches for intellectual world-view and ideological orientations. (shrink)