CHAPTER 2.

LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Definition of Nation

During various historical eras the problem of nation and national identity penetrated into
public life and had its peculiarities. Today national division remains the leading principle of
the geopolitical structure of the world. At the same time individuals, groups and citizens of
the old and new nations are constantly looking for the answers to the following
questions: Who are we?, What is our national identity? The answers seem to be rather
simple, however they are not that easy. Moreover, there are many political and scientific
debates about crisis of national identity that have been taking place in many countries during
the last 10 15 years, particularly in the USA, the UK, Germany, China, India, Ukraine, Japan,
Iran, Turkey and Russia.

According to Huntington, crisis of national identity has a global nature. The Japanese cannot
decide whether they are a part of Asia (due to a geographical position of islands, history and
culture) or a part of the western civilization with their economic prosperity, democracy and
a modern technological level. Iranians are quite often seen as a nation in search of identity,
as well as South Africa and China in a quest for national identity, while Taiwan got in the
dissolution and reconstruction of national identity (Huntinton, 2004, pp 35-36).

As stated by Habermas (1995, p. 255) in the ancient Rome natio was the name of the
Goddess of Birth and Origin and the word nation refers to peoples (often called wild,
savage, barbaric or pagan) who were not yet organized in political alliances. According
to this classical usage of the word, the nation was a patrimonial community of people of the
same origin, sharing the same territory, and culturally united by traditions, customs and a
common language, but did not yet have a state organization that would integrate them
politically.

Despite the fact that the concept of nation is often used in journalistic and scientific
literature, there are no clear and generally accepted definitions of the concept. The famous
British philosopher Ernest Gellner (1983) claimed:
A man without a nation defies the recognized categories and provokes revulsion... A man
must have a nationality as he must have a nose and two ears... Nation is not an innate human
characteristic, but now it is perceived as such (p.6)

There are two traditions of interpreting the concept nation which are conditionally called
Western and Eastern. Within the Western tradition (which can be also called English-
Roman or French) the origin of the nations is referred entirely to the period of Modern and
Contemporary times, and connect it with formation of the national states. The nations
appear as historically developed form of community of people and represent community of
all citizens of the same state. The main characteristics of the nation, according to the Western
tradition, are common culture, national consciousness and statehood (or aspiration to have
one). Defining characteristic of the national identity of an individual is entirely his state and
civil affiliation, not his ethnic origin.

The nation is seen as a social and intellectual construct artificial social formation, the
product of purposeful activity of political elites (Gellner, 1983) or as claimed by Benedict
Anderson (1991) nation is an imagined community.

In the opinion of Ernest Gellner (1983), the formation of the nation is a direct result of the
beginning of the modernization process, which basically means the transition from a
traditional agrarian society to an industrial and post-industrial society. Nations did not exist
before the modernization process.

Other tradition of the essence of the concept nation is Eastern and it significantly differs from
the Western. In this tradition the nation is a synonym of ethnos and is not perceived as a
political nation, but as an ethno-nation. The national identity of the individual is defined not
so much by his legal status, but more by his ethnic and national consciousness. Eastern
tradition of the nations origin is widespread in Germany, Eastern Europe and Asia. Herder
(1977) and the German romantics were founders of this theory and they did not accept the
nation as political, meaning that it is a community of citizens or citizens of the state. They
opposed to this approach the idea of the nation as the ethnic, natural community of people
expressing national spirit (Volksgeist) and, relying on the general culture, values, world
outlook features and the general origin.

Despite the accurate criteria allowing to separate one tradition of ideas from another, it
seems that this division is somewhat conditional, speculative and does not consider a
possibility of existence of the intermediate variations. For example, Jacques Maritain (1998),
in the book Man and the State gives a definition of the nation as follows

The word nation originates from the Latin nasci, that is, from the notion of birth, but the
nation is not something biological, like the Race. It is something ethico-social: a human
community based on the fact of birth and lineage, yet with all the moral connotations of
those terms: birth to the life of reason and the activities of civilization, lineage in familial
traditions, social and juridical formation, cultural heritage, common conceptions and
manners, historical recollections, sufferings, claims, hopes, prejudices, and resentments
(Maritain, 1998, p. 14)

Therefore, in the opinion of Maritain (1998) nation is a public community uniting people not
on the basis of relationship or similarity of a biological origin, but by the principle of belonging
to the same moral standards, history and culture. It is also important to mention a civilized
structure as a distinctive sign of the nation. The civilization represents a certain stage of
historical and cultural development in which the distinctive features are inherent. The most
important characteristics of a civilization are formation of the states, growth of the cities,
script emergence, and separation of agriculture from crafts and a class differentiation of a
society, development of technologies. The nation is formed from an ethnic community. It is
also important to emphasize that an indispensable condition of the nations formation is an
emergence of its consciousness, understanding its own unity and originality that are
distinguishing it from other ethnoses. Maritain denies that an ethnos possesses its own
consciousness. When the ethnic community realizes its existence as a separate community,
it begins to turn into the nation.

Another author, Jan Aart Scholte (2005) says that nations have the following characteristics.
First of all, the term nation is used in relation to a big community of people. Secondly, as a
rule, every nation has an allocated territory with the special status homeland. Each nation
takes root in a certain country even if (as in case of concrete Diasporas) the majority of this
group stays out of these possessions. Thirdly, the nation defines itself through designation of
signs which separate it from other national groups. Each nation declares itself unique on the
basis of distinction. These distinctive features can be related to language, customs,
temperament, forms of the fine arts, religion and race etc. The fourth characteristic of the
nations is that they prove emergence and further existence of each other. They arise not
independently, but through the international relations. It proves that the characteristic of
one nation are found out by means of contrast with the other nation, but also that the nations
are established on the basis of mutual recognition.

2.2 Origin and Definition of the Term Identity

Identity is one more frequently used notion in this research and it appears in many
disciplines: in the social and exact sciences; philosophy and cultural science; in psychology; it
is also applied in the field of interdisciplinary researches.

The word identity comes from the Latin word identitas (the same, equal) and it entered to
other disciplines from psychology and sociology. In psychoanalysis, it is used for designation
of the processes of moving into adulthood and also the mechanism for allowing self to
realize oneself. The necessary need of the individual for self-determination puts in action
process of formation of oneself which allows to overcome fear of uncertainty, to find and
allocate oneself from world around, having protected thereby from it by means of self-
determination. Process of self-identification is a necessary condition of entry into a social and
cultural space. (Patyrbaeva, 2012).

Introduction of this concept to the sphere of psychology as a psychosocial identity is linked

to Eric Eriksson. However some scientists believe that the progenitor of this concept is
William James. Although James (1890) did not use that term and used the word character
instead, he first described in detail the sharp and exciting feeling of oneness and integrity,
which in modern psychology is called identity.

Erickson distinguished the individual (personal) and social identities. As believed by Erikson
(1994), the personal identity is a persons own sense of uniqueness, the uniqueness of his life
experiences that also has some equality with oneself. At the social level, Erikson defined
identity as the personal frame that shows the inner unity of a person with social and group
standards and ideals and thereby helps the process of the self-determination.

According to Erikson (1994) identity comprises several aspects. First, the personality
perceives itself as entire selfsameness, realizes a continuity of the life and preservation of
this unity, despite all happening changes. Secondly, individual, personal identity is connected
to the fact that society and social environment will recognize and approve these
selfsameness and continuity. Dominic Abrams and Michael Hogg (1988) described identity as
people's concepts of who they are, of what sort of people they are, and how they relate to
others (p. 2).

The term identity was identical to the concept national (ethnic) consciousness since it
originally meant consciousness of an individual or a group. There is a sufficient choice of
possible sources of identity. According to Samuel Huntington (2004), those types of identity
are, for example:

1) Ascriptive age, sex, consanguinity, ethnic and racial origin;

2) Cultural clan, tribal, language, national, religious, civilization affiliations;

3) Territorial an immediate circle, a village, a city, a province, a region, a climatic zone;

4) Political a fractional and political affiliation, groups of interests, ideology, interests of the
state;

5) economic work, a profession, a position, a working environment, branches, economic

sectors, labour unions, classes, the states;

6) Social friends, clubs, teams, colleagues, the social status.

However all these sources are not always shown in practice.

The notion of identity is defined differently in the field of sociology. It means various
mechanisms of individuals entry into a social space. With their help the person seizes
different types of social activity, gets used to necessary social and cultural roles and the
behavioural installations corresponding to them, and acquires norms and values accepted in
the society. As a result of implementation process of identification, the person feels that he
/ she is belonging to this or that concrete community. This internal feeling of unity is also
designated by the concept identity.

As claimed by Peter L. Berger and Thomas Luckman (1966) identity is objectively defined as
location in a certain world and can be subjectively appropriated only along with that world.
... [A] coherent identity incorporates within itself all the various internalized roles and
attitudes. (p.132)
Each person changes both externally and internally, physically and spiritually. They grow,
mature, their views, personal tastes and addictions change, they have better knowledge of
the world and people, their individual experience changes as well. The person becomes a
different person, comparing to what he or she was before. But at the same time there is a
certain internal unity which allows him / her to approve identity of his self and to confirm
it with experience of identification from surrounding people. As stated by one of Erikssons
basic provisions (1994), identity is dynamic and never reaches completeness. It constantly
changes according to the new vital realities making the contribution to transformation of
internal state of the individual and his relations with a social environment. Change of identity
of the person during all his life represents a number of consecutive psychosocial crises.
Personal experience in a varying degree puts to the personality a trauma, but at the same
time mobilizes, motivates it to act, to further search of identity, validity and integrity of his
own life.

Thus, identity in psychology is understood as difficult emotional and cognitive process of an

identification by the individual comparing with other people, groups and collectives, own
ideal, with characters from art works and culture.

2.3 National and Cultural Identities

The concept of national identity is a complex and highly abstract matter. National identity is
a kind of collective, socio-cultural identity of the individual. It assumes the feeling of a
connectivity of the person to one of the national communities, identifying oneself with it as
with a whole, feeling of own coherence with other members of this nation. According to
Likhacheva and Makarov (2014), national identity is the sense of belonging to a certain state
or nation, which is shared with a group of people regardless of their country of citizenship.

The national identity of the individual is caused not only and not just by his ethnic origin and
the general relationship with the people who are a part of this nation. It is defined by his
citizenship and also individuals participation in social, political, cultural, economic and other
life of the resident country.

On the authority of Stefanenko (2003), there are three components in the structure of the
national identity: cognitive, affective and behavioural. The cognitive component of the
national identity represents the information about the individuals identification of a specific
nation, understanding oneself as one of its members. National self-determination includes
the knowledge that the territory has strictly outlined borders the borders of the state
separating it from the other adjacent countries. The child seizes this knowledge not at once,
but gradually, from vague and incomplete idea of where and in what country of the world he
was born and lives, to more or less issued consciousness of his civil identification.

The cognitive component of national identity includes not only awareness of the individual
on his own actual nationality. Along with it the knowledge of the nation to which the human
belongs and from what nation originates, and also what ethnoses are part of the nation which
represents him. (Stefanenko, 2003)

Cognitive component of the national identity also includes cultural heritage. The information
about national culture includes the facts of its origin and the history of the people of this
nation, their culture, language, religion, customs and traditions. For national culture and
history an important subject is the process of formation of statehood, education and
attaching the territorial borders, establishment events and change of political regimes.

A current state of the nation, as well as how the country is living now, what political policy is
and to what ideology adheres, what national interests of the country are, what is planned
and expected in the future; with what problems it is necessary to deal at the national level,
and how to solve them. Thus, the cognitive component of national identity means existence
of a set of the most different moments.

An affective component of the national identity includes the individuals feeling of

belongingness to this or that nation, experience the feeling of unity and participation in it
and in its national culture.

Furthermore, estimation of qualities of the nation, its value in the world, and also the
membership in it. As a result the person has either positive or negative attitude to the nation
which represents him. At positive perception of the national community the individual shows
feeling of satisfaction with it and self-identity. It rises the national pride of the fulfilments
which are carried out by its nation, desire to share with it this success and join it. The negative
attitude to his own nation express discontent of its destiny and a present state of affairs and
gives a negative assessment of the belongingness to it. (Stefanenko, 2003).
In these circumstances the individual is inclined to consider the nation from a critical position,
to diminish its advantages and achievements and to pay special attention to shortcomings
and failures. It has a sense of shame for his own national community, desire to disown,
separate itself from it, to avoid an identification with it. But both at positive and negative
attitudes there is a tendency to participate in the future of the nation as the person remains
its member, as well as he has an aspiration to hold it on the roll and to move to the new tops,
or to change a negative situation to the best.

A behavioural component of the national and cultural identity can be seen in the rueful
feelings for the destiny of the nation and it is realized in certain actions of its representatives.
There are different forms of activity and strategy of behaviour. It can be nationalism and
state centrism, prosecution of national interests or just high civil political activity.

Nowadays the concept national identity has become extremely important, due to the
accelerated processes of globalization, informatization and democratization.

The national identity consists of: the steady characteristics of the national culture, customs,
beliefs, myths, moral imperatives, etc. The components of the national identity include:
historical memory, national myths, traditions, symbols, national identity, national character
and national mentality.

Awareness of identity as a phenomenon is extremely important for the modern person and
has become more urgent with the advent of modernity. Numerous achievements in the
industry and post industry, engineering and technology, accelerated the pace of
globalization, innovative inter-state communication, accelerated development of
information space and made the process of self-determnaton extremely difficult
(Stefanenko, 2003).

All of the above processes and especially the process of comprehensive globalization have
led to a crisis of national identity.

The process of globalization also dictates democratization, economization, informatization,

cultural and value standardization: these processes exacerbate the crisis of national identity.

2.4 Definition of Culture. Mass Culture.

Its not easy to define culture, as this term is polysomic and reflects a wide range of human
ideas about it. Moreover, it is impossible to determine it in two or three sentences and
difficult to name any other word, which would have so many shades of meaning.

In the opinion of Gurevich (1981), the variety of interpretations of the term culture exists due
to the fact, that culture expresses depth and immensity of human existence. Every man is
different and many-faceted, as well as every culture is various, diversified, multifaceted and
many-sided. Each researcher draws attention to one of its sides. In addition, not only culture
experts study culture, but also philosophers, sociologists, historians, anthropologists, etc. Of
course, each of them uses their own methods and techniques.

Thus, according to the estimates of U.S. anthropologists Kroeber and Kluckhohn, from the
1871 to 1919 only seven definitions of culture were given, and from the 1929 to 1950 the
number had risen to 150. Moles in her book Sociodynamics of Culture (1968) already has
250 definitions.

Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn (1952) suggested that:

Culture consists of patterns, explicit and implicit, of and for behaviour acquired and
transmitted by symbols, constituting the distinctive achievements of human groups,
including their embodiment in artefacts; the essential core of culture consists of traditional
(i.e. historically derived and selected) ideas and especially their attached values; culture
systems may, on the one hand, be considered as products of action, on the other, as
conditional elements of future action (p.181).

The term culture refers to language, beliefs and religion, values and norms, customs,
costumes, music, art, food, education, knowledge and skills, and all the other things that
people learn from their everyday life in a society.

Culture is passed on from one generation to the next through the process of communication.
Matsumoto (1996) explained culture as ... the set of attitudes, values, beliefs, and
behaviours shared by a group of people, but different for each individual, communicated
from one generation to the next. (p. 16)

According to Momdzhyan (1994), culture is a set of results of people who created the system
of traditional values of humankind, both material and spiritual. Thus, on the one hand,
culture is a fossilized part of human society. And on the other it is a set of supreme human
values that define and express the ultimate purpose of human existence in the history
(Goodness, Truth, Beauty, Justice, etc.). Even the fossilized (for an individual) part of
culture is changing as well as supreme human values are changing. In other words, the culture
is a changing system.

Based on these preliminary considerations, we can put forward the idea that, although the
structure and function of culture is quite stable formation, nevertheless it currently has a
serious impact from changing mechanism of intercultural communication, which becomes a
serious factor of intercultural changes as well. Culture is not static, its dynamic.

Prior to the beginning of the 20th century the universal culture that is often referred to as a
classical culture. The cultural changes occurred very slowly and indistinguishable for the
individual consciousness, which gave to a general understanding of culture a fossilized,
stationary character.

As said by Momdzhyan (1994), local culture as a complete integrated system of symbolic

cultural values, reflects the completeness of human existence and humanity in the products
of its work. Completeness is generally one of the principles of classical culture. In music it is
a symphony, in literature a novel, in architecture mature style buildings, etc.

Seclusion and self-sufficiency of local culture appear in the opposition to other cultures. It
does not mean that local cultures did not know about each other, but each culture produced
a powerful frame, a kind of immunity to a different culture, that did not allow alien
elements and influences to pass over. Therefore, the opposition to other cultures was the
central cultural oppositions of local culture, so that their own culture was seen as true and
foreign as hostile (false). The basis of local cultures was primarily a system of ethnic and
religious values. Recognizing the existence of other cultures, any local culture has always
regarded itself as the ultimate expression of human culture.

External, alien culture was represented as an encoded system. That is why language was the
main communicational means between the cultures. Language is a living cultural formation,
and it includes such a component as memory. Memory is a timeless symbolic communication,
providing the real essence of living and peculiarities of culture; it creates a memory
distinctiveness of a particular culture.
Language in itself is a product of culture. It serves not only as a conduit of a large number of
cultural messages but, in its very structure and vocabulary, it carries messages from the
society to the individual and vice-versa. Knowing how to designate, name, identify, and
combine concepts through the use of the words that support them represents a type of
cultural channel (Moles, 1968, p. 15).

The intersection of two languages as spaces of two cultures can be described as a dialogue
between cultures.

Dialogue between cultures is a knowledge of other cultures through your own and your
own through other cultures by interpretation and adaptation of cultures to each other in
terms of semantic mismatches and even conflict. But the conflict is a form of contradiction
that allows a system to develop. The result of this development is mutual understanding
between cultures. Therefore, the language is not just a means of communication or
transmitting information, it is an essential mechanism of cultural communication.

Nowadays the process of destruction of the classical local culture is almost completed,
because of destruction of communicational mechanisms between them. With the sharp
expansion of opportunities for communication between cultures communication is changing
its qualitative characteristics.

Present state of culture captures stage of its transition from the local to the integration level.
If previously communicational space appeared between two or more cultures, without
affecting them and depended on them itself, now the cultures are in global communication
space. Thus, the dialogue between cultures is often forced by the laws and regulations of the
new conditions of communication. Its not a dialogue between cultures anymore, it is an
international dialogue.

During the period of the dialogue between local cultures the difference between them was
very important as a condition of inclusion through the mechanism of adaptation via meaning.
Today the world has already begun to speak the language of the dominant countries. The
dialogue is practically impossible, or rather uninteresting and meaningless or simplified. We
can understand any person anywhere in the world, but this is communication for
communication. Communication in this case exists without saturation with meanings.
We can determine 4 categories of culture, defined by their modes of dissemination, as
Browne (1972) suggested:

Those elements which are too sophisticated for the mass media are generally called Elite
culture, those distributed through these media that are something less than massthat is
such things as the smaller magazines and newspapers, the less widely distributed books,
museums and less sophisticated galleries, so called clothes line art exhibits, and the likeare
called in the narrow sense of the term popular, those elements that are distributed through
the mass media are mass culture, and those which are or were at one time disseminated
by oral and non-oral methodson levels lower than the mass mediaare called folk (p.
45).

Elite or high culture is a set of individual creations by a privileged part of the society
(intellectual elites), who are interested in new ideas, innovations, critical discussion and
analysis, or by their order to professional creators. It is generally seen as being superior to
other forms of culture and refers to culture that has long-lasting artistic or literary value.
Typically, elite culture goes above the average level of perception of educated people. It is
something unique, that goes apart from everyday life, something special that is worth
preserving and it includes art, literature, classical music, etc.

Unlike high culture, there is a certain degree of spontaneity in the folk culture and quite often
it doesnt have any authors, as it is authentic rather than manufactured, as it is actively
created by anonymous creators or local communities who do not have professional training.
It includes various elements: myths, legends, epics, songs, dances, proverbs, folk songs, crafts
and much more, based on the experience, traditions, customs and beliefs of the ordinary
people in their everyday life. It is also called an amateur (meaning the origin, not the quality),
or collective. Folk culture can be individual (telling legends), group (performing a song or
dance), and mass (carnivals). Although, it is generally associated with pre-industrial or early
industrial societies, it is still can be seen in different traditional or rural events in a form of
folk music or dances and is characterized by a high artistic level.

A popular culture is the next category of culture and in the opinion of Browne (1994):

Popular culture is the television we watch, the movies we see, the fast food, or slow food,
we eat, the clothes we wear, the music we sing and hear, the things we spend our money
for, our attitude toward life. It is the whole society we live in, that which may or may not be
distributed by the mass media. It is virtually our whole world (p. 260).

Williams (1983) provided several meanings of the popular culture: well liked by many
people; inferior kinds of work; work deliberately setting out to win favour with the
people; culture actually made by the people for themselves (p.237).

The term mass culture can often be used as a synonym for popular culture. Both terms have
a lot in common, but these terms are not interchangeable.

Marek Krajweski (2005) perceives mass culture as a phase of the development of popular
culture.

In the 21st century the mass culture has become dominating means of influence on human
civilization through the proclaimed values, installations, reference points, expression forms.

It is possible to divide all the variety of the hypotheses and the points of view explaining a
phenomenon of pop cultures into several directions.

According to the first direction that is based on the works of British book critic Frank
Raymond Leavis (1974), mass culture is the visible proof that from a cultural view the
mankind tends to decline. The culture is ruined by standardization and mass production.

Other point of view (Frankfurt philosophical school) explains rapid development of mass
culture due to era of consumerism: the cultural industry is interested in increase of cultural
goods sale, which are, as a rule, of low quality, cheap, but available to the majority (Erasov,
1996).

According the aristocratic theory, the reason of popular cultures domination can be
explained by the weakening of traditional public institutes, such as religion and family
(Erasov, 1996, p. 420). It means that modern society lost a certain hierarchy of the power
which was responsible for formation of certain cultural tastes.

Supporters of the progressive evolution theory adhere to another point of view. As claimed
by Marshall McLuhan (1964), the essence of progressive evolution can be described in the
following way: in liberal society there can be most different samples of cultures which are
manifestation of freedom of speech. Because of pop culture, people have an opportunity to
realize themselves in cultural space. Therefore pop culture is not evil, but beneficial.
Supporters of this theory prove that pop culture did not destroy the culture of esthetes: so,
for example, pop music did not become the reason of the death of classical music. According
to the point of view of the proponents of this theory, pop culture serves not the
destruction, but democratization of cultures.

Mass culture refers to the process how the culture is produced and whereas popular culture
refers to how the culture is consumed.

Mass culture is inferior to high culture. It has lack of roots in local traditions and are produced
by industrial societies for masses. They are aimed at the mass of ordinary people, but are
manufactured by companies to get some profit rather than reflect their experiences.

Changing forms of communication in human society has led to widespread samples of high
culture, their replication, which actually made them the subject of everyday culture,
characteristic of modern life. Natural balance between high and low culture disrupted.

Mass culture is a typical low culture, but significantly enhanced with the latest audio-visual
media exposure, enabling it to reproduce samples of the whole world and it does it very
quickly. It is old indeed, but differs significantly in its shape. It is based not on the ethnic,
locally closed base, but represents a new integrative education, in which almost all is
common and stereotypical. Thanks to the media, culture has no longer its genetic roots (even
if paired with the language of their culture), and now the culture is the property of all. This
is a typical formation of a new global communicative field.

Today, during the era of electronic communication creation, replication and perception of
culture became available to any Internet user, for any consumer of mass media.

The modern world is a great show, and it operates according to the laws of the genre. A genre
dictates, for example, the viewer and the performer must literally be merged, and perception
should not have purely individual, internal character. Hence the phenomenon of warming
up the audience before the performance of pop stars, etc. Traditional listening of classical
music (for example, symphony) is an internal dialogue between each individual and piece of
music and the fact that the music hall can be full of people doesnt not change the essence
of the intimate perception of this music. The show is always based on active behaviour and
mass interaction and instantaneous considers peoples response.
Moreover, changes in forms of communication led to such widespread patterns of high
culture in human society, for such a huge amount of replications, so actually made the high
culture a subject of everyday culture, a characteristic of a modern life. It turned out that
Bachs music by itself is not a guarantee that it will not become a product of mass culture,
the reasons for this lie outside of it. The natural balance between high and low cultures was
broken and the relation of its parts changed in favour of the mass culture to the point that it
began to act as the official culture.

At the present stage of development of the culture its dual nature is preserved, but due to a
sharp increase of quantity of mass culture formations, the mass culture becomes dominant,
at least temporarily suppressing the high culture.

Described above the state of culture, whether we like it or not, seems to be appropriate for
the stage of development of mankind and it is a natural-historical product. It has a deep inner
motives to protest against stereotypes and norms of behaviour, characteristic of the
generation of the modern era. People begin consciously oppose themselves to the culture.
People tried to protest by means of different behaviour, clothing, haircut, etc., protest
against the dissolution in a society. But the paradox is that the society turns even this protest
into a subject of sale and easily goes from the consequences of the protest, making it just
another fashion. Alternativeness remains alternativeness itself. It becomes a part of the
show, part of a long-standing universal carnival, which has become a reality.

Today everyone has an Internet access, can watch TV and listen to radio, read newspapers
and so on. These media have a tremendous impact on all people and quite often this impact
is negative. Mass media is one of the most influential ways of shaping cultural norms and
values, as it not only provides information about goods, products, services or entertains, but
according to a Canadian communication theorist Marshall McLuhan (1964), it also affects
peoples lives by shaping their opinions, attitudes and beliefs (p. 45). In other words it shows
information also about the social, political, and other types of relationships in society, its
cultural structures, including interpersonal relationships between men and women. It
constructs a system of symbolic values: social, moral, gender, family, and others.

Nowadays information is considered decisive strategic factor in all spheres of life. Nobody
will deny the fact that a human perception constantly comes under influence of modern mass
media. The world turned in huge screen of the monitor. The person obtaining information
through mass media also accepts the view that is propagandized by means of
communication.

Changes in mechanisms of broadcast of cultural values, in mechanisms of social adaptation,

social recreation and social identification also led to a wide circulation of mass culture in
modern society.

Among the complex challenges and problems that accompany the development of modern
society, a prominent place is occupied by the problem of global spread of mass culture and
its influence on the character of social and anthropological processes of modernity. As
evidenced by the results of international researches, one of the main dimensions of cultural
globalization, that is covering most of the regions of the world, is the spread of American-
style mass culture, with its focusing on consumption and hedonism that emphasize fun and
entertainment and make absolute sense of living material comfort and personal wealth.
Globalization can be called a replication of American culture. (Berger, 2002). Global mass
culture brings with it an expanding consumption of somatization. From consuming goods,
buyer starts consuming signs prestige, success, etc. (Radayev, 2005). Ideals and values of
the culture are losing the moral dimension. Cultural products, such as movies, books, music,
in a modern society are becoming goods, functioning according to market laws. The result is
the transformation of the consumption of single acts in a set of practices, totally covering the
vital space of the person. Semiotic cultural sphere is filled with threads of spending, pleasure
and extravagance, the transformation imperative guiding consumer practices in the lifestyle
(Kozlova, 1999). A global culture of happiness, pleasure and comfort is rapidly formed.

What are the features that fundamentally distinguish contemporary global culture from all
the previously known cultural forms? Apparently, the following can be pointed out:

1. Dramatically increased speed and volume of information transmitted, followed by the total
expansion of the audience (Delyagin, 2001).

2. Audio-visual flow of information is dominant, comparing to verbal communications

(McLuhan, 2003). The transmission of information through sound and image is a significant
breakthrough in the way of simplification of its perception, compared with printing
technologies. Perception of information through print and verbal channels requires quite a
hard work of consciousness and imagination, intelligence efforts. While emotive audio visual
images are easier to understand, because it relies more on the subconscious than conscious
mental mechanisms.

3. Simplification of culture, accompanied by its intense consumerization and

technologization of cultural production (Ionin, 1996). In order to obtain commercial benefits
while transmitting the cultural products via mass media channels inevitably will cause
simplification of cultural meanings, acquire only entertainment and informational purposes.

4. Compression of distance and time, erasing the boundaries between cultures and
territories through the media. (Inglegart)

5. Consumerization creativity: an increase in the number of intellectuals engaged in distinct

business areas such, as media, advertising, show business (Kornev, 1998).

6. Unprecedented before technological power of man and total dependence of modern

human culture and the technologies used (Inozemtsev, 2000).

2.5 Definition of Globalization

The concept of globalization has a big variety of interpretations, which are not always
successfully combined with each other, on the contrary, represent competing and even
mutually exclusive concepts. Globalization is the modern term which originated in the late
20th century. For example, according to A. N. Chumakov (2009), R. Robertson was the first
who used this concept in 1983. However, other authors designate other dates. Globalization
gained the greatest distribution in the spheres of economy, policy and political science, in
various humanitarian disciplines, in social science, cultural science, history and other
disciplines. However, the word is rarely used in daily speech in everyday life.

The term globalization gives rise to an idea of something global, large-scale, grandiose,
about something absolute, the phenomenon all-embracing in character. It originates from
the Latin verb globo and a noun globus. Globo has the following meanings: to round (to be
rounded); to heap up, to flock; to crowd; to pile up. Globus is translated as sphere, ball;
clique, band; dense mass, close packed throng, crowd; globe (Mahoney, 2002). According to
it, global is something large-scale and numerous that became result of association, unity in
one general circle. Globalization is a process which leads to this cohesiveness and unity.
One of the most authoritative experts in the field of modern social processes, the British
sociologist and the political philosopher Zygmunt Bauman, in his book Globalization: The
Human Consequences talks about consequences of globalization, not paying lots of
attention to the nature of this phenomenon.

Bauman (1998) notes that the word globalization recently has become very popular. With
its help many people try to explain any phenomenon, changes and processes happening in
the modern world. This concept quickly turns into the slogan, into a spell, in the certain key
capable to open a door to any existing and future riddles. However, with its usage
paradoxically the situation does not clear up, and on the contrary, becomes less clear.

On the word of Bauman (1998), globalization is inevitable and inconvertible process, equally
affecting every human being.

As one of the most noticeable tendencies of the process of globalization is deterritorialization

of the power, spheres of policy, production and management, release of business, finance,
trade and flows of information from spatial restrictions and a territorial binding acts. Bauman
agrees with Richard OBrien (1992), that today it is possible to declare with a bigger
confidence the end of geography. Distance does not matter anymore and in the modern
world it becomes more and more difficult to support the idea of geophysical border. Dividing
barriers, according to the author, arose and existed only due to imperfection of vehicles
which were incapable to overcome big distances. Nowadays the concept of distance stopped
being the physical characteristic, it becomes more and more conditional and turns into social
construct.

The greatest freedom and independence of distances and restriction by space has the sphere
of information. A possibility of separation of information from its medium radically affected
its speed. As Zygmunt Bauman (1998) reports, development of the computer equipment and
emergence of world wide web allowed to transfer messages almost instantly to every spot
on the globe. And it means you can hardly use distance concerning this type of information.

Zygmunt Bauman (1998) pays the main attention to globalization consequences for national
states. The author points out, that all the national states, seemingly, come to the end, and
they gradually die off.
Bauman (1998) points out that the deepest sense of idea of globalization is an uncertain,
uncontrollable and independent character of everything that occurs in the world; lack of the
centre, control panel, board of directors or head office.

2.5.1 Political and social value of globalization

Ulbrich Beck is the famous sociologist, political philosopher and another researcher of the
globalization phenomenon. In the book What Is Globalization? he tries to clear up already
existing discourse about globalization, to show how confusing the notion is and the concepts
used in it are indistinct and inexact.

The keynote of his book is the subject of political and social meaning of globalization, and
also consequences of it in the political and public life. Ulrich Beck (2000) is firmly convinced
that globalization does not mean the end of politics and does not result to it. Political activity,
he considers, is not only possible in the globalized world, but moreover, it has new prospects,
inaccessible before.

Economy, finance, information and other important spheres of social life turn into the closed
self-governed global systems that are more and more insensitive to the outside influence.
Their numerous Trans world communications strike to the marrow and repeatedly cross
territorial borders of the national states, without reckoning with their existence at all and by
that depriving their meaning. All this leads to the fact that the states appear not to have a
complete control over the events happening on their territories and cannot manage
autocratically their internal life.

Negative consequences of these changes are very traumatic for the national states.

The expansion of the world market has far-reaching consequences for the culture, identity
and lifestyles. The globalization of economic activity is accompanied by waves of
transformation in the field of culture, a process that is called cultural globalization. In this
case we are talking first of all about the fabrication of cultural symbols. Universalization is
getting more and more widespread in the sense of unification of styles life, cultural symbols
and transnational norms of behaviour global industry of culture in the increasing measure
means convergence of cultural symbols and life forms. A very important role in the
distribution of universal cultural symbols played formation of global information
infrastructure and evolution of mass media.

This is one side of the cultural globalization that has an image of a makdonaldization (Ritzer,
1983) of the world. However, Ulrich Beck (2000) tries to show that idea of globalization as a
makdonaldization is wrong. In order to confirm his words he addresses to Roland Robertson,
one of founders of the theory of cultural globalization. Robertson (1992) constantly points
that globalization is inevitably connected with localization. Within the same process two
opposite directed tendencies are carried out: release from the restrictions imposed by local
scale and along with it new localization, strengthening of a role and meaning of local, its
values in the conditions of the modern world. Local scale is a global aspect global and they
do not exclude each other. In the course of cultural globalization there is a collision of locality
and local cultures.

According to Beck (2000), cultural globalization means not only standardization and
unification of cultures, but also an opposite tendency of cultural diversity increase,
emergence of the mixed, hybrid forms of culture, cultural alloys. Besides a combination of
unification, on the one hand, and hybridization of cultures and increase in cultural diversity,
on the other hand, there are different tendencies that characterize globalization such as:
universalism and particularism, communication and fragmentation, centralization and
decentralization. Thus, globalization not only unites and connects, but divides and
establishes various barriers. And this circumstance only supplements the image of
globalization presented by Ulrich Beck as difficult, multidimensional and internally
inconsistent process.

2.5.2 Globalization and westernisation: optional identity

Anthony Giddens (2013) joins to the views of his colleagues also compiles their ideas in the
book The Escaping World: as Globalization Changes Our Life. Addressing the fact of
emergence of the concept of globalization, the author declares that in the late eighties this
term was practically not used neither in scientific literature, nor in the daily speech. It
appeared from nowhere, but it present almost everywhere. As well as other researchers,
Giddens (2013) points out difficult and multidimensional nature of globalization processes.
Globalization covers not only economical, but also political, technological, cultural spheres.
It is not one process, but a complex combination of a number of processes. They develop in
inconsistent or even in opposite directions however the author, as well as some other
experts, pays the main attention to the consequences of globalization, rather than to the
essence of this process.

The process of globalization, according to Giddens (2013), leads to formation of new

economic and cultural zones both inside the certain countries, and within the several
countries at the same time. The driving forces of globalization are economy, finance and
technological capabilities. Besides, the author points to the following feature of a
phenomenon of globalization. For people who are not inhabitants of North America or
Europe, globalization often is associated with a westernisation or as sometimes it is called
Americanization. At the level of mass consciousness globalization is quite strongly connected
with trademarks and logos of the companies that are popular around the world, like Coca-
Cola, Nescafe, Nike, and McDonald's as its cultural symbols. Therefore it is no wonder
that critics of modern process of globalization neatly and venomously call it global
makdonaldization. Even if globalization as a westernisation is not obligatory
Americanization, this process assumes distribution worldwide and recognition of global
meaning of the western values, control systems of economy, outlooks, behaviour models,
democracies and other.

The countries which are not relating economically and technologically to the developed
Western world, try to evade from the rules of the game imposed to them on the world arena
and resist to this process. They try to keep their originality which happen to be under the
threat of disappearance, relative political and economic independence and stability, a
cultural originality, ethnic and national identity. Opposition of globalization in its western
option takes various forms. Various antiglobalistic movements, attempts to find their own
way of globalization development, so-called alternative globalism.

Giddens (2013) perceives current globalization as a process which more and more gets out
of the control of the leading states and multinational corporations, becomes spontaneous
and uncontrollable, and therefore unpredictable.

According to the Robertsons model (1992), the climax of the social and cultural history of
globalization is the phenomenon of the global human status. The socio-cultural dynamics of
the further development of this phenomenon is presented by two directions, interdependent
and mutually reinforcing. The global human status develops in the direction of
homogenization and heterogenezation of socio-cultural patterns. Homogenization is a global
institutionalization of the life world, which was understood by Robertson as the organization
of local interactions with the direct participation and under supervision of the
macrostructures of the world economy, politics and the media. The global life world is
formed and promoted by the media as the doctrine of universal values, which has
standardized symbolic expressions and also has aesthetic and behavioural models for
individual use.

The second direction of development is heterogenezation, that means localization of global

or routinisation intercultural and interethnic cooperation through the inclusion of foreign
culture, exotic of the everyday life... In addition, the local socio-cultural development of
the global consumption patterns, behaviour is followed by banalization of global constructs
of living space.

Robertson (1991) introduced the concept of glocalization, in order to lock the two main
directions of socio-cultural dynamics of globalization. In addition, he considers it is necessary
to talk about the trends of this process, meaning the economic, political and cultural
dimensions of globalization. In this context of cultural globalization processes he calls the
global expansion of standard characters, aesthetic and behavioural patterns produced by the
Western media and transnational corporations, as well as the institutionalization of world
culture in the form of local multicultural lifestyles.

The above concept of socio-cultural dynamics of globalization is, in fact, an attempt to

portray globalization as a historical process for the formation of an organic human
mammalian species.

2.5.3 Cultural dynamics of globalization

The concept of cultural dynamics of globalization, proposed by Peter Berger and Samuel
Huntington (2002), has the second highest authority and frequency of citations in
international cultural and social debate about the cultural globalization. In the opinion of its
creators, it is aimed at identifying the cultural globalization settings. The basis of the
simulation of these parameters laid methodological trick, well developed by Berger and
Huntington previous experience of theorizing. Berger and Huntington (2002) say that the
starting point for the concept of global culture appears from the notion culture, which is
defined in the conventional social scientific sense as beliefs, values and the way of life of
ordinary people in their everyday existence.

The emerging global culture, as well as any other culture, detects, according to Berger and
Huntington's vision (2002), two levels of its operation - an elite and popular. Its elite level is
represented by practices, identity, beliefs and symbols of international business clubs and
international intellectuals. The popular level is the culture of mass consumption.

The content of the elite level of global culture are the Davos culture (Huntington's term)
and club culture of Western intellectuals. The representatives of the elite culture is a
community of ambitious young people involved in the business and other activities, the
purpose of their life is to be invited to Davos (Swiss international mountain resort, which held
economic consultations at the highest level every year). The elite sector global culture of
Berger and Huntington (2002) also include Western intelligentsia, which creates an
ideology of global culture, embodies the teaching of human rights concepts of feminism, the
environment and multiculturalism.

People's level of global popular culture is a mass culture, which is promoted by the Western
commercial enterprises, mainly shopping, food and entertainment (Adidas, McDonald,
Disney, MTV, etc...). Bearers of mass culture, according to Berger and Huntington, are
considered as the masses of consumers.

Popular culture, according to Berger and Huntington (2002), implements and disseminates
the efforts of mass movements of different types: feminists, environmentalists, human rights
activists.

The final component of the conceptual theorizing is the dynamics of the global culture. Here,
Berger and Huntington (2002) consider that it is necessary to reinterpret the concept of
glocalization, the basic term of the first interpretations of socio-cultural dynamics of
globalization. Unlike most of their colleagues, Berger and Huntington (2002) prefer to speak
of hybridization, alternative globalization and subglobalizatin. The combination of
these three trends of globalization forms the concept of socio-cultural dynamics of
globalization.
The first trend hybridization is understood as a deliberate synthesis of western and local
culture in business, economic practices, religious beliefs and symbols. Cultures are divided
into strong and weak, proposed by Huntington. Strong cultures Huntington calls all those
who are capable of creative adaptation of culture, meaning the processing of the samples
of the American culture on the basis of their own cultural traditions. The cultures of East
and South Asia, Japan, China and India, he refers to the strong, while African cultures and
some European cultures to the weak. Hybridization is not a trend, but a thoughtful
geopolitical project of the game of survival.

The second trend of the dynamics of the global culture is an alternative globalization, defined
as a global cultural movement that occur outside of the West and has a strong influence on
it. This trend, according to Berger and Huntington, shows that the modernization, spawned
Western model of globalization is a necessary stage of the historical development of all
countries, cultures and people. Alternative globalization is a historical phenomenon of non-
Western civilizations that have reached in their development phase of modernity. Berger and
Huntington believe that these different model of globalization has a popular and elite levels
of performance. It is called alternative only because it is contrary to the national historical
and cultural traditions.

The third trend is subglobalization trend defines motion with a regional scope and
promoting the convergence of societies. Proposed by Berger and Huntington the examples
of subglobalization are as following: Europeanization of post-Soviet countries and
masculine colourful shirts with African motifs (Mandela shirts). Berger and Huntington
believe that sub globalization is not part of a global culture, but rather act as intermediaries
between it and the local cultures.

Modern French sociologist Alain de Benoist (De Benoist & Champetier, 2000) sees
globalization as the end of the modern era and the advent of postmodernism. This
phenomenon presents the main characteristics of life:

- Individualisation (individuals cut off from everything that surrounds them)

- Massification (adoption of standard solutions)

- Desacralisation (devaluation of the sacred samples, religious beliefs, philosophical

systems)
- Rationalisation (use of instrumental reason)

- Universalisation (extension of the same systems of thought and values)

He also defines a globalisation as a reign of economic man, commercial values and Western
ideology as universal. The consequence of globalization has become homogenization, which
means uniformity of images, ways of life and behaviour to the detriment of public culture, as
well as reducing the diversity of the human, the establishment of the ideology of sameness.
Therefore Benoit emphasizes the important question of our time: a unipolar or multipolar
world? Unipolar is the same, unified, easily managed and controlled. Multipolar is varied,
interesting and developing. Benoit believes that the diversity of mankind is its wealth. Thus,
he claims that there are three powerful centres in the modern world: the US, China, Russia.
Europe, he gives political power, but in commercial terms Europe is strong enough. Benoit
also indicates the number of errors committed in the process of unification of Europe.