MODES OF LAUGHTER IN SOCIO-CULTURAL DYNAMICS:SOCIOPHILOSOPHICAL RECEPTION OF OLGA MALTSEVA

Abstract

The publication is devoted to the analysis of the socio-philosophical concept of laughter, which was presented by a modern Ukrainian scholar Olga Maltseva. Our task is to examine, using the texts of the monograph “Metamorphoses of Laughter in the Dynamics of Sociocultural Space” and the corresponding doctoral dissertation, how it is establishing the “discourse of laughter”, a multidisciplinary research field with fruitful scientific communication, the search for theoretical and methodological foundations, a conceptual and terminological framework, and a special the language of «Gay Science». One of the questions that remains debatable is whether it will be possible to create a “universal scientific theory of laughter”.In the conceptualization of laughter and the development of a methodology for studying it as a sociocultural phenomenon, a special role belongs to social philosophy. On this basis, we highlight the main thematic regions of social and philosophical study of laughter. One of these thematic regions is laughter and national identity. Laughter is considered as a phenomenon of “frontier”. The sources of Ukrainian national identity are studied as a result of the “meta- frontier” existence of our people. The Cossack myth of Ukraine illustrates an unconscious appeal to trickster strategies of self-regulation in borderline situations, revealing the archetypal features of a “cheerful warrior”. Olga Maltseva considers types of post-modern carnivalization. Traditional holidays today are turning into total, artificial “festivity”. There is a carnivalization of the media, intellectual sphere and scientific activity, carnivalization of sports and fashion industry, leisure and recreation practices (carnival tourism), carnivalization of eschatology as a anticipation of an apocalyptic carnival. The result of the study became a wide panorama of the consequences of postmodern carnivalization. Laughter in transitional states of social development violated the usual mode of existence of stable spheres of community and culture, changed their societal destination, At the same time, laughter provides an impetus for the emergence of new attitudes, the generation of new meanings that can become the basis of the value paradigm of the future.