Cultural Figures Research Articles

Neglected Trauma: The Lives of Women Dissidents and Émigrés in Daňa Horáková’s Memoirs

At the end of the 1970s, the Czechoslovak State Security, under the banner of the so-called ASANACE (‘sanitation’) campaign, used brutal means to deport leading dissidents abroad and break up the domestic opposition. As a result, many cultural figures emigrated, among them Daňa Horáková, a philosopher and collaborator of Václav Havel. Drawing on her memoir and the testimonies of other Czech female dissidents (and émigrés), the text reflects on the difficulties that life in dissent brought to women, as well as the pitfalls in which women were most at risk of becoming traumatized. Among the most risky moments was emigration and the uprootedness associated with it. Against the backdrop of research on emigration and trauma in literature, the present study offers an interpretation of O Pavlovi as a testament to the destructive impact of power.

NOVEMBER 13 – IVAN LYPA MEMORIAL DAY (24.02.1965, KERCH - 13.11.1923, VYNNYKY)

Events dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the death of Ukrainian politician and cultural figure Ivan L. Lypa were held on 13 November 2023 in Vynnyky.

Suleyman Rahimov s Role in the Development of Libraries in the 20th Century

This article contains significant information about Suleyman Rahimov, a popular writer and cultural figure, as well as his life and activities. Suleyman Rahimov’s outstanding cultural services and the attention he paid to library development were examined in further depth in the article, and his involvement in library construction was recognized. The first work of Süleyman Rahimov, who started his literary activity in 1930, is "Shamo". However, he worked on this work for 50 years and made additions to it. One of his most famous works is "Black Earth and Yellow Gold". Now this work is used in 5th grade literature. Süleyman Rahimov was the chairman of Azerbaijan Writers Union in 1939-1940, 1944-1946 and 1954-1958. Azerbaijan Lachin, Samukh, Shahbuz and Norashen regions worked as a party leader (1934-1937). Propaganda secretary at the Baku City Committee of the Azerbaijan K(b)P (1940–1941), deputy director of the propaganda and agitation department at the Central Committee of the Azerbaijan K(b)P (1941–1944), Azerbaijan SSR He worked as the chairman of the Committee for Cultural and Educational Affairs under the Council of Ministers (1945-1958). Suleyman Rahimov always thought it was vital to take special care of libraries, and in many papers and other scholarly works he authored in this field, he made numerous recommendations to help libraries do their jobs better. Examples of his scientific research works on libraries are also included in the article.

Историческая память и современность: Башкортостан и Донбасс в годы Великой Отечественной войны

This article turns to the relationship between the Bashkir Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (ASSR) and the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic (SSR) to demonstrate the solidarity of Soviet peoples and regions during the Great Patriotic War. This period was a gruelling test of strength and unity for the fraternal peoples of the USSR. Special attention in the study is given to the role of the workers of the Bashkir ASSR in the restoration of the national economy of the Donbass, liberated from the Fascist occupation. Little-studied archival documents are introduced here, covering the extent of the aid, including social assistance, provided by the people of the Bashkir ASSR to the affected territories (machinery and building materials, industrial equipment, livestock, food and consumer goods). It is noted that during the harsh war years, the best qualities of Soviet peoples were drawn forth, which have enduring significance and stay relevant today: solidarity, cooperation and selfless mutual aid, which made an important contribution to the victory. In addition, it is argued that the aid to the liberated regions strengthened the economic and political unity of Soviet society and laid the foundations for the country’s successful post-war reconstruction. The research is based on documents from the National Archives of the Republic of Bashkortostan, which keeps an extensive body of invaluable sources on the history of the relationship between the peoples during the Great Patriotic War (materials on the evacuation of factories and scientific and cultural institutions as well as the population of the Ukrainian SSR, on launching the evacuated industrial plants in the Bashkir Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, on the cooperation between Ukrainian and Bashkir scientists, writers and cultural figures, as well as on the aid of Bashkir workers to the liberated territories of the Ukrainian SSR).

Restoration of Monumental Painting in Ukraine in the 1950–1960s. Social Aspirations and Ideological Collisions

The purpose of the article is to consider the peculiarities of restoration of sites of monumental painting of Ukraine in the post-war years 1945-1960s in the context of the influence of social, economic, and ideological factors. The research methodology consists in the application of general scientific and special research methods, in particular, analysis, synthesis, induction and deduction, generalisation and abstraction, semitic, descriptive, which together made it possible to obtain well-founded conclusions. The scientific novelty consists in outlining the general directions and approaches in preserving the artistic heritage of the post-war period of the 1950s-1960s, identifying gains and losses. Conclusions. Against the background of the global scale of the destruction of cultural heritage monuments, which required the implementation of complex monument protection and restoration tasks, the foundations of scientific methodology in the field of restoration of wall paintings were formed. The increase in the pace and volume of the restoration of cultural and artistic monuments after the Second World War was affected by new challenges caused by the lack of a material, technical and methodological base, qualified human resources, and shortcomings in the organisation of work. At the same time, deep destructive manifestations caused by atheistic state policy with a pronounced totalitarian colour have become fatal for a number of Ukrainian historical and cultural monuments, introducing a contradictory character into the establishment of the restoration work in the country. Thanks to the active position of leading cultural figures and the founders of the new Ukrainian restoration school of monumental art – Luka Kalenichenko, Olha Plihusch, Yevhen Mamolat, the first post-war decades became decisive in the formation of the national restoration and monument protection industries. Keywords: monumental painting, restoration, restoration workshop, preservation of monuments.

Valerii Herasymchuk’s biographical drama: culturological intertextuality

The article is devoted to a voluminous biographical dramas Valerii Herasymchuk — the cycle «Piesy pro velykyh (Plays about the Great)». It is not yet fully formed, as the author is still adding works to this day, so it is required careful reading. A professional analysis of the writer’s biographical drama in the context of the intertextual methodology of modern literary studies seems appropriate.It is noted that Valerii Herasymchuk created his own system of relationships to the biographies and works of each of his protagonists, practicing new genre experiments and updating the already known forms of literary biography in relation to the cycle «Piesy pro velykyh (Plays about the Great)».Analysis of literary works devoted to contemporary biographical drama allows us to conclude that researchers of its various aspects often ignore the dramatic works of Valerii Herasymchuk as quite difficult for literary reception. At the center of each drama in the cycle «Piesy pro velykyh (Plays about the Great)» is a prominent historical or cultural figure: Metropolitan Andrii Sheptytsky, writer and film director Oleksandr Dovzhenko, historian and fiction writer Dmytro Yavornytskyi, Hetman Ivan Mazepa, poet Olena Teliha, fighter for Ukraine Stepan Bandera, classics of Ukrainian modern literature Ivan Franko and Lesia Ukrainka, singer Kvitka Cisyk, and outstanding Ukrainian director Les Kurbas.These plays can refer to different models and kinds of biographical drama, which is a distinctive feature of contemporary Ukrainian drama. As a playwright, Valerii Herasymchuk creates one of the directions of its development. His biographical drama organically combines dominant tendencies tied to the broadest cultural intertext. Valerii Herasymchuk’s innovation is the involvement of dramatic genres in the system of motifs and characters of plays, when the cultural intertext in the dramatic discourseworks at one of the deepest levels — the genre level.Herasymchuk’s biographical drama, represented by the cycle «Piesy pro velykyh (Plays about the Great)», is distinguished by «biographical trust», brave genre experimentation, and different strategies of prose, fiction, philosophical and literary reflections. Summarizing all of the above, Valerii Herasymchuk’s biographical drama is a promising material for literary analysis and generalization.

The origins of piano performance in Podillia

The article analyzes the socio-cultural features of the development of Podillia's piano performance. It is noted that piano art is an important part of domestic musical culture. Indicated that the study and generalization of the experience of the past allows a holistic consideration of the radical transformations of modern musical art in general, and piano performance in particular. Features of the development of Podillia's piano performance are considered in the works of N. Kashkadamova, O. Lihus, Yu. Portnyi and others. Piano performance preserves rich experience and cultural traditions of domestic musical art. The authors draw attention to the fact that the birth and improvement of Ukrainian piano art took place under the influence of socio-cultural and geopolitical conditions of the ХІХ-ХХ centuries and involved the synthesis of the creative language of Ukrainian and foreign piano schools. It is noted that Vinnytsia, Khmelnytskyi, Kamianets-Podilskyi are cities in which piano performance in Podillya actively developed. It was determined that during this period one of the foci of development of piano performance in the Podil region were the newly established educational institutions. A. Kotsipinskyi, V. Zaremba, M. Zavadskyi, T. Ganytskyi and others were famous cultural figures who promoted the development of piano performance in Podillia. Their creative achievements intensified the development of piano performance in this region. It is noted that the expansion of Podillia's piano performance opportunities was also initiated by various musical projects, festivals, and competitions held in Vinnytsia. An important event in the cultural life of Vinnytsia was the holding of a series of concerts «History of the development of piano art». Organized by the piano department of the Vinnytsia School, this cycle of concerts was diversified by various pieces of music of different styles and genres.

THE CONCEPT “PERSON AND LIFE” AS THE MAJOR CATEGORY IN PHILOSOPHY OF CREATIVITY AND CULTURE OF MAXIM GORKY (ON THE MATERIALS OF HIS LETTERS)

In the article, based on the material of M. Gorky’s letters, the concept of “man and life” is considered and investigated as one of the deep categories of his philosophy of artistic creativity and philosophy of life. It is traced how the theme associated with man, with human life, was gradually mastered by Russian literature since the end of the Middle Ages and how it was transformed and solved in Gorky’s work at the turn of the XIX-XX centuries. The thesis is formulated that, along with M.V. Lomonosov and A.S. Pushkin, Gorky is a symbol and embodiment of one of the most important periods in the development of Russian culture. It is proved that the purpose of literature, according to Gorky’s philosophy of culture, is to depict man as a creator and the highest stage in the development of nature. The qualities of a person that are integral to his social essence are identified and systematized. An assessment of the personality of the writer himself is given on the basis of numerous statements about him by domestic and foreign cultural figures. The role and significance of Gorky in Russian, Russian and world literature and culture is determined.

Entangled Memories: representations of Crimea in literature, poetry and art

The United Nations' cultural agency, UNESCO, has recently added the Historic Centre of Odesa (Ukraine) to its World Heritage List. Odesa is part of the Crimean Peninsula and it is a legendary port that has left its mark on the cinema, literature and the arts. Crimea has always attracted a large number of cultural figures including Alexandr Pushkin, Maxim Gorky, Anna Akhmatova, Ivan Bunin, Marina Tsvetaeva, Isaac Babel, Boris Pasternak, etc. Like the Russian-born Anton Chekhov, Ukrainian authors who have written about the peninsula were, historically, not native Crimeans. Crimea is not only the focus of geopolitical conflict, but also the source of artistic and literary inspiration. In this article, I analyze some perspectives on Crimea, starting with Ivan K. Aivazovsky’s paintings (1817-1900), and some selected texts from those of the above-mentioned authors. For a current view on Crimea, I shall also consider some aspects of Ilya Kaminsky’s contemporary poetry.

At home in Harlem: The politics of domesticity in Faith Ringgold's The Bitter Nest

The Bitter Nest, a sequence of five large-scale story quilts created in 1988 by Faith Ringgold (American, b. 1930), probes the dynamics of an imagined Black middle-class family, their home in Harlem, and the connections they forge within it. Originally conceived as a performance piece, the quilted series likewise expands on its themes of home, family, mother-daughter relations, and Black female creativity. Bringing together storytelling and quilting traditions prominent in the artist's family, the African American community, and across the African diaspora, The Bitter Nest extends the concept of home to encompass Harlem itself, connecting its residents and neighbourhoods across multiple generations. Celebrated as a visual artist, author, educator, and lifelong advocate for social justice, Faith Ringgold, is among the most influential cultural figures of her generation. While major exhibitions showcasing the scope of her achievements have recently generated a welcome outpouring of new scholarship, The Bitter Nest remains surprisingly overlooked in literature on the artist. In examining the series' representation of the politics of domesticity, home, and family, this article aims to remedy this oversight as it expands the scope of critical discourse on the work of a major American artist, and directs renewed attention to Ringgold's powerful reimagining of the Black home and family in this series and throughout her oeuvre. Drawing on the artist's commentary on The Bitter Nest and related topics, the visual evidence of the quilts, and late twentieth-century and more recent feminist theory, this essay provides a foundation for further research into The Bitter Nest and its many contributions to the evolving story of Black women and families in America.

Synergity of religion, culture and arts: meeting point model of religious education for ustadz, culturals and artists in Garut district

Garut Regency is a religious area with good Human Resources (HR) potential, including many religious instructors, religious teachers, cultural figures, and artists. They became community figures who were influential enough to move the wheels of development in Garut society with a spiritual, arts, and cultural approach. However, their current existence has not been able to motivate people to improve their quality of life. The root of the problem is misperceptions among community leaders, especially religious counselors, religious teachers, artists, and cultural figures. They view that religious education or Islamic da'wah and the development of arts and culture are two different things and even tend to be contradictory. A qualitative research approach using descriptive analysis methods from field studies by synergizing and discussing with religious, arts, and cultural figures, then conducting workshops, preparing and disseminating model drafts in the form of limited training as a trial of the cultural approach to religious education model for religious instructors, Ustadz, Artists and Cultural People in Garut Regency. This activity aims to equalize perceptions about Islam and arts and culture and to create good synergy between religion, arts, and culture. This community service produces new ideas and models of religious education with an arts and culture approach that elevates and socializes local wisdom.

Girl Dads: spectacular girlhood, paternal appropriation, and the cultural dynamics of father-daughter filial attachment

ABSTRACT This article examines the cultural figure of the girl dad, which has emerged as a prominent masculine sub-type in the 2020s, celebrating and spectacularising the father-daughter relationship. A diffuse presence across old and new media forms, we trace the girl dad’s long-standing origins in film and television right up to its transmedial deployment in diverse contexts including professional self-branding on LinkedIn, a hit comedy special, and an aging action star’s entrepreneurial family branding. The article unpacks the cultural work that the hyphenated subject position does at a time when masculinity is putatively under duress and the girl has emerged as the premiere subject of postfeminist media cultures. At once imbued with positive associations of innocence and fun and insulated from any suggestions of naivete or weakness that might be stereotypically deemed girlish traits, the girl dad syphons the positive associations of girlhood only, often for commercial or professional gain.

ӘЛЕМГЕ ӘЙГІЛІ АКТЕРДІҢ БЕЙНЕСІН ЖАСАУ ЖОЛЫНДАҒЫ ЗАМАНАУИ ҚАЗАҚ ТЕАТРЫ (Ч. ЧАПЛИН ҚОЙЫЛЫМЫНЫҢ МЫСАЛЫНДА)

The article analyzes the first performances on the Kazakh stage of the world-famous image of Charlie Chaplin, the course of the production, features, ways of creating the image. The events that influenced the transformation of a personality into a "cult figure", an actor who began in his life, an autobiography left by the author, interviews with colleagues, wives and scientific articles about the actor were analyzed. During the production, problems, difficulties, familiarity of the theater troupe with a previously unknown work process, the specifics of the style of work from other invited directors were touched upon. From the research conducted about the actor, we know that the innovations introduced by the actor into the film industry have not yet lost their relevance, the image of the "Little Tramp" proposed by the author has caused the appearance of still popular funny images. Through the events that influenced and influenced the actor's work, the birth of the image of the main character of the actor "the little tramp" and the first image of Charlie Chaplin on the Kazakh stage are analyzed.

Celebrities dressed like a goddess: Admiration, cultural appropriation and disrespect

In September 2020, the Italian edition of Vanity Fair magazine published a series of interviews with Italian women in important professional positions. Each woman interviewed was compared with a female figure that had a paramount role in history or in popular culture. Chiara Ferragni, entrepreneur and influencer who had established herself in the international fashion scene, was depicted as the Madonna with child, painted by Giovan Battista Salvi, also known as Sassoferrato, upsetting readers and social network/internet users. This will be the starting point of our analysis of other cases. At times the media portray or adorn the celebrity as a deity, or as a cult figure, thus mystifying or desecrating the sacred meaning of deities and history; there are dozens of examples of famous people who were portrayed or have made appearances dressed as divinities. The article will aim to offer a comparative analysis by attempting to systematically explain the variants of the social phenomena found in the parallelisms between appropriation and spectacularization of religious clothing.

Peerless Dulcinea, Love of God, and Shoah

Abstract Building upon the extended notion of conceptual history as a diachronic study of conceptual interactions, the article begins with deconstructing the paradoxical semantic core of incomparability statements that, it is claimed, endows them with a capacity of stabilizing social semantics. By declaring certain foundational values—positive (Shoah) or negative (God)—“incomparable” and thus immune to the challenges of cross-evaluation, the users of discourse uphold the boundaries of civilized society. On a smaller scale, this exclusion of competitive valuation is undergirded by the ascription of “incomparability” to the small pool of political and cultural figures, literary artifacts, social events, and representative allegories. The conclusion outlines the social contingency of conventions regulating the ascriptions of “incomparability” against the backdrop of their discursive stability across genres, epochs, and languages.

Art journalism: formation of aesthetic taste or satisfying consumer demand?

The article is devoted to the consideration of the dual nature of art journalism, manifested in the trajectories of its development and the corresponding functions in the modern media space — cultural-educational and information-advertising. The author of the article interprets art journalism as a sphere of professional activity, the purpose of which is to form the aesthetic taste of the target audience and convey a set of values that have universal and national significance. Arts journalism is increasingly targeting a wider audience, as evidenced by trends towards deliberate simplification of text and increasing entertainment value. At the same time, the goals of art journalism — the preservation of cultural and national values, the comprehensive development of man, his education based on examples of world culture — are embodied in the implementation of the cultural and educational function of art journalism and, as a consequence, in the development of aesthetic taste using its tools and means. In an effort to satisfy the needs of the target audience for information about facts and cultural events, about works of various types of art, art journalism also implements an information and advertising function. The intentionality of art journalism is characteristic of both trajectories of its development in the modern media space: the formation of ideas, positions, and opinions naturally determines the emergence of expected emotional states in the addressee. The article proves that the information and advertising trajectory of art journalism organically complements the cultural and educational one: in any of the areas studied, the addressee is able to expand his cognitive and emotional experience in the cultural space, possessing creative potential. The cultural and educational trajectory of the development of art journalism cannot be implemented outside of information and entertainment: expanding the intended target audience by attracting attention to cultural and artistic events contributes to the representation of the news occasion from the perspective of organizing leisure time, deepening knowledge about a particular work of art or cultural figure and, as a result, ensuring and maintaining cultural balance in society

L. N. Tolstoy's Pattern in the cultural landscape of Crimea

The cultural landscape as a concept is not a homogeneous formation, but, like a mosaic, includes patterns of cultures, both ethnic groups and state and other entities, religions, professional traditions, art, literature, science. Outstanding personalities who have contributed to the culture of the area have a separate role. The Crimean cultural landscape is rich and diverse, which is natural for a multiethnic region with a rich centuries-old history. Many outstanding figures of culture and art have contributed to the cultural landscape of Crimea, such as artists I.K. Aivazovsky, M.A. Voloshin, K.F. Bogaevsky, poets and writers A. Mickiewicz, A. S. Pushkin, I. Shmelev, architects A. N. Beketov, P.Ya. Saferov and N.P. Krasnov, composer A. Karamanov, ethnographer and sociologist N.Y. Danilevsky and many others. The subject of this article is the contribution to the cultural landscape of Crimea of the outstanding writer, cultural and philosophical figure, Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy. Research methods used in the article are: the method of historicism in retrospect of the details of the cultural landscape of the Crimea, the method of historiography in clarifying the concept of cultural landscape, the associative-artistic method in comparing what L.N. Tolstoy wrote about the Crimea and its contribution to the cultural landscape. The scientific novelty of the research consists in understanding L. N. Tolstoy's contribution to the cultural landscape of Crimea. The cultural landscape of Crimea is rich and diverse due to both the unique natural and climatic zone and the geographical location of the peninsula on the way from east to west, which since ancient times has led to the polyethnicity, polylingualism, and multi-confessional nature of the Crimean cultural ecumene. The formation of the Crimean cultural landscape was influenced not only by communities, but also by prominent personalities who lived and/or visited the peninsula at different times. The contribution to the Crimean culture of the famous writer, philosopher, educator L. N. Tolstoy consists in his deep philosophical understanding of the local cultural flavor, expressed in the cycle "Sevastopol stories", as well as in the diaries of the writer, where he talks about Crimea as a place whose beauty and harmony embodies the philosophical harmony of thought, understanding by man and his the eternal pursuit of goodness and light as the goal of life.

The hidden power of children in Christmas traditions: Unveiling the role of secrecy and agency

The standard narrative surrounding Christmas figures like Santa Claus and the Three Wise Men often portrays children as passive recipients of adult‐orchestrated illusions. This perspective overlooks the active role that children play in sustaining these traditions. Drawing on a study conducted in Catalonia, Spain, and existing literature, this article challenges the conventional wisdom by using the lens of secrecy theory to explore how children exercise their agency. It argues that children are not just passive actors but essential participants whose understanding of secrecy contributes to the perpetuation of these cultural figures.

대통령의 국경일 연설문에 나타난 어휘 사용 양상

This study analyzes 76 commemorative speeches by South Korean presidents, focusing on Constitution Day, National Foundation Day, and Hangul Day. Among 28 Constitution Day speeches, key terms include “National Assembly, Republic of Korea,” “democracy, constitution,” and later, “unification, peace, autonomy.” Notable shifts occur, with “country's constitution” and “constitution establishment, constitution, North Korea” gaining prominence, followed by “democratic constitution,” “presidential election,” and “Republic of Korea.”
 National Foundation Day speeches (23 in total) highlight “Hongik Ingan, people, culture, history, authenticity,” transitioning to “unification, peace, North Korea, nation-building.” Early mentions of “North Korean Communist Group, national people, ethnic history, 60 million people” shift to focus on terms like “people, nation” later on.
 Hangul Day speeches (25 in total) feature evolving themes, from “scholar, culture, newspaper, national language, China” to emphasis on “King Sejong, cultural fi gure,” and eventually “culture, people, Hangul.” The 16th president's speeches uniquely emphasize “our language,” “King Sejong,” and “compatriots, Japanese colonial era Hangul, our language, Korean language.”
 The study extracts characteristic keywords using an algorithm, providing insights into presidential discourse on national holidays. However, interpreting their meaning solely based on data poses challenges. This research serves as a foundation, urging further studies for a clearer understanding of trends.

Local soundmark to conquer traffic noise. Case of Kotagede, Indonesia

Indonesia is noisy; traffic noise dominates almost all areas; noise regulations need to be updated, and noise is not a problem for Indonesians. It makes the unique sound disappear over time, leaving a uniform sound environment in Indonesia. Kotagede, the former capital of the ancient Mataram Kingdom, currently a preserved historical site and one of the tourist destinations in Yogyakarta Province, is facing a similar problem of losing unique soundmarks along with changes in people's lifestyles. It was exacerbated because the remaining soundmark had to cope with the traffic noise that plagued main roads and narrow alleys. This study collected quantitative and qualitative data regarding current noise and unique soundmarks in the past. It was revealed that the noise of Kotagede, which mainly functions as a residential area, generally exceeds 60 dBA, and some get closer to 80 dBA, dominated by human and traffic noises, especially from motorbikes passing through narrow alleys. Meanwhile, local cultural figures describe that Kotagede used to be rich in various sounds that are sorely missed today. They describe the soundmark as the orchestra embellishing their routines. Further studies are underway to follow up on these findings to revive soundmark and lower noise.