Historical Forms of Ethnic Identity in the Context of the Development of Contemporary Art

Abstract

The field of ethnography is extremely broad, nevertheless, conditionally it is possible to distinguish two classes of objects of this science depending on its attitude to its material. The first class of such objects includes spontaneous ethnic processes or processes which have taken place in the past, and the second class includes ethnic processes which by their nature, involve a certain social regulation. In the first case, the task of ethnography consists in scientific study of facts and maximum complete reconstruction of the past ethnic cultures, in the second its task is not exhausted by research and theoretical reconstruction of the activities of ethnic groups, although, of course, the creation of theories is the first task for any science. In society, ethnography is increasingly faced with the task of exercising, within the limits of its competence, a sociotechnological, regulatory function. Increasing the efficiency of carrying out socio-technological or already socio-pedagogical tasks by ethnography significantly actualizes the problem of further clarification and enrichment of its framework of categories and concepts, of mobilization for this purpose of theoretical and cognitive means of other disciplines (social psychology, literature, linguistics).