A report on the condition of culture and ngos in - Kultura Enter

intelligent” forms, this directive is expressed through patient supremacy of theimperial culture beam to not talentless natives (“Thanks God, they learned towrite!” – it is approximately how Iosif Brodsky explained the situation in brotherlySoviet literatures to American colleagues).However, in both cases, the described situation of prejudgment results inignoring indigenous literatures/cultures as little valuable. It is very difficult toovercome such prejudgment since the objective value of a composition does notmean anything here. It is subjectively low value of the very indigenous culture forthe recipient that is decisive. They know a priori that there cannot be anythingoutstanding there, and thus it is not worth wasting attempts, time, and moneyon a dubious, little prestigious, and, most probably, valueless thing. The essenceof the position was expressed in the reaction of one lady in a bookshop in Odesato History of Odessa just translated into Ukrainian by the Harvard professor PatriciaHerlihy. Having examined the book and sadly sighed, the lady put the bookback on the shelve and said: “Such a book has been spoilt!..” I should say that thepublication was quite high-quality and the translation was quite professional.But it was not the point. The publication was bad a priori – no matter whetherthe translation, the price, or the printing were acceptable. It was Ukrainian andtherefore nothing else mattered.All this can already lead to the following conclusions. Firstly, the Ukrainianculture in Ukraine will still be functioning as a culture of a quasi-minority (in bigcities) or quasi-diaspora. On the other hand, it will still preserve its declarative“state” status as the culture of the title nation that largely legitimizes its separate(from Russia) political existence. It means that the “nominally” Ukrainian state willstill support Ukrainian cultural institutions and practices more than any minorityor diaspora would expect. However, this support will be still decreasing – dueto the general disfunctionality of the state, economic decay, total depredationof resources, and less and less interest of the authorities in political legitimizationthrough the culture which is separate, mostly unknown, and unintelligibleto them.Meanwhile, on the other hand, all market mechanisms – in the absence ofproperly Ukrainian bourgeoisie and almost omnipresent domination comprador,neo-colonists elites – will support and explore the minority, quasi-diaspora statusof Ukrainian culture. Popular culture in Ukraine, despite certain local coloring,remains a purely peripheral, provincial part of the “imperial” one – as it was both20 mykola riabchuk