Juri Lotman - Culture, Memory and History: Essays in Cultural Semiotics

Description

This volume brings together a selection of Juri Lotman’s late essays, published between 1979 and 1995. While Lotman is widely read in the fields of semiotics and literary studies, his innovative ideas about history and memory remain relatively unknown. The articles in this volume, most of which are appearing in English for the first time, lay out Lotman’s semiotic model of culture, with its emphasis on mnemonic processes. Lotman’s concept of culture as the non-hereditary memory of a community that is in a continuous process of self-interpretation will be of interest to scholars working in cultural theory, memory studies and the theory of history. Front Matter ....Pages i-vi Introduction: Juri Lotman’s Semiotic Theory of History and Cultural Memory (Marek Tamm)....Pages 1-26 Translator’s Preface (Brian James Baer)....Pages 27-30 Front Matter ....Pages 31-31 The Phenomenon of Culture (Juri Lotman)....Pages 33-48 The “Contract” and “Self-Surrender” as Archetypal Models of Culture (Juri Lotman)....Pages 49-65 Toward a Theory of Cultural Interaction: The Semiotic Aspect (Juri Lotman)....Pages 67-81 Culture as a Subject and Its Own Object (Juri Lotman)....Pages 83-93 On the Dynamics of Culture (Juri Lotman)....Pages 95-113 The Role of Art in the Dynamics of Culture (Juri Lotman)....Pages 115-130 Front Matter ....Pages 131-131 Memory in a Culturological Perspective (Juri Lotman)....Pages 133-137 Cultural Memory (Juri Lotman)....Pages 139-148 Some Thoughts on Typologies of Culture (Juri Lotman)....Pages 149-159 The Symbol in the System of Culture (Juri Lotman)....Pages 161-173 Front Matter ....Pages 175-175 Clio at the Crossroads (Juri Lotman)....Pages 177-187 A Divine Pronouncement or a Game of Chance? The Law-Governed and the Accidental in the Historical Process (Juri Lotman)....Pages 189-199 Technological Progress as a Culturological Problem (Juri Lotman)....Pages 201-223 The Time of Troubles as a Cultural Mechanism: Toward a Typology of Russian Cultural History (Juri Lotman)....Pages 225-243 Afterword: (Re)constructing the Drafts of Past (Mihhail Lotman)....Pages 245-265 Back Matter ....Pages 267-275