Yuri Rozhdestvensky’s Law of Accumulation and Non-Destruction of Culture
Definitions are boring, and any scholarly argument centered around a definition is suspect.
However, there is one sense in which a good definition is important – it is the sense expressed by
Confucius: "If the name is wrong, the speech does not obey; if the speech does not obey, the action
does not take shape. But if the name is correct, then the speech obeys; and if the speech obeys, the
action takes shape". The same idea is explored in Plato’s Cratylus, where Socrates says:
“Regarding the name as an instrument, what do we do when we name?… Do we not give
information to one another, and distinguish things according to their natures?… Then a name is an
instrument of teaching and of distinguishing natures, as the shuttle is of distinguishing the threads of
the web… Then, Hermogenes, not every man is able to give a name, but only a maker of names;
and this is the legislator, who of all skilled artisans in the world is the rarest”.
We can shape our action and discuss high and low culture if we first find a good definition for both.
Following the tradition of Plato and Confucius I would like to discuss the definition of culture
offered by one of rare skilled “legislators” of culture studies, the Russian scholar Yuri
Rozhdestvensky. In his definition there is no such thing as “high” or “low”. But before I present
that theory, let me say a few words about its author.
Yuri Rozhdestvensky is not known in the US. During his life, Rozhdestvensky’s works have been
published in German and Chinese. As often happens, his students began to worry about translation
after their teacher died, so now English translations of a few of his books are in the works.
Undoubtedly, it will be interesting for the Western linguistics to discover this philosopher, linguist,
educator and communication theorist.
Rozhdestvensky started his scholarly career from writing on Chinese grammar; his second Ph.D.
involved the study and comparison of 2,000 grammars and established several language universals;
he then moved on to comparative study of Chinese, Indian, Arabic and European rhetorical
traditions. However, discourse and communication interested Rozhdestvensky not as a pure science
but only as long as they could be put to use to serve the needs of his country and his language.
For example, one of the pressing needs of Russia as a multi-cultural country is diversity and
development of ethnic and linguistic minorities. Rozhdestvensky advocated for internal (domestic)
oriental studies – he submitted proposals to the government that warned about the precarious
situation in the Caucuses. According to him, rich economic reserves of the region – for instance, oil
and gas – conflict with its unsatisfied spiritual needs in education. The misbalance between
material and spiritual culture needed to be addressed. The Russian government authorized
Rozhdestvensky to conduct negotiations after the first Chechen war, and in devastated city on poor
paper the Chechens published Rozhdestvensky’s brochure on rhetoric. Rozhdestvensky said,
“Their eyes shone when I talked about education”. A group of scholars under Rozhdestvensky’s
guidance was creating a thesaurus for education in Chechen schools, and the university in Grozny
was translating that thesaurus into the Chechen language, creating necessary vocabulary in the
process of that work. After the war resumed, the dean of the Chechen university fled to Russia and
stayed at Rozhdestvensky’s home for a while. The project was killed in that war, but the need
remains to address the unsatisfied spiritual and educational need of the people of the Caucuses.
My teacher was a unique person. He was very ironic but also, or maybe because of that, very
accepting of others. His house was always full of us, students. He cooked huge pots of meals and
used to say that the tradition of Moscow University has always been for the professors to feed the
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students. He conducted seminars at his Moscow home and at his country house, and at every party
made every guest make a speech, turning it into a competition in inventiveness. His wife presided
over that incessant flow of students, colleagues and friends. The way he advised sophomores on
paper topics was, “Tell me, lovely creature, what did your parents teach you when you were little?”
I answered, “Dancing and figure skating”, and Rozhdestvensky said, “See if you’d be interested in
exploring similarities between language and movement. Those are the only human sign systems that
use no other tools except human body – there must be some fundamental similarity in them”. Eight
years later I was defending a Ph.D. thesis comparing methods of teaching native language and
foreign language with the methods of physical training. A good friend of mine, when asked “Tell
me, lovely creature, what did your parents teach you?” said, “To love Turgenev”, and eight years
later she defended a Ph.D. on literary styles, parody and composition of literature readers for
schools.
On his deathbed, when the priest was administering the final rites, Rozhdestvensky said, “I have
completed my task”.
One of Rozhdestvensky’s areas of research was Culture Studies, and this returns us to definition of
culture and the style changes occurring between generations.
In his Introduction to Culture Studies Rozhdestvensky defines culture as events, facts and artifacts
that are relevant for future generations because they provide rules, precedents and best practices. In
that sense culture does not include daily activity or new works of art. New artifacts or events
appear; then they are critiqued and evaluated by experts; then they are included in museum or other
appropriate collections; they become systematized and codified. Then they become part of culture.
The process of selection, description, codification is the process of formation of culture. In that
sense there is no “high” or “low” inside culture: if something is low quality, it does not become
selected by experts and does not become culture. It remains on the level of daily exploits, vanity
and handfuls of wind, and eventually sinks into oblivion. The difference between culture and “daily
exploits” is illustrated by the difference between Mozart and Salieri: the former remained valid for
future generations, and the latter was widely popular in his time but apparently lacked a secret
ingredient that would make his music unique and thus everlasting.
Once an event or work of art has become part of culture, it stays forever. This is the Law Of
Accumulation And Non-Destruction Of Culture.
According to this law, new facts and artifacts do not cancel out other facts that are already included
in culture; facts and artifacts belonging to one time period form a stratum; new strata enhance and
invigorate old ones. For example, preliterary societies use animals as a source of power (horses,
oxen, donkeys, mules, etc); ancient civilizations add mechanisms (windmills, water mills) and keep
and improve, through selection and breeding, the breeds of animals used as source of power;
modern civilization adds electricity and nuclear power and keeps animals as a source of power,
enhancing that old stratum through attributing entertainment value to it (e.g. hay rides and sleigh
rides at $3 per adult at a historic farm). For another example, every preliterary society has oral
speech, news and folklore; when writing is invented, old genres become invigorated and grow with
the help of the new technology: folklore can be recorded and stored, oral dialogue can involve
exchange of notes, news can be recorded and spread confidentially, public speeches now may be
written down before they are pronounced, and there is an expectation of greater uniformity in
grammar even in traditional oral genres. With the invention of the printing press manuscripts
receive standard orthography, footnotes, tables of content, i.e. printing adds on to the achievements
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of the written stage; and certainly with the introduction of electronic means oral genres are not
cancelled out but are enhanced (we can now talk on the phone or even a videophone), written
genres are enhanced (documents, letters and memos receive additional formatting and can be
exchanged faster) and printed genres are enhanced (e.g. many texts can be accessed easier, searched
for specific expressions and abundantly commented).
So contrary to what the new generation thinks, they are not starting anew; they are going to add to
the previously existing platform on which they stand.
An important task of society is to acculturate the young. The degree of cultural knowledge
differentiates generations. It is confirmed in the initiation rites that the young ones pass. All
peoples have initiation rites to mark a person’s passage into the category of adults; all of those rites
include a course of study and some testing that needs to be completed before the rites are
administered. The new generation needs to be “assimilated” into the culture of their parents in
order to be able to function. In the light of the Law of Accumulation and Non-Destruction of
Culture it is clear that no matter what the Animaniacs generation says about the obsoleteness of our
“old” “high” culture, it is our role as educators to assimilate them into it, even if it means teaching
“the dead white guys” (who have already invented a lot of bicycles, to a great surprise of most
young students).
Clearly, each generation has a characteristic behavior; each generation re-assesses “old” culture that
we provide for them. What exactly do they re-assess? How are they different from us?
Rozhdestvensky classifies culture as follows:
Physical Culture
Hygiene
Childbirth and birth control
Games
Rites
Diet
Safety
Etc.
Material Culture
Animals
Plants
Soils
Buildings
Tools
Roads and transportation
Communication
Technology
Spiritual Culture
Morality
Tribal
Religious
Professional
National
Ecological
Beauty
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Applied art
Non-applied art
Knowledge
Information
Wisdom
Science
Interestingly, the new generations almost never criticize or reject the physical culture of their
society: they accept uncritically what coaches and teachers present to them; the innovations in
physical culture come from the old generation – teachers and coaches.
Material culture is not so lucky: the new generations will re-assess existing agricultural practices,
technologies, buildings, materials, etc. and try to approach them differently, or introduce new
additions. However, the young ones are usually respectful of the old generation’s material culture
because they need to use it – they live in our houses and drive in our cars until they can invent
something better.
The worst lot falls to spiritual culture: learning it is a long and dull process, so it is easier to start
creating your own, anew, rejecting the “obsolete”. My 17-year old sister hasn’t watched any of the
movies of my youth, and when I suggest a movie that was famous 20 years ago she says, appalled,
“But it’s OLD!” Every new generation goes through this cycle: they create their own new works of
art and behavior precedents. For instance, modernism negated preceding culture and claimed to
start a “new era”. They create a new style, and call it culture. In this sense, every new style is, to a
degree, demonstration of ignorance! Often new styles are based on inventions of a new technology
or on an innovation in division of labor.
Another definitional tendency is to use the term culture for the process of creative work, especially
in entertainment and arts, where the artist’s individuality is present – i.e. to identify culture with
style. The problem with the process of invention is that it produces a lot of scrap. Current new
generation is at a disadvantage, because the process of creative scrambling around becomes
amplified by mass media. Before a work of art, or a new genre, or a behavior style can be properly
critiqued, it is already advertised and copied. But what if it is at best mediocre? It litters the
wavelengths, and only after that is discarded. Before it is discarded it has already made good taste
retreat. Fortunately, not everything that is being experimentally created in the new style will fall
into oblivion. While most experiments will be classified as pathetic scrambling around, a few
artifacts or acts will eventually be sorted out as worthy of becoming part of culture in the eternal
sense.
There is a dialogical relationship between “real culture” – things that have already been selected as
rules and precedents – and current goings-on of creative work. They feed off each other: new items
are born in the imagination and intuition of an artist; those new items are successful if they find
their place in relation to the tradition; tradition is enriched by new items. It is the role of experts to
determine what products of the new aesthetic should become part of tradition, i.e. overall human
culture (for the future generations to try to overthrow). It is the role of educators to include those
items in the curriculum and to adjust curriculum accordingly. It is certainly the role of educators to
preserve in the curriculum everything important that has been a part of culture.
Obviously, the aesthetic of the new generation is influenced by mass media and, as said above, by
the new technology – the electronic one. Mass information, mass culture, mass advertisement, mass
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games and various computer systems need to be discussed in terms of their relationship to the law
of accumulation and non-destruction of culture and in their relationship to style. Rozhdestvensky
describes them in his Philosophy Of Language And School Curriculum.
Mass information is created based on division of labor (financing organizations determine the
direction, information agencies provide the material, journalists write, editors combine pieces, etc.)
and is characterized by daily variation, timeliness and factual correctness. It creates an ever present
backdrop of people’s life – we are used to constantly receiving news collages. The collages of mass
information are designed to make an aesthetic or emotional impact, and thus they are not eligible for
a critique by logic. The only part of mass information that can be addressed with logic is the
information strategy. However, information strategies are not immediately obvious; to isolate and
describe them one needs to use special analytical tools, like content analysis. Information strategies
of mass information need to be constantly evolving. This law of evolution is caused by the
recipients’ satiation: when themes and commentaries have been repeated in mass media to the level
of satiation, recipients begin to reject them. Then a new information strategy needs to be
developed. Because mass information has this daily nature with quick turnaround, it is not a
cultural type of activity – it is mainly concerned with daily exploits and is not built to last. If I am
not mistaken, in Greek language the newspaper is called, appropriately, ephemerida. Mass
information does, however, influence the style and methods of education. It does so through mass
culture and mass advertising.
Mass culture is a curious formation. It is a system of entertainment that is based on quick style
changes and is linked to the changes in mass information strategies. It consists of mass spectacles
organized by professionals on one end of the continuum and amateur talent shows on the other, with
many intermediate stages. Mass culture is similar to the military and to sport in the following
sense. Every human society functions using 16 semiotic systems:
1. Language
III. APPLIED ART
II. NON-APPLIED ART
crafts
architecture
costume
dance
music
pictures
3. Rites
4. Games
commands
measures
reference points
signs
omens
future-telling
IV. MANAGEMENT
I. PROGNOSIS
2. Count
These semiotic systems are present in every society, though they may be fleshed out differently –
e.g. one may use taro cards, turtle shells, stochastic calculus or crystal balls to predict weather, stock
market behavior, war victory, etc. In the course of society development the military separated into a
pocket of activity that is serviced by all semiotic systems. It may even be called society in
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miniature, with its own forms of art, games, prognosis and management. The same principle
applies to sports: in the course of society development it grew into a field serviced by all semiotic
systems. In the 20th century mass culture became a third field in human history to be gemmated
into a pocket with its own rituals, language, management, prognosis, etc. However, unlike the
military and sports, mass culture is inexorably linked to mass information (being dependent on TV,
newspapers, radio) which is by definition not a cultural but a transient text. This makes mass
culture also a transient phenomenon oriented at the style of one particular generation (though does
not preclude a possibility of a timeless piece being created in that field).
Mass advertisement is, obviously, also dependent on mass information and is influenced by its
collage and figurative structure. Its goal is to cause a desire in recipients. To cause a desire it is
necessary to use semiotic signs to appeal to the rational, the emotional and the subconscious. This
is why mass advertisement turns to research in animal psychology. It addresses all levels of
zoological behavior in humans: tropism and taxis, which are behavior patterns common to all forms
of life, e.g. viruses and bacteria moving to parts of the Petri dish that contain more broth; knee-jerk
reflexes, which is a behavior present in all animals with a nervous system; instincts, i.e. innate
complex behavior programs, like those determining reproductive or social behavior in insects;
conditional reflexes, like salivation of Pavlov’s dogs; rational behavior demonstrated in an
individual’s learning, e.g. a mouse memorizing through trial and error the shortest way to food in a
labyrinth; and finally conscious behavior, i.e. solving new problems in new situations, e.g. a cat
rolling its toy under a closed door and walking around through a second door to reach the toy.
Common to all advertisement is attracting attention through paradoxical images. Also common to
all forms of advertisement is the change in the notion of “value”: from a philosophical and
ideological notion it has changed into an object of desire. Advertisement creates values in the sense
that it causes recipients to desire additional objects.
Mass games are lotteries, TV word-guessing games, trivia games, erudition competitions, and
others. While games have folk origin, mass games depend on mass information. The games
include prizes, i.e. financial interests, not even excepting children athletic competitions. This
creates an atmosphere of gambling and chance, where taking a risk or subjecting oneself to public
embarrassment may suddenly result in a windfall. Many such games are fairly plebeian, e.g. eating
competitions or public undressing and dressing; all are based on a desire of a chance reward.
Amplified by mass media they create an atmosphere of primitiveness and of possible luck.
Together, mass culture, mass advertisement and mass games produce the feeling of liberation and a
state of mind in which success is necessary, is achieved through a gamble without effort, and can be
achieved through a new gamble if this one didn’t work out. This combination contrasts with the
scary dark news of mass information. On the other side of the screen there are someone else’s
disasters like airplane crashes, famines, arms race, etc.; those gloomy events underscore the joy of
entertainment, game, freedom and intuitive good guesses. Life, ideally, is shaped as a sequence of
stages: carefree babyhood; studying for the sake of future earnings; earnings; and, thanks to the
earnings, carefree idleness after retirement. This system has no room for spousal fidelity, love
towards parents, tending to children. People steeped in mass media are seized by a desire to acquire
valuables and by the fear of losing those valuables as accidentally as they were acquired.
Beyond such state of mind there is real life with family, creativity, professional achievement. This
serious life requires consistent work and real feelings; it has its foundation in real culture, i.e. in
rules and precedents selected in history. Productive activity is impossible for individuals limited to
mass media culture oriented at quick changes of fashion and not familiar with real culture. Of all
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new technologies, computer programs reflect real productive activity. Computer programs can
participate in almost all semiotic systems that service human culture, e.g. computer design (applied
arts), computer graphics and music (non-applied arts), computer games, computer simulation
(prognosis). Two semiotic systems do not use computer programming: rites and dance. Those two
are not eligible for computer help because their material carrier is the human body which so far
cannot be blended with computer hardware. Thus there is an opposition between transient, fleeting
products of mass media and real culture that forms the foundation of real life.
One may say that the aesthetic of the new generation and modern development of culture have been
influenced by the tragic mood of mass information and the euphoric mood of mass entertainment.
Together they produce a few effects. Parenthetically, we should not count acquisitive impulses and
other physiological effects among serious cultural shifts: they are better classified as curable
diseases of mass media consumers; the cure lies in turning off the TV for a few days. Valid modern
developments include these: heightened interest in religion as the bearer of more solid moral values
(people need an anchor, after all); heightened interest in health and activity in the adulthood and old
age (valeology); heightened interest in games and winning (game-ology?); heightened interest in
world culture, its logic and typology (culture studies). Rozhdestvensky calls the former three
“stylistic interests”. The latter appears because it may be helpful in predicting future style changes.
Rozhdestvenky offers the following chain of reasoning: ecological and valeological interests are
often in contradiction with the game interests; the contradiction may be resolved through study of
style; even the most sophisticated mathematical models cannot predict future style changes;
however, systematization of culture, its typological and comparative study may give us tools to see
the laws of style shift.
Destruction of culture is called barbarism and is denounced and deplored. Barbarism can be
physical (when facts of culture are physically lost); more interesting are two other forms: usagerelated (when access to facts of culture becomes limited or hampered. It remains to be seen if
expensive opera tickets can be classified as usage-related barbarism) and educational barbarism
(when knowledge is not passed on, or education loses prestige, or schools are stagnated in their
curriculum and methods). All three forms of barbarism will wreck a country’s culture. We can
avoid committing educational barbarism if we preserve the old achievements in our subjects, timely
include new achievements in the curriculum and if we learn to teach our old subjects through the
prism of new stylistic interests, as long as we do not confuse diseases, like consumerism, and
temporary fashions, like messy look in one’s hairstyle, with valid new directions of style.
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