EDITOR’S NOTE

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MUSEUMS AND ETHICS: ROBBYNG THE PAST

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In this research we explore one of the questions which is part of museum ethics. That is the question of the rights of museums to lay claim to artifacts that are parts of cultural heritage of different countries. The question has arisen even more in public debates during the last ten years with a tendency of growing importance. There are several important parts of this problem. One of them stems from the fact that many museums have collected their artifacts without even asking too many questions about the origin of donated objects, although many artifacts have been collected legally. Many researchers, also, open the question of authenticity of those who claim the artifacts. They ask, for example, as the Etruria civilization does not exist any more, to whom the objects that are part of this great vanished civilization should be returned to? Should that be Italy?

CULTURE BETWEEN THE WAR OF SPIRIT AND THE SPIRIT OF WAR

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This paper explores the concept of culture in the work of a Russian immigrant writer Irina Aleksander (1900-2002), based on the concepts of “the war of spirit” and “the spirit of war,” which is important for understanding of her aesthetic and political ideas, as well as her artistic and socio-political activities.

GARBAGE COLLECTORS AND/OR ARTISTS: IS IDOLATRY OF WASTE UNCULTURED

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In this papers the authors attempt to explore the relationship between contemporary art and industrial waste material and its interface with society. In addition, the paper deals with the physical and mental human pollution in modern society and the role of the artist as a witness and a visionary. Discarded objects, exploited and abandoned, like tired old men, became objects of idolatry and a new obsession for a number of artists. Question is how did it come to legitimate glorification of rubbish and waste, ie. many discarded and worn items of industrial production and mass culture.

LIVING WITHOUT CULTURE: THE MEDIA AND CULTURAL POLITICS IN SERBIA

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Media are intermediaries in the system of culture. Their role is one of a watchdog, carefully monitoring the Government. This is why the topic of this presentation is the relationship between the media and cultural policy. The basic research question is: If cultural policy represents a response to cultural needs and problems of the society and particular social groups in culture and arts, in what way do media mediate to fulfill this function? Another question is whose interests the media represent. If they are privately owned – are they protecting the interests of the citizens in whose name the Government is carrying out public policies or are they protecting the interests of the capital owners? The number of published articles on contemporary art production and the national cultural heritage indicates that there is no correlation between cultural policy and the media content in Serbia. Cultural policy favors non-commercial cultural and artistic content, while the media favor commercial ones.

THE CONCEPTS OF THE CULTURAL MODEL AND THE SEMI-INTELLECTUAL

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The culture of a nation as understood by Slobodan Jovanović (1869–1958) encompasses all aspects of intellectual life, science, religion, ethics, literature, art, politics, law, army, economy, customs and leisure. The paper presents the phenomenon of a semi-intellectual as described and understood at the time the term was invented. It points to association with the concepts used in Bogdan Popović’s (1864–1944) “theory of the parvenu”. The semi-intellectual’s evolution ends with his taking over the position of the intellectual. The paper examines if the concept of the semi-intellectual as defined by S. Jovanovic is applicable to the present time.

CYBERNETIC EUGENICS: CULTURE IN THE BERMUDA TRIANGLE AND THE DISAPPEARANCE OF MAN

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In the work “Cybernetic Eugenics: Culture in the Bermuda Triangle and the Disappearance of Man” we identify strategic concepts and theoretical directions and analysis of culture in the late twentieth and early twenty-first century, authored by Paul Virilio, a cultural theorist and phenomenologist, whose thought is based in physics, philosophy, politics and urban planning. Paul Virilio’s analysis is focused on mutual interweaving and taking human’s ontology that takes place in the triangle of war – speed – the means of representation, such as machines of perception and logistics of perception. Virilio’s project is not, however, aimed only at identification of the impact of internal logic of individual technologies or technological phenomena on culture, but also penetrates into broad implicit impact that this technology has on the collective perception of space and time, where each new technological device has affected the discipline and colonization of the human subject, allowing establishment of the ‘globalitarian’ power which, supported by science without conscience and bio-technological extremism, shatters and breaks down the very foundations of humanity.

GALATEO ON MANNERS. THE RULES OF CIVILITY BY GIOVANNI DELLA CASA, 1558

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The rules of civility (the popular books on manners) may serve as reflections on the principles that shape everyday life of a society, offering codes of conduct to its members. Such was, possibly the first such modern book, Giovanni della Casa’s “Galateo” of 1558, in which the author dealt with the bad habits that were to be overcome if one wished to be considered a gentleman. “Galateo” did not represent a set of propositions meant for successful service at a princely court, such as Castiglione’s “Cortegiano”. It was written, instead, as a set of rules, which one was to follow as an active and civilized member of a republican society. “Galateo” focused on those models of conduct that represented basis for the definition of civility which understands the existence of cultural habits that are still considered positive and welcome, focusing on politeness, respect and consideration for others we are so much in the need of today.