Russia and Japan: to the question of the historical tradition of cultural in-teraction

Abstract

The study raises the question of the importance, the content and the way of transmission of historical tradition during the cultural interference. It regards historical tradition as a process of cultural heritage conservation and its renewal in later generations through acceptance of cultural objects and moral values. To compare the process of cultural interference Russia and Japan were chosen. Despite having significant differences in content, both cultures have one important trait in common: at the beginning of formation of the national identity each county was involved into intensive cultural adoption of Eastern and West European cultural forms. The study shows that Russia and Japan had similar in form, but completely specific in content periods of adoption and they managed to conserve and strengthen their national identities. It also demonstrates that Russia and Japan have similar traits in the way of borrowing of European cultural forms. First of all, both countries dealt with prejudices, fought with the economic lag and suffered from the need to educate people. Secondly, both cultures showed their ability to transform the adopted forms and assimilate in an appropriate way without any loss of their national identity. The similarities in the process of interaction in the Russian and Japanese history help to show some differences concerning the content and geopolitics. For example, Japanese elite group, as compared with that of Russia, managed to be more pragmatic and adopted only European technical innovations without letting alien ideas and values penetrate into its cultural centre