CINEMATIC DISCOURSE OF HISTORY IN THE CAMERA GLASS OF A HISTORIAN

Abstract

The article is devoted to the interdisciplinary problem of using cinematic interpretations of the historical past in the professional activity of a historian, including its research and educational tasks. The purpose of the study is to create opportunities for a scientifically based definition of a historian’s professional “niche” when he turns to the cinematic discourse of the historical past. Materials and methods. To determine the methodological foundations of selected cognitive models, the principles of neo-positivism, narrative philosophy, methods of discursive analysis of texts, including such features of the language of cinema as imagery and pronounced symbolism, as well as the provisions of phenomenological epistemology, were used. In their unity, these cognitive theories of culture allowed the author of the article to present a verified version of the results obtained by analyzing interpretations of the creative intent of film directors found in the scientific literature. Study results. In the first part of the article, the main debatable aspects of the problem are considered in line with modern scientific trends, convincing of the relevance of the research undertaken. In its second part, the analysis of existing research practices in this field of knowledge is presented, the algorithms for reading historical information in feature films characteristic of each variant are identified and disclosed. Conclusions. The final part of the article contains as results the definition for each of the identified research models, conventionally called “descriptive-informational”, “imagological”, “source studies” and “memorial”. The classification is based on the criterion of goal-setting and the scientific apparatus associated with it – the methodological approach, methods, the object and the subject of research. The author of the article gives assessment of their importance in the interdisciplinary paradigm of scientific historical creativity, thereby determining possible prospects for the development of historians’ research practice in the field of cognition of the past based on cinematography works. It seems obvious that the practical significance of observations proposed by the article’s author about the possibilities of solving the problem posed by not only active, but also critically meaningful inclusion of the cinematic discourse of history in the sphere of research practice and in the construction of educational space.