Маскультурний концепт народництва
Masscult Concept of Populism

Summary/Abstract: Ukrainian romanticists, having put the grass-roots language into the foundation of the national and cultural revival and abandoning the legacy of the Baroque, made a fatal mistake. Its consequences can be clearly seen now, namely – they identified traditional folk and national cultures, thus creating masscult concept of populism. At the turn of the 18th century, as Tamara Hundorova mentions in her book called "Kitsch and Literature. Travesties", popular Ukrainian literature evolved and special kind of kitsch was born, which can now be called colonial. And it is at this time when vernacular acquires features of a subculture that is a sort of burlesque Little-Russian style, which survived until today in the form of the language-mix kitsch. The Little-Russian style is a mass culture product that began to emerge in the late 18th century. And even earlier – in the 17th century, when puppet-theater drama was well known throughout Ukraine, popularly called Vertep. Therefore, Vertep was probably first to have legitimized mass culture of the Little-Russian style. At that time, there were prevalent forms of popular culture such as amateur paintings, adventure literature, exotic travels and masquerades. The Little-Russian style was not unsuccessfully sustained by imperial mechanisms directed against the cultural identity of Ukraine. Understanding the masscult concept of populism in specific historic and social contexts attempts to summarize in culture, philosophy, art, and in the field of political mindsets. In light of the first context, unlike the European culture, the Ukrainian culture, as part of imperial, never experienced similar capitalist fervor of the nineteenth century and was based on conservative ideology of the nobility and governors-general, and could not build its own perception of the world. The second context – the non-canonical subordination of the Ukrainian church to Moscow in the 17th century meant nothing but the establishment of the colonial style in the spiritual sphere, which led to strong assimilation processes and fatal destruction of the authentic nature of the Ukrainian culture’s, according to Oksana Palkhovska. The third historic and social context is in separation of the Ukrainian people relentlessly and tirelessly cultivated by Russia. The fourth context dimension follows from the third one – the loss by Ukraine of its elitist cultural face. Finally, the fifth historical context of masscult concept of populism summarizes all the previous – separation of the Ukrainian culture from European, depriving it of communication tools. Therefore, the masscult concept of populism, as slave culture, assumed certain ideological struggle with the dominant and absorbing culture. This is its inherent positive pattern under colonial existence. On the other hand, populist unitarity, it's pathetic element, mythological origin and verve are inseparable from imitation of the national character, provinciality, brute populace and colonial kitsch. The Ukrainian populism existed beyond the parameters of cultural discourse of the era, but in its own local parameters often bound to issues of self-preservation and identity: nation, nationality, culture and renaissance. Populism, as an organic philosophy of any society under specific historic and economic conditions, is always on guard of national identity in transition from one historical formation to another. Its mission is exhausted at this point though. If the masscult concept of populism fails to "grow" into its transition phase, it becomes a destructive factor in the era of mature civilization. This is what actually happened to the Ukrainian populism. After two centuries of imperialist experimentation, its code undergone such complex modifications that its epidemic became a deadly threat to the whole Ukrainian identity in Ukraine itself and worldwide, despite the carved out national independence.

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