Academic Discipline “History of Ukraine” in Higher Education Institutions: Problems, Judgments

Background and aim of study:

In the field of social sciences and the humanities, in the late 80-s and early 90-s of the 20th century, a radical rethinking of values, social theory, and social practice took place in Ukraine. The domain of theorists of democratic countries has entered into scientific circulation. In recent years, many young Ukrainian scientists – historians have taken part in internships and attended courses on the basics of democracy, the state, and the principles of political development of society at universities in the USA, France, Great Britain, Canada, Germany, and other democratic countries. The general evolution of the theory from Marxism to post- Marxism, and from it to modern historical science, has taken place. Historical sciences have become vital, realistic, analytical, that is, science in the full sense, and not ideology. This arouses trust in itself and at the same time provides an opportunity to attract the comprehension of urgent problems of modern socio- political development.

Results:

In the mid-90-s, the first post of a non-Soviet generation of scientists appeared, brought up in Western scientific paradigms (albeit through Russian and Polish translations), with qualitatively different ideas about the craft of the historian and the model of social advancement. However, not all of those young people who have already established themselves as mature researchers have been able to pursue scientific degrees, and only some of those who have received them have been able to withstand Soviet practices of new research paradigms. In modern conditions, new conceptual and methodological approaches to the study of historical processes are promoted. Member of the French Academy of Sciences, Director of Research at the Graduate School of Social Sciences (Paris), Pierre Nora, put forward the idea of “speeding up history”. He believes that the key characteristic of the present time is not a successive change, but a change – the rapid overthrow of all events into the past, is quickly moving away from us. These changes destroyed the continuity of historical time, the straightforward progressive nature of the development of events that traditionally connected the present and future with the past. In light of this, a new question is raised about the options for historical representations. How a society, nation, group or family imagined its future, traditionally depended on what elements of the past it needed to remember. This attached importance to the present, which played the role of a link between the past and the future. The problem of memory is associated with the emergence of brightly liberating tendencies among social and ethnic groups – the emergence of various forms of memory associated with minority groups, for which the revival of the past means the affirmation of their individuality. It is noted that the memory of previously oppressed peoples arises mainly as a result of the occurrence of three types of decolonization – international, intra- social, and ideological. In modern conditions, self-education is becoming an alternative to historical education as a source of knowledge. But it is known that not everything is preserved in books, popular science films, publications, the most valuable thing is that the essence of the historical craft is transmitted orally in the lecture hall, at the seminar, directly from a teacher to a student.

Conclusion:

It is advisable to apply the principles of mastering historical processes based on the variability of teaching educational material and the creation of appropriate alternative situations in a higher educational institution. In our opinion, one should pay attention to the advisability of moving in technical and agricultural and other non-humanitarian institutions of higher education to reading special courses on the history of Ukraine, due to the profile of the institution, their subject can be determined to take into account two points. Firstly, these are special courses on a general topic: “Stages of the struggle of the Ukrainian people for state independence”, “Features of the formation and development of a multi-party system in Ukraine in the XX-XXI centuries”, “The place and role of the Ukrainian intelligentsia in the history of the Ukrainian people”, “Ethnonational processes the development of civil society in modern Ukraine”, “Agrarian history of Ukraine”, “History of land relations”. Secondly, as part of the curriculum, it is possible to highlight special courses on the history of Ukraine, taking into account the profile of the institution. The level of assimilation by students of the history of Ukraine in this context also depends on the availability of textbooks, teaching aids, and relevant methodological developments.

DOI and UDC:

UDC: 378(045):94(477) DOI: 10.26697/ijes.2020.2.11

Information about the authors:

Kadenyuk Oleksandr Stepanovych – Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor, Department of Theoretical and Legal, Social and Humanitarian Disciplines, State Agrarian and Engineering University in Podilya, Kamianets-Podilskyi, Ukraine. Research interests: agrarian history, socio-economic; https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2173-6055. Zavadska Iryna Mykhailivna – Doctor of Philosophy in History, Associate Professor, Department of Theoretical and Legal, Social and Humanitarian Disciplines, State Agrarian and Engineering University in Podilya, Kamianets- Podilskyi, Ukraine. Research interests: agrarian history, socio- economic; https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7680-9514.