Russian Studies in Culture and Society

The article is devoted to the analysis of the role of artificial intelligence (AI) in the social, cultural and value space. It is noted that the initial status of AI as a technological phenomenon was the status of an object influenced by a person who created it and sets its action parameters. Using methods of analysis, synthesis, observation, description, interpretation and others, it is revealed that AI occupies a special position in comparison with other technological phenomena, having ceased to be only an object of the value space, having become a cultural phenomenon and having acquired the properties of a subject. AI itself has value, transmits a number of values ​​(technological efficiency, knowledge, intelligence, education, science, ideas, creativity, etc.). In this, as well as in the formation of the AI ​​culture as a special cultural layer, the subjectivity of AI in the value space is manifested. Further development of AI as a component of the value space is manifested in the fact that it is developing the properties of an actor. According to the actor-network theory of B. Latour, AI is a full-fledged actor of the social space, interacting with other actors and being an active agent. In the value space, the role of an actor is not fully performed by AI in its weak version. This role would be fully performed by a strong AI, which has not yet been created. It is concluded that AI is a complex phenomenon of the cultural field, combining the role of an object, subject and actor of the value space.

The article examines the phenomenon of cognitive dissonance among young people employed in the digital economy, amid the growth of precarious employment in Russia. According to the Federal Tax Service and Rosstat, from 2020 to 2024, the number of self-employed people exceeded 12 million people, while young people actively choose platform employment, despite the awareness of its risks. The author analyzes this paradox through the prism of theories of cognitive dissonance (L. Festinger), risk society (U. Beck) and the precariat (G. Standing), revealing the contradiction between the rhetoric of "freedom" and real instability.

The empirical part of the study is based on a survey of 450 respondents (18-35 years old) living in different cities of Russia, employed on platforms (delivery, freelancing, taxi), and an analysis of digital communities. The results showed that 65-80% of workers experience dissonance (expressed in the contradiction between the declared "freedom" and actual dependence, the absence of a long-term work plan, the "demonization" of traditional labor, the illusion of autonomy, ignoring financial risks), rationalizing it with different psychological attitudes. The manifestation of dissonance is manifested at three levels: emotional, behavioral and social. These signs confirm that dissonance is not just an individual psychological conflict, but a systemic mechanism of adaptation to precarity.

Conclusions

1. State policy (tax breaks without social guarantees) and the lack of transparency of algorithms exacerbate dissonance.
2. Young people aged 18-25 and residents of small towns are more likely to justify precarity.
3. Social consequences include increased inequality, postponement of family creation and "deferred poverty" due to the lack of pension savings.

The author proposes measures to reduce dissonance: regulation of algorithms, inclusion of the self-employed in the social security system, and the creation of legal associations to protect rights.

Background. The article is devoted to the study of the so-called parody religions. Parody religions are religious movements that have gained popularity under the influence of mass culture at the beginning of the 21st century, the purpose of which is to mock and reduce to absurdity the doctrines and ritual practices of world religions through protest forms.

Purpose. The purpose of the study is to find out the potential for institutionalization of parody religions and their consolidation as the full-fledged participants in the socio-cultural and religious life in Russia.

Methodology. The work uses the method of expert interviews. Nine specialists (including Doctors of Philosophy and Doctors of Science) in the field of philosophy, psychology, religion, and mass media were selected as experts.

Results. The following conclusions were made in the work. The main purpose of creating parody religions is self-expression of young people and their unification in the fight against theism; the main factors of creation are secularization, westernization of Russian culture, and urbanization. The degree of influence of parody religions on Russian public culture is insignificant. Despite the lack of need for legal regulation of parody religions, they require public control, prevention of their transformation into destructive sects, etc.

Practical implications. The results can be applied when lecturing in the sociology of culture and the sociology of religion. The practical implication lies in the possibility of using separate materials of the work in the implementation of state confessional policy.

The article examines the multi-genre works by Alexei Nikolaevich Tolstoy from 1917 to 1921 − fairy tales, short stories, novellas and plays − in which various types of artistic conventions are used. The tasks of comparing these works are subordinated to the goal of identifying the role and types of artistic convention; for this purpose, the author uses comparative, problematic, chronological, cultural-historical and biographical methods. Such structuring and comprehensive study of different types of conventionality in this historical period has not been undertaken previously and represents the scientific novelty of the article. The author highlights the conventionality in fairy tales (“Fofka”, “The Soldier and the Devil”), the types of conventionality in realistic stories and the play “Danton's Death” − psychologically motivated fantasy (visions – “In Delirium”), (dreams – “A Dream in a Thunderstorm”, “Aunt Marya Grigoryevna”, “The Tale of the Time of Troubles”, “Danton's Death”), carnival conventionality in the play “Love is a Golden Book” and the story “Count Cagliostro” and comes to the conclusion that A.N. Tolstoy's appeal to the types of artistic conventionality was a consequence of his understanding of a complex historical era and the desire to convey it in all its multidimensionality and diversity.