The thinning physicality of an artifact
Journal: Vestnik of Saint Petersburg University Philosophy and Conflict Studies
Year: 2021

The article compares two versions of the development of cultural studies. In the first (wide) version, culture is traditionally understood as the whole artificially created “second nature”. According to the second, currently prevailing narrow version, the subject of cultural studies is the mental (ideational) aspects of cultures; the physicality of artifacts is supplanted to the periphery of research. A narrow interpretation of culture leads to a number of conceptual flaws and thematic gaps. The