Ethnocultural Frontier: Conceptual, Typological, and Circumstantial Aspects (Alien — Other — One’s own)

Abstract

Scholarly discussions of the frontier, conspicuously vibrant in the recent decades, have expanded the former regional framework of American frontier related to the specific conditions and circumstances of the time of the Wild West colonization. Currently, these discussions cover various fields of humanities, and are becoming more relevant at the present stage of the global historical development, as they signal new civilizational traits and specific features of this stage. By this, I imply globalization and glocalization processes that encompass multiplicity and variability, also unpredictability, oddity, and non-stability of combinations as well as diversity of ambivalent forms and transitive states emerging on this basis. The article defines key theoretical and methodological principles forming the intencial (according to R. Carnap) approach to the concept of the frontier; it also suggests a number of typological models of the ethnocultural frontier. Finally, it analyzes select literary cases that emerged in geopolitical and ethnocultural zones of Ukraine (namely Austro- Ukrainian and Polish-Ukrainian frontiers) within the framework “Alien — Others — One’s own.” The analysis, both diachronic and synchronic, specifically considers contextual factors, i.e. genetic, historical, geopolitical, international, ideological, and sociocultural contexts.

Keywords

• frontier
• concept
• context
• ethnocultural zone
• typology
• model
• Alien — Other — One’s own