ISSN 0798 1015

Vol. 39 (Number 40) Year 2018. Page 24

Humanistic technologies in education: the dialogue-building experience

Tecnologías humanísticas en educación: la experiencia de construcción de diálogo

Elena GALITSKIH 1; Svetlana ZALUTSKAYA 2; Nadezhda NIKONOVA 3; Irina SOSNOVSKAYA 4; Olga YURIEVA 5

Received: 23/08/2018 • Approved: 10/09/2018

Contents

1. Introduction

2. Method

3. Results

4. Discussion

5. Conclusion

Bibliographic references

1. Introduction

1.1. Significance of the study

In modern education, humanistic technologies act to introduce dialogue in the learning process, bring creative synergy to the communication between the author and readers, and enrich the tutorial toolset of modern educators with such techniques as dispute, discussion, debate, problem-based and intertextual dialogue and dialogic communication experience. Dialogue as an interdisciplinary problem brings humanistic technologies to the front line of education progress, its methodology and thesaurus. The polyphonic nature of the world, the cultural dialogue and the presence of multiple equally valid perceptions, the dialogue between the author’s fictional world and the value-based priorities of his/her readers substantiate the significance of developing and mastering humanistic technologies in education. Dialogue is identified as a tool for putting to practice the dialectics of “questioning existence,” a process of exposing a person to culture, to a kind of question-and-answer cognition, self-knowledge, professional and personal self-actualization. The research work by M.M. Bakhtin, V.S. Bibler, S.V. Belova, M. Buber, G.Ya. Bush, Ye.O. Galitskikh, V.V. Gorshkova, M.V. Klarina, I.A. Kolesnikova, Ye.I. Kazakova, S.P. Lavlinsky, L.M. Luzina, A.P. Tryapitsyna made it possible to see and identify through analysis the following tendencies in studying how dialogue performs in education.

The first tendency reflects the increasing interest of the society, philosophers and researchers towards humans as subjects of cognition and action, therefore further focusing on dialogue as an explicative, inspiring and developing force.

The second tendency indicates that the integrative processes in science have significantly expanded the terminological meaning of the concept of dialogue, which gave name to the dialogic teaching method and found its way into pedagogical research works. In the context of educational philosophy, dialogue is a specific way of expressing a person’s self, a common definition of humanistic thinking and its undivided elements; a unique, comprehensive way of existence for culture and a human within culture, a situation of a search for the meaning of values (Eco, 1979).

From the perspective of education in humanities, dialogue is an exchange of information between all parties to the education process, an educational technology, a joint search effort, a way to approach the contents of learning materials; it is the definition of the very essence of the learning subject and of the very composition of a human’s soul, speech and thought. It is worth pointing out that the dialogic environment facilitates the making of a person, the shaping of his spiritual values. Therefore, dialogue is viewed as a goal, result and contents of education, a way to cognize the reality and a didactic and communicative environment that fosters reflection and self-actualization of the student’s personality.

The third tendency can be traced in the demand for dialogic forms of education and dialogic teaching style placed by higher education facilities, schools of the digital age, gymnasiums and lyceums. Education has created the need for a teacher proficient in dialogic humanistic technologies.

The fourth tendency is the integrative approach to the studying of dialogue, its notion as a “key” that “opens up” the cognition of life through the “participation in a dialogue” with the world, people, one’s self, text.

The fifth tendency is related to the understanding of the complexity associated with influencing a person’s inner world, as spiritual values cannot be instilled by explaining, learning by rote, drilling, strict control, external goal-setting. They emerge in the course of life through conscious life-building activities, ethical behavior, active empathy, responsible attitude towards one’s calling. A teacher who constantly participates in a dialogue with “another person” must always nurture the inner “beneficial self-dissatisfaction” (A.A. Ukhtomsky), the “continuous effort of becoming a human” (M.K. Mamardashvili). Monologue, with its logic of typical, uniform structure where one thing derives from the other with necessity and unambiguity, used to eliminate doubt and choice, discussion with one’s self and a different opinion, the understanding of deep changes in scientific and spiritual life. It is by no means coincidental that negative traits of teachers commonly included monologism, didactism, inclination towards ready answers to all questions and a claim to know the ultimate truth.

Let us not forget that by looking closely at someone, “putting the other person’s face first” (A.A. Ukhtomsky) and striking an imaginary or actual dialogue with them, it is possible for a person to understand himself, become potentially inexhaustible, go beyond the boundaries of his own perception of himself. The person gets involved in the integrative interaction with the world of culture, science, vocation, best practices of getting to know the people in front of him, self-actualizing within the time and space of his life journey.

1.2. Problem definition

How can dialogic humanistic technologies be effectively used in learning? If a pedagogic technology is understood as a system of focused efforts to accomplish a concrete pedagogical task, then dialogue can be described by listing four components: texts as pedagogical tools, forms of interaction between a teacher and a student, their viewpoints and stimulation techniques. Text, being a pedagogical tool, can be used as a problem description of the studied subject, while interaction must take place in a form of joint-effort, group activities (mutual exchange of tasks, sharing of topics, Socratic dialogue, team work, tutorial dialogues, discussions, debates, disputes, round tables, catechetical dialogue, project-based activity technology, pedagogical workshops technology, critical thinking development technology, associative thinking development technology) (Galitskikh, 2004).

The narrative of the equality of all members of the conversation in terms of their values and meaning, the focus on dialogic communication, cooperation and joint creativity are the main prerequisites for implementing humanistic technologies and fulfilling their dialogic, emotional and growth potentials.

2.1. The methods and methodology of the study

The methods and the methodology of the study rely on the integrative and communicative/activity-based approaches, along with the theoretical analysis, pedagogical and tutorial experiments, summarization of experience, statistical data processing, purposeful observation, and questionnaires.

2.2. Details of the study base

The study of the practical use of dialogic technologies in education was conducted over 2016 – 2017 among the teachers of the Russian language and literature at public education facilities in the city of Irkutsk and Irkutsk Region. Overall, 165 educators from city and rural schools, lyceums and gymnasiums took part in the questionnaire survey.

2.3. Review of educational technologies used in literature classes

The purposes of the survey are to find out which kinds of educational technology are currently used to teach literature at school. The survey helps trace the percentage of language teachers who use humanistic technologies, specifically dialogue, and demonstrates a willing to apply the interactive and communicative/activity-based approaches in their teaching of literature. The results of the survey are outlined in Table 1.

Table 1
Educational technology used in literature classes across
schools in the city of Irkutsk and Irkutsk Region

The list above includes educational technologies that meet the requirements of the Federal State Educational Standard for Secondary (Complete) Education (hereinafter, FSES) and implement the communicative/activity-based, personality-oriented, developmental approaches to learning.

Also, a two-stage study was undertaken involving 540 students of years 7-10 at schools of the city of Irkutsk and Irkutsk Region. The first stage of the study consisted of a survey. Its purpose was to reveal the methods, techniques and activities used in literature classes today; to find out dominant forms of communication between students and the teacher; to measure how well students are ready for interactive learning and dialogic interaction during their learning of literature.

The students were offered to choose answers to the following questions:

• What do you typically do the most in literature classes?
• Listen to the teacher’s narrative
• Read literature works
• Recite texts
• Talk to the teacher about the problems raised in the books
• Take part in a discussion, a dialogue with classmates
• Other activities
• Which forms of communication normally prevail in your literature classes?
• The teacher does all the talking
• Dialogue
• Discussion
• Do you enjoy your literature classes? Would you like to change or add anything?

The question “What do you typically do the most in literature classes?” is meant to identify methods and techniques used during the classes. The respondents’ replies are arranged in the descending order of percentage of students who chose them: “read literature works” – 60%, “listen to the teacher’s narrative” – 50%, “talk to the teachers about the problems raised in the book” – 37%, “recite texts” – 17%, “take part in a discussion, a dialogue with classmates” – 5%, “reflect on life” – 2%, “other activities” – 2%. The results drive us at a conclusion that reproductive activities prevail in literature classes.

This conclusion is further reinforced by the responses to the second question, “Which forms of communication normally prevail in your literature classes?” The results are as follows: “the teacher does all the talking” – 50% of pupils, “dialogue” – 24%, “discussion” – 16%.

Table 2
Ranking of activities in literature classes based on the results of a pupil survey

The answers to the question “Do you enjoy your literature classes? Would you like to change or add anything?” included suggestions to add some active or creative work in pairs and groups, to hold an unstructured dialogue with each other, to use interesting multimedia technologies more often, etc.

The second stage of the study involved measuring the effectiveness of using dialogic technologies as part of the communicative/activity-based approach in the context of pupils’ proficiency in dialogic skills and their dialogic perception.

The pupils were given the questionnaire:

• Do you always want to participate in a conversation about a literature work during a lesson?
• Is the teacher’s opinion unquestioned or do you feel like arguing?
• Is your teacher interested in your opinion?
• Is a dialogue with your teacher an option during the lesson?
• How do you see your part in a dialogue?

In years 7-8, the pupils were presented with writing assignments on the subjects “What am I talking about with my favorite book?”; “Who do you consider as your favorite conversation partner?”. The pupils of years 9-10 were challenged with a theme on the topic “My dialogues with the author.”

The effectiveness of developing a dialogic perception and dialogic skills in pupils was assessed using the criteria and metrics listed in the table below:

Table 3
Criteria and metrics for the effectiveness of dialogic technologies in the teaching of literature

The results of the survey about language teachers have shown that the greatest percentage of technology used was for project-based learning, learning in groups and pairs, the critical thinking development technology and problem-based learning. These are traditional, long-time technologies used in pedagogics and teaching methodology. A lesser percentage of language teachers employ dialogic, motivational and multimedia technologies. This indicates a low to medium level of readiness in school teachers for innovation in school education, including education in literature. Also, the survey has revealed that young teachers with 5+ years of pedagogical experience are the ones most ready for using interactive educational technologies.

Summing this up, most teachers of young and middle age have a fairly high level of readiness for innovative activities, which in fact enables them to overcome stereotypes in teaching pupils and to build the educational process in an interactive mode.

Based on the qualitative analysis of the pupil survey results, the authors have arrived at the following conclusions:

• The traditional explanative and illustrative structure of literature classes still prevails today;
• During reproductive learning, little focus is placed on the independent exploration, discovery, dialogue of opinions, voices, stances, viewpoints;
• The pupils do not know how to prove and substantiate their viewpoint, they do not feel motivated for learning and knowledge acquisition;
• The pupils are reduced to memorizing and reciting the acquired information rather than to understanding it and digesting it using dialogue, which hinders their intellectual and creative growth.
• The results of the second-stage pupil survey have shown that:
• The teachers’ pedagogic toolkit is dominated by judgmental opinions and authoritative methods;
• The pupils do not feel any need for or interest in expressing their opinions;
• The pupils do not feel like genuinely relating their viewpoints;
• Most pupils do not realize they can actually talk to a book. Dialogues with authors are reduced to trivial problems, one-sided statements.

In addition to that, the study has shown the motivation, the will in most school pupils to actively interact with the teacher and their classmates during a lesson. Pupils in years 7-10 feel the need for teachers who are able to initiate a dialogue or discussion, they long for creative, lively, active literature lessons, which are conditioned upon a relatively high level of the teacher’s proficiency in interactive techniques and teaching methods, as well as humanistic educational technologies. Teachers need to broaden their experience of dialogic interaction, to learn new technologies and come up with creative ways of using them in an educational process, to take into account the specifics of perception and thinking of a modern pupil living in a digital age.

4.1. The experience of studying the dialogic potential of humanistic technologies: the contrastive-comparative analysis in literature classes

Humanistic technologies are aimed at shaping a personality who is able to respond to the challenges of today’s reality and is ready for self-actualization and well-balanced adaptation to the relevant social and professional environment (Zalutskaya, Oshchepkova, Nikonova, 2017). They are dialogic by nature. According to the dialogic school of thought by M.M. Bakhtin, dialogue is a way to engage others (who are no longer strangers) in one’s own, above all – in one’s own conversational life. M.M. Bakhtin calls such attitude to someone else’s sense (word) dialogization (Bakhtin, 1986). Dialogization in literary education is implemented through communicative/activity-based technologies (Lavlinsky, 2003), in particular, dialogic technologies, that help a teacher to facilitate the dialogue of cultures as part of the analysis of a fiction work. The cultural dialogue can be taught in literature classes using cognitive assignments, such as those meant to “separate the common from the distinct…” (Khutorskoy, 2001). Comparison assignments are aimed at accomplishing interdisciplinary learning goals of helping pupils develop the skills needed to compare, understand other people’s texts, to acquire system thinking. Such assignments are reasonable in analyzing lyrical literary works at lessons between years 5 and 11 in the multicultural environment of the educational space. The dialogic method becomes in this case a leading tool for text analysis that compares the works by Russian and foreign-language authors.

To give an example, let us turn to the best practices of building a cultural dialogue through tasks that aim to compare lyrical texts of Russian and foreign authors at schools in Yakutia – a multilingual subject of the Russian Federation. The technology has been trialed in years 8-10 of the Arktika experimental boarding school that educates students with multiethnic backgrounds (Evenkis, Evens, Dolgans, Yukaghirs, and Chukchis).

To facilitate a cultural dialogue based on the national poetic material, it is reasonable to isolate an artistic concept as an element of artistic philosophy that reflects the train of the author’s thought which conveys, as P. Abelard has put it, the “author’s intellect, spirit and thought” (Neretina, 1995). The concept allows reconstructing the author’s creative laboratory, seeing the worldview of the author as a champion for a certain language or culture who creates new meanings, builds a conceptual poetic space for his/her lyrical protagonist.

It is possible to study the concept of “snow” by comparing the lyrical works by the Russian classical poet A.S. Pushkin (Pushkin, 1981), the contemporary Russian-speaking Yakut poet A.K. Mikhaylov (Mikhaylov, 1980) and the Evenki poet D.N. Aprosimov (Aprosimov, 1981). The choice of concept is explained by the natural and climatic profile of Yakutia that is called the land of snow and cold, which cause a great influence on the mentality of the northern people who live amidst permafrost. It is in Yakutia – the coldest region in Russia – that one of the world’s poles of cold is situated. Russia itself is associated with winter, snow, cold, which is reflected in the literary works of the Golden Age of Russian poetry.

Winter is one of Pushkin’s favorite weather seasons (see such poems as “Winter morning,” “Winter evening,” “Winter road,” “Winter. What shall we do out in the country?”, etc.). Snow, as the primary content of the Russian winter is depicted by the poet as dazzling, pure, luxurious (“The snow […] Like a majestic carpet lies, / And in the light of day it shimmers.”). His lyrical persona quite often declares love for the winter landscape (“Better harsh winter; then I can feel happy / I love the snows”). In the author’s perception, the long Russian winter, with its winds, snow-blasts, blizzards (“The snow goes on for weeks and months”), does not destroy a person but rather on the contrary, it brings joy, merry laughter and strength of the spirit (“Like a Russian maiden, fresh in the dust of snow!”). Snow always reflects the inner disposition of the lyrical persona, demonstrating “the most profound exposal of the soul of the Russian nature, as well as the feelings arisen from observing the winter landscape” (Utyasheva, Zaripova, 2017).

In the cultural traditions of Arctic peoples, snow has always been associated with purity, whiteness and virginity. In the Yakuts’ national psyche, it is perceived as the symbol of the eternal existence, the event circle, the steady pace of life. Snow is the central visual object of Yakut poetry, specifically the literary legacy of the poet Aleksey Mikhaylov who was working at the end of the 20th century. The titles of his compilations and lyrical poems dated 1970s-90s would often include the word “snow”: “Snow,” “Snow in Yakutsk,” “White wonder,” “The silent snows will fall,” “To the snow,” “The thirtieth snow,” “I thank the first snow,” etc. From the perspective of the poet’s work, snow is not only a fascinating natural phenomenon (“Snow, all ornamental and sparkling…”) that covers the autumn slush and withering grass (“But, not in the least proud of itself, / It was falling, fluffy and weightless, / Whitening off the remaining mud”), but also a way to find the philosophical meaning of life, a symbol of solace, tranquility, mental quiet (“The silent snows will fall…/ And the world will suddenly turn silent”). In keeping with the author’s thinking, “the falling of the first snow gives rise to a new annual cycle, a natural phenomenon that is not subject to human will” (Burtseva, 2014). Mikhaylov’s lyrical persona, much like Pushkin’s, rejoices in the first snow (“I thank the first snow / For its pure, griefless light”), marvels at it, admires it. Whereas when the snowy season is the time to part with a sweetheart, the poet introduces sad, cold, indifferent “farewell snows” (“We are again separated / By the farewell snows; / They are lying there, / So transparent and cold”).

The poetry of the indigenous Arctic peoples of Yakutia (Evens, Dolgans, Evenkis, and Yukaghirs) is rich and diverse. In the context of studying “snow” – a signature poetic concept to a Northern dweller – the Evenki culture presents some interesting case. It is reflected in the works of the poet Dmitry Aprosimov. In the Evenki culture, the word “snow” assumes several meanings, of which the main one implies that “snow is the symbol of purity, beauty, freshness” (N.Z. Kopyrin, 1990). Aprosimov depicts a hunter rejoice in fresh snow (“My friend the hunter / Laughs to the fresh snow, / Reading it like a newspaper, / As the snow is traced by the forest animals, / trodden all over.”). This natural phenomenon reflects the mental state and the philosophical reflection of the lyrical persona (“I am so tired… The snow cover is cooling down”).

The concept of “snow” receives various interpretations from authors in different cultures, it reflects both the national and a personal, author’s individual perception of this natural phenomenon. However, the common denominator for the poets of different historical periods and cultures is the purity and superlativeness of snow. Students can ascertain this by working on tasks to research the concept of “snow” in the lyrical works of Pushkin, Mikhaylov, Aprosimov. The results of the poetic text analysis obtained by the pupils should then be transferred to a table for further comparison and making conclusions about the role of the artistic concept of “snow” in the poetry of authors representing different cultures.

To every poet, snow is something special, alive, a source of inspiration and power. In his poems, A.S. Pushkin uses the image of snow to create a picture of a vivid winter landscape. Nature clad in a snow dress shines upon the man with joy, gayety, sincerity of feelings. For a while, the snow imparts the state of hibernation and peace to winter. The delightful feeling of space helps the persona to forget his loneliness and gloom.

The image of snow has a semantic role in the poetry of the Yakut author A.K. Mikhaylov. Reflecting the national worldview, the poet draws a snowy sketch surrounded with a mysterious halo of peacefulness, quiet and tranquility. The poems breathe calm and softness, they do not offer any calamity of feelings, mirth, zeal, unlike Pushkin’s verses.

To the Evenki poet D. Aprosimov, snow is the time to fathom the secrets of nature, of one’s self. Winter is the time when trees go to sleep, old people’s hair turns grey, and the moment comes to reflect. Snow symbolizes the cycle of time and the continuous renewal of life.

It is not the ultimate purpose of literature classes to look at the concept of “snow” as part of learning to compare the lyrical works of Russian and foreign poets. The more important goal is to develop analytical, creative skills in the students, to stimulate their willingness to see and perceive the world around them in the fullness of its cultural diversity.

4.2. The associative thinking development technology

Another way to work out dialogue is to use the associate thinking development technology, when pupils are presented with a task to come up with five association “circles” for a descriptive word, a concept. The first circle includes the experience from the empirical reality, feelings, and emotions. The second circle consists of literary associations, such as quotes. The third circle includes musical associations. The fourth one is comprised of artistic associations. Finally, the fifth circle includes philosophical, symbolical and culturological associations. To give you an example, let us use the descriptive word “snow.” The five association “circles” can have a graphical representation, i.e. as concentric circles, linear representation as a table or technical representation as a mind map. From childhood impressions, e.g. visual experience of the first snow, blizzard, storm, tobogganing, snowball fighting – to literary impressions: A.S. Pushkin, “The snow […] Like a majestic carpet lies, / And in the light of day it shimmers…”; B. Pasternak. “Snow is falling”; N. Rubtsov, “Snow has fallen, and I have forgotten everything that used to hurt my soul…”; Ye. Yevtushenko, “White snow is falling…”; etc. Furthermore – to the musical illustrations of G.V. Sviridov for the short novel The Blizzard by A.S. Pushkin and the artistic ones, e.g. The First Snow painting by A.A. Plastov, etc. Snow as a symbol of purity, the Russian North, winter, homeland. This creative work is engaging and is open to the eternal search and the dialogue between the arts, because, according to O. Mandelstam, “being educated is about the speed of forming associations.”

4.3. The experience of building an intertextual dialogue while learning classical and contemporary prose

A special role in the implementation of dialogic technologies and facilitation of live communicative space in literature classes is played by the dialogue between writers of different time periods through their works. The modern information space is intertextual; it features a huge diversity of worldviews, cultural and artistic phenomena that represent subjective personal notions. “Text within text” thus becomes a characteristic formula for many fictional works written at the brink of the 21st century; writers hold a never-ending dialogue using both verbal and non-verbal texts.

The concepts of “intertext,” “intertextuality,” not being new, are well-studied in philosophy, communication theory, literature studies (Bakhtin, 1996; Bart, 1994; Kristeva, 2004; Kristeva, 1969, Fateeva, 2007). Intertextuality is related to Bakhtin’s notion of the “foreign word,” when every statement is filled with dialogic overtones, which are essential for understanding the speaker’s style (Bakhtin, 1996). Intertextuality is also defined as a mindset for a deeper understanding of the text or resolving the misunderstanding by identifying its multidimensional links to other texts (Fateeva, 2007).

Thanks to the intertextual links, text acts simultaneously as a “accumulator of cultural memory” and as a “generator of new ideas” (Lotman, 2000) that emerge from the transformation of quotes, allusions, dialogues with the literary tradition. Based on that, it is possible to facilitate the analysis of text during a lesson in such a way as to show the “life” lived throughout the text within a “larger time frame” and in the context of a never-ending dialogue. Each intertextual reference is thus a point of alternative for the readers; they can choose to either keep on reading, treating it as a mere fragment not different from others and being part of its structure, or refer to the source text for an adequate understanding of this text (Conte, 1974; Jonson, 1976). The dialogic principle dominates both at the semantic and the technical levels.

In this regard, one can refer to intertextual dialogue as having in its center the methodology of comparing literary works based on intertextual links and contexts using dialogic techniques and activities, and the creation of communicative situations during lessons.

The technology of intertextual dialogue must follow the logical sequence below:

• Choosing works for the intertextual analysis;
• Identifying the types of intertextual links and interactions;
• Facilitation of communicative situations at lessons;
• Intertextual analysis of texts using dialogic techniques and communicative activities.

Table 4
Implementation of the intertextual dialogue technology in literature classes

In the context of intertextual dialogue, let us look at the short story The Queen of Spades by the contemporary writer L. Ulitskaya and the well-known tale The Queen of Spades by A.S. Pushkin. The intertextual links can be traced at the level of the system of images, the complex of ideas and topics in the literary work, and also in part at the level of expressive and pictorial tools.

Following the logic of intertextual dialogue in the process of text analysis, let us attempt to comprehend the title, the “strong point” (I.V. Arnold). It sets a “certain expectation horizon” for the reader. In this case, the titles of both texts compel the readers to compare the authors’ artistic viewpoints, to get involved in the dialogue of the authors and their characters, to hear and understand the opinions of other readers along with one’s own opinion.

The lesson starts from working to understand the meaning of the title. The pupils are supposed to use association and forecasting techniques. The opinions of high school pupils can be on the opposite ends of the spectrum. The titles can be more easily understood with the help of the epigraph to Pushkin’s novel, “The Queen of Spades signifies ill will” (The new fortune-telling book)” (Pushkin, 1981).

The next stage of the lesson should lead to the dialogue between the pupils and the authors. The main techniques here are the emphatic dialogue that takes place during the perception of existential notions in the context of a fiction work (the reflective bridge), such as life and death, the good and the evil, self-denial and self-indulgence, selfishness and self-sacrifice; contrastive and comparative techniques, observation of the text, reflection (Sosnovskaya, 2016).

While working on communicative situations within the dialogue, teachers can rely on four kinds of dialogue that can be identified within a fictional text: a) a dialogue of the characters’ lines and voices; b) a dialogue of meanings, subject matters; c) a dialogue of personalities (between the characters, between the characters and the author); d) a dialogue inside the mind of the main character, the narrator, the author (Sosnovskaya, 2016). Based on this, the pupils compare and establish the distinctions and similarities in the episodes, descriptions of characters, portrayals, interiors, the authors’ notes. Thus, by comparing the two Queens of Spades – the female characters of the classical and the contemporary fiction – the pupils trace the similarities in the authors’ remarks that help understand the female characters’ behaviors. By finding common and different features in their description, the students notice not only the age, but also the likeness of the tempers and life stories.

The focal point of Pushkin’s The Queen of Spades is the evil that has lost its “heroic,” romantic image, scaled up and came up with a warning for the humankind about the danger of losing its human face. In which way does the story by L. Ulitskaya brings up and develops on the same topic? High-school pupils are unanimous in that it is dreadful to find oneself in a situation in life with no freedom, misunderstood and bullied, when others are delighted with humiliating their close people and family members. Teenage readers find it hard to understand one thing: why L. Ulitskaya’s heroine, Anna Fyodorovna, lives under the oppression of her mother and what makes the prominent professor, a highly-skilled surgeon, give in to the whims of Pur? To answer this question, it helps to role-play the characters’ imaginary dialogues, lines, voices. As pupils do the creative role-play reading, they acquire a deeper understanding of the heroines’ mindsets.

Ulitskaya is skilled in portraying psychological profiles. By employing the game-based technique called “Discover the foreign word,” the teacher offers to find common traits in the profiles of Pushkin’s and Ulitskaya’s female characters. Ulitskaya emphasizes Pur’s cruelty and inhumanity by the details of her appearance, “…yellowish knobbly fingers squeezed into rings that no longer could be taken off and a long neck with a small head on top were sticking giving her a puppet-like look” (Ulitskaya, 2007). Certain details of her portrayal resemble those of Pushkin’s Queen of Spades, “Her yellow dress, embroidered with silver, fell at her swollen feet. […] Looking quite yellow, the Countess sat rocking to and fro in her chair, her flabby lips moving” (Pushkin, 1981). Exaggerating the images of their respective old women, the authors emphasize the horrible nature of human selfishness and evil, capable of destroying, burying all that is alive, e.g. feelings, souls, relationships.

Let us further develop this thought by analyzing the theme of the home in the story by Ulitskaya. The plot unravels in the constrained space of a city apartment. It is devoid of any symbols that are associated with “home” as an epitome of several generations’ family hearth. It is merely premises, a place of permanent residence for people who have lost any particular hope for a change. Note the ragged, decrepit state of the apartment and compare that to the description of the drawing-room in Pushkin’s tale, “glittering but wearisome,” “soiled arm-chairs,” “faded stuffed chairs and divans with soft cushions stood in melancholy symmetry” (Pushkin, 1980). There is a need for renovation not only in the house, but above all in the relationships and souls of the characters. It is especially daunting to see that everyone has been infected by the virus of dead end, a dull, lackluster future whose impossibility has been established in the home where everything obeys the rule of the old woman.

Why are the characters putting up with such life?The question is hard to answer. Anna Fyodorovna gives a brief answer, “I am afraid of her. And there’s the duty. And pity” (Ulitskaya, 2007). Could Liza from A. Pushkin’s tale have uttered the same words?

For the only time in her life, Anna Fyodorovna dared to confront Pur with family disobedience. Pupils should notice the rise of timid seedlings of freedom in her soul. Yet… death has come upon her before she had the time to accomplish that. Could Liza from Pushkin’s tale have confronted the Lady of the house? Why does Ulitskaya kill her heroine in such an absurd way the very moment the latter started a new life? To answer this question, let us turn to Pushkin. Hermann loses his mind, that very “tool” he was going to use to master the Law of Fate. Apparently, it was his punishment for greed and avarice, his payment for all his villainy, whereby he infatuated the poor ward, inflicted death on the old Countess and thus ruined his own soul.

But what does Anna Fyodorovna have to pay for? Let us recall Pushkin’s words that “there is nothing so tasteless as long sufferance and self-denial.” In the etymological dictionary, the word “suffer” has a common Slavic root with the word “to go numb” (Lithuanian), “to become motionless, torpid” (Latin), “to die” (German) (Shansky, 2002). Anna Fyodorovna’s life in her mother’s home proves the validity of the historical meaning of this word. What does Anna Fyodorovna pay for? Let us give the pupils an opportunity to express their opinions, reinforced with arguments from the text:

• A high price for a life that has been lived not for the benefit of her children and people around her, but for the sole benefit of one person whose life was centered on her whims;
• Anna Fyodorovna paid for her failure to understand the purpose of life;
• The heroine paid for her inability to stand up to any injustice;
• Anna Fyodorovna and her daughter both paid for not being able to maintain their human dignity.

The main theme of Pushkin’s The Queen of Spades is the evil that has lost its “heroic” face. However, it has retained its demonism, for it is bound with mystery. In Ulitskaya’s short story, the evil has even lost its mysteriousness and, consequently, its romantic flare. It has presented itself as trivial, unassuming, trite, however it remained evil and no less murderous.

By introducing their pupils into the dialogue between the authors of different time periods, teachers guide them via the lack of understanding towards comprehension and acceptance of the purpose of life that has been repeatedly affirmed by writers of different ages in their works.

Summarizing the dialogue that has taken place between the two authors, the two pieces of fiction, the two cultures and the readers at high-school, let us get back to the epigraph of the lesson and try giving our own vision of “why life is beautiful for some… and is hard and horrible, full only of grief and tears for others.” Let us suggest thinking up intertextual epigraphs to L. Ulitskaya’s story and comment on them. The pupils’ answers have shown that the dialogue they had participated in helped them to not only understand the works of Pushkin and Ulitskaya, but also understand themselves, the world around them, their place in it and the means for expressing the life purpose.

Dialogue as part of text analysis and interpretation during a lesson is not only a conversation between a teacher and his pupils, but also, hidden from a superficial glance, a process of integrating different cultures, perceptions, thoughts, universes in their interrelation and interaction. The intertextual dialogue inside the texts of different authors who worked in different time periods helps accumulate the experience of the “dialogic apprehension of fictional books, the understanding of their links to each other and to the readers in the context of the humankind’s spiritual culture” (Belova, 2003).

To draw a conclusion, let us sum up the implementation results of humanistic technologies as a dialogic experience of communication between a pupil and a teacher, an author and a reader through the following acquired skills:

• The ability to put others first; to put forward nurturing, personally valuable education goals in a joint search effort.
• The ability to build partnerships, the willingness to carefully listen to and properly understand the conversation partner. The continuous maintenance of feedback, reflection, observation of the creative individuality of both pupils and their teacher.
• The active attitude to the clarifying of one’s values and viewpoints, including humanistic, subjective, dialogic and professional. The building of results and outcomes through discussion, clarification, integration of individual conclusions, cooperation.
• Focus on individual creative skills and the cognitive life experience of every member of the dialogue. The facilitation of a dialogue space, activation of individual traits of temperament, speech, intuition, improvisation.
• The maximum use of pupils’ self-reliance, initiative, critical thinking.

The actualization of the students’ creative potential, engaging them in the search for the truth. The clarification of concepts, texts, contexts, the use of symbols, metaphors, epigraphs, graphical organizers, various languages of science and art.

APROSIMOV, D. (1981). Three spring wells: poems. Moscow: Sovremennik.

BAKHTIN, M.M. (1986). The aesthetics of the written word. Moscow: Iskusstvo.

BAKHTIN, M.M. (1996). The problem of speech genres. Moscow: Russian dictionaries.

BART, R. (1994). S/Z. Moscow: Ad Marginem.

BELOVA, S.V. (2003). Dialogic study of the literature in the high school. How to help a schoolchild to open its “I”. Moscow: Logos.

BEZRUKOV, A.N. (2017). Intertextuality reception in postmodernist discourse. Przeglad Wschodnioeuropejski. Vol 8, year 2017, issue 2, 263-271.

BURTSEVA, Zh.V. (2014). Russian literature of Yakutia: artistic and aesthetic peculiarities of the bordering areas. Novosibirsk: Nauka.

CONTE, G.V. (1974). Memoria dei poeti e sistema letterario: Catullo, Virgilio, Ovidio, Lucano. Turin.

CORNWELL, N. (2013). Reference guide to Russian literature. London: Routledge.

DINKGRAFE, D. (2009). Consciousness, theatre, literature and the arts. Cambridge: Scholars Publishing.

ECO, U. (1979). The role of reader. Explorations in the semiotics of the texts. London: Bloommgton.

FATEEVA, N.A. (2007). Intertext in the world of texts: The counterpoint of intertextuality. Moscow: KomKniga.

GALITSKIKH, E.O. (2004). The dialogue in education as a means to develop tolerance. Moscow: Academic Project.

GALITSKIKH, E.O. (2016a). Reading with pleasure: the workshop of the creative life. Moscow: Bibliomir.

GALITSKIKH, E.O. (2016b). Educational technology "list" as a resource for the organization of children's literature reading. The European proceedings of social & behavioral sciences: 2nd international forum on teacher education, Kazan. Kazan: the Future Academy.

JONSON, L. Allusion in poetry. PTL. Vol 1, year 1976, page 579-587.

KHAZANKOVICH, Y.G. On the edge of Siberia: Russian old timers in some twentieth and twenty-first. Rupkatha Journal on Interdisciplinary Studies in Humanities. Vol IX, year 2017, issue 1, page 187-194.

KHUTORSKOY, A.V. (2001). Modern didactics. A textbook for higher education facilities. Saint Petersburg: Piter.

KOPYRIN, N.Z. (1990). The uniqueness of pictorial techniques in the poetry of Northern Yakutia. Literature of the peoples of Northern Yakutia. A collection of research papers. Yakutsk: Yakutsk Research Center, the Siberian Branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences.

KRISTEVA, Yu. (2004). Selected works: the destruction of poetics. Moscow: ROSSPEN.

KRISTEVA. J. (1969). Le mot, le dialogue et le roman. Semeiotike. Recherches pour une semanalyse. Paris.

LAVLINSKY, S.P. (2003). Technology of an education in literature. The communicative/activity-based approach. Moscow: Progress-Traditsia, INFRA-M.

LOTMAN, Yu.M. (2000). Semiosphere. Saint Petersburg: Iskusstvo.

MIKHAYLOV, A.K. (1980). Snow in Yakutsk: poems. Moscow: Sovremennik.

NERETINA, S.S. (1995). The word and text in medieval culture. Abelard’s conceptualism. Moscow.

NIKITINA, R.S. (1994). Literature of the peoples of the Far North: A reading book for the pupils of years 5-9 at Russian-language schools. Part 2. Yakutsk: The National Publishing and Printing Company Sakhapoligrafizdat.

PUSHKIN, A.S. (1981). A collection of works in 10 volumes. Moscow: Pravda.

SHANSKY, N.M., BOBROVA, T.A. (2002). Russian etymological dictionary for schools: the meanings and origins of words. Moscow: Drofa.

SOSNOVSKAYA, I.V. (2016). Methodology of teaching literature at a modern school: monograph. Irkutsk: VSGAO.

The Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation. (2012). Federal state educational standard of secondary (complete) education. Approved by the Order #413 of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation on May 17, 2012. Retrieved from: http://минобрнауки.рф/2365

ULITSKAYA, L.E. (2007). Zu-Zurich: Novel, short stories. Moscow: Eksmo.

UTYASHEVA, L.A., ZARIPOVA, Z.A. Poetics of A.S. Pushkin’s winter landscapes in school teaching. Pedagogical journal of Bashkortostan. Vol 73. Year 2017, issue 6, page 121 – 128.

ZALUTSKAYA, S.Y., OSHCHEPKOVA, A.I., NIKONOVA, N.I. Practice of teaching cross-cultural communication to humanities master students: regional specifics. Man in India. Vol 6, year 2017 page 109-122.

1. Doctor of Pedagogical Sciences, Professor, Head of the Department of Russian and Foreign Literature and Teaching Methodology at the Faculty of Philology and Media Communications of Vyatka State University, 36 Moskovskaya St., Kirov, Volga Federal District, 610000, Russian Federation.

2. Associate Professor, Candidate of Pedagogical Sciences, Professor of the Department of Russian Language and Literature Teaching Methodology at the Faculty of Philology of M.K. Ammosov North-Eastern Federal University, 58 Belinsky St., Yakutsk, Sakha Republic, 677000, Russian Federation.

3. Candidate of Pedagogical Sciences, Associate Professor of the Department of Russian Language and Literature Teaching Methodology at the Faculty of Philology of M.K. Ammosov North-Eastern Federal University, 58 Belinsky St., Yakutsk, Sakha Republic, 677000, Russian Federation. Email: professor.nikonova@yandex.ru

4. Associate Professor, Doctor of Pedagogical Sciences, Professor of the Department of Philology and Methodology at the Institute of Pedagogy, Irkutsk State University, 1 Karl Marx St., Irkutsk, Siberian Federal District, 664003, Russian Federation.

5. Associate Professor, Doctor of Philological Sciences, Head of the Department of Philology and Methodology at the Institute of Pedagogy, Irkutsk State University, 1 Karl Marx St., Irkutsk, Siberian Federal District, 664003, Russian Federation.