文明的对话：文化、身份和政治

普西奇
贝尔格莱德大学语言学院东方学系

高速发展的通讯技术，尤其是卫星技术、先进的电脑技术和传媒工业的发展，使现代文明被网络联系在“地球村”里，并能够轻而易举地“越界”，在全球范围内介入另一种文明形态的文化和传统。对于当代社会，不同文明、不同文化间通过各种媒体建立的联系是十分重要的，它们将人们的关注点从传统的人际关系或群体间的沟通转移并聚焦到全球化沟通的框架下。

来自不同文明和文化背景的个体，或具有不同的沟通风格或不同的世界观，在他们的交流中往往会产生理解困难和沟通障碍。理解一种文明的文化的价值和传统，是进行沟通交流最基本的前提条件。对任何一个群体来说，传统能够起到稳定社会的作用，它包涵了这个群体的集体认知、象征符号、道德标准、神话体系、礼仪文化等诸多方面。进行对话的两个个体，不是孤立的两个生命存在——他们各自都代表了自身文化和传统中物质、社会和意识形态等各个方面。人、世界、传统和社会都处在不断的运动和变化中，因此部分族群身份和文化也不得不随之变化。进行文明间对话的前提条件之一就是适应这种新的变化。全球经济文化的一体化进程所带来的不是族群（或文化）的整合化或同质化，而是“零碎化”和“解域化”，这一事实正说明了当代社会的一个主要特征，它更加需要进行对话。而对话的最终目的就是探索真理，通过话语（逻各斯或道）探求“光明”，其宗旨指向事物的本质。活跃的全球文化体系依赖于个体、科技、金融、信息和意识形态之间的关系。

语言在文明对话以及文明差异的表现中有着不容忽视的、极其重要的作用。我们首先必须学习，然后才能授教；必须首先聆听，然后才能言语。

文明对话的本质是“求同存异”，而不是消灭差异。

Cultural Dialogue: Culture, Identity, and Politics

PUŠIĆ, Radosav
University of Belgrade

The rapidly developing information technology (especially satellite technology, computer technology and media industries) has made the civilized modern world more intertwined.  The Internet has become a “global village” and one can easily “cross borders” and enter into some other cultural tradition or sphere.  For society today, connections across different cultures are formed by all kinds of media.  They transform the traditional personal relations or group related communications and gather them into a framework of global communication.

Individuals who come from different cultural backgrounds with different ways of communication or worldviews will often encounter obstacles or communication problems in their interactions. The most basic condition for communication and interaction is to understand the values and traditions of a culture or civilization. For any group of people, traditions can have the function of stabilizing society and encompass the collective knowledge, symbols, moral standards, myths, rituals, etc. of this group. If two individuals interact, it is not a dialogue between two isolated persons, since each of them represents the different material, social, and ideological layers of their respective cultures and traditions. Persons, the world, traditions, and society, are in a constant transformation and change.  Therefore, the identities and cultures of some groups are bound to follow these changes. One of the preconditions for having a dialogue between civilizations is to adjust oneself to a new change.  The processes of the unification of the global economy and culture have brought about not the integration or assimilation of national groups (or cultures), but a kind of “fragmentation” and “dispersion.”  This fact shows a major feature of today’s world, which needs to dialogue even more. The last purpose of dialogue is to search for the truth.  It is to search for the “light” by using words (logos or dao). The final aim is to point to the real nature of things.  A vivid system of global culture would rely on the connections between individuals, technology, finances, information, and ideologies. 

In the process of cultural dialogue and the expression of cultural differences, language has a very important function. First we must learn, then we can teach. We must first listen, then we are able to speak. The essence of cultural dialogue is “to search for common elements and to accept differences” (qiu tong cun yi) and not to wipe out all differences.