Ethnocultural fundamentals of modern education

Education is instrumental in developing and socialising an individual, as well as in transmitting experience, knowledge, basic moral values and norms to new generations. However, the traditional ethnic and cultural orientation of the educational process nowadays collides with the global integrative trends towards the unification of education. Considering the issues of ethnic and cultural foundations of the educational system the author divides the methodological concepts of „ethnic culture" and „culture of an ethnic group", and focuses on the correlation between national and universal. A specific semantic basis of ethnic culture is transmitted by a dominant function of education expressed as the continuity of generations, which requires a special attention to traditional national history, philosophy, mother-nature, and to national literature and folklore. The adoption of universal values ensures a qualitative conversion of the ethnic model on the basis of these values. The universal in culture is formed in two ways: from the ethnic that has become generally valid for other cultures, and from the “inoethnic” borrowed from other cultures that is nationally acquired. Therefore, it is necessary to use a culture-integrative approach combining education and upbringing based on studying the culture of own people, forming the ability of personal ethno-cultural identification and developing respect for the history and culture of other ethnic groups.