The metamorphoses of coronavirus everyday life [book review: Bradshaw, A. & Hietanen, J. (Eds) (2020) the dictionary of coronavirus culture. London: Repeater books. 203 p.]

The Dictionary of Coronavirus Culture (ed. by A. Bradshaw, J. Hietanen) under rеview presents an A-Z of everyday life in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. The book can help us adapt to the changing environment and better understand risks and opportunities in the COVID world. The reviewer, based on the results of mass sociological research and personal experience of exploring the social consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic, notes the relevance of the issues discussed in the Dictionary. Among the topics discussed there are the following: health care at individual and social levels; social distancing; interaction practices with one’s home, wοrkplace, relatives and colleagues; lockdown; consumption and market in the pandemic era; increase in social tensions and aggravation of social problems; humanity’s immersion into a world of dystopias. The authors of the Dictionary are convinced that the restrictions caused by the pandemic will long be an integral part of our social life. The book notes that among the most important changes in everyday life was a fundamentally new attitude towards the home. Instead of being a place where people usually spend their free time, the home is gradually becoming a core living space. The book emphasizes that our natural desire to make our homes as comfortable as possible and to ensure our own “quarantine” time has given birth to a new coronavirus type of consumer culture. Under the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic, a certain coronavirus etiquette has been established in society, enforcing compliance with social distancing and interaction standards and rules of online behavior during the pandemic. The authors notice that, despite many negative consequences caused by the pandemic, the COVID-19 pandemic produced a recovery in public cultural and leisure life that may be regarded as a pοsitive emergent effect. The lockdown restrictions and self-isolation regime have opened new interesting opportunities in leisure and creative activities (quite often involving digital technologies) for many residents in Russia and in foreign countries. The reviewer concludes that under the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic there has been a coronavirus cultural shift in modern society and a trend towards active cultural consumption has become more pronounced. The phenomenon of coronavirus culture deserves the attention of researchers, and the topic is likely to become a subject of study in culturally oriented disciplines in the future.