Download - Российский комитет Программы ЮНЕСКО ...

speakers. The presence of indigenous cultures and languages on the Web cannot
guarantee their wider use by speaker communities in real life. There is also a risk
of turning living indigenous cultures into a mouthballed heritage for museum
conservation and display. The preservation of cultures and languages is no easy
task, and there are still no established managerial practices to implement it.
The problems of culture and language preservation management arise from a
need for long-term commitment (50-100 years), the difficulty of foreseeing
economic and socio-cultural scenarios, and the complexity of the object to be
preserved.
Foresight Project as a Tool for Preserving Linguistic and Cultural Diversity
in Yakutia
The Foresight Yakutia project is being run by two leading higher education
establishments: the Siberian Federal University and the North-Eastern Federal
University. Launched in 2010, it follows up on the republican government’s
policy toward preserving cultural and linguistic diversity.
This project is a complex and multidisciplinary one. Its research and planning
groups are comprised of methodology specialists, economics, sociologists,
demographers, medical doctors, cultural anthropologists, specialists in culture
studies, ethnographers, teachers, historians, and philosophers. The research
and development work involves more than 50 scientists and scholars, many of
whom hold high academic degrees.
As a new tool for “working with the future,” Foresight includes the following
dimensions:
120
• foreseeing the future (identifying basic trends in the development of
large socio-economic systems, countries, regions, corporations, etc.);
• managing the future (comparing forecasts by key players and
coordinating their strategic goals);
• promoting the future (drawing roadmaps that would show possible
routes, bifurcation points, and windows of opportunity).
Foresight is to be rerun every five years for verifying the findings, carrying out
a critical analysis of the practical results, and updating the tasks set.
A modern centre will be set up on the North-Eastern Federal University
grounds to perform the following tasks: conducting research and monitoring
sociocultural processes in circumpolar areas; elaborating modern sociohumanitarian
techniques; and implementing pilot projects in socio-