UNIVERSITY INTELLIGENTSIA AS A VALUE-DETERMINED
COMMUNITY: EXPERIENCE OF A SOCIOLOGICAL RESEARCH 

Vorob'ev Vladimir Pavlovich, Doctor of sociological sciences, professor, sub-department of public administration and regional sociology, Penza State University (40 Krasnaya street, Penza, Russia), vvp@sura.ru
Skvortsova Anastasiya Aleksandrovna, Postgraduate student, Penza State University
(40 Krasnaya street, Penza, Russia), finep63@mail.ru

 316.752, 316.34/35

Background. The research of value orientations of university teachers is a topical one due to the fact that values characterize not just the specifics of professional groups, but also act as an indicator of social development processes. The aim of the work is to analyze actual value self-determination of university teachers, and on the basis thereof to determine the degree of introduction of the given professional group into a wider community, traditionally characterized as intelligentsia.
Materials and methods. The research was based on the analysis of scientific works on evolution of social funtions of intellectual labor representatives in modern conditions. The empirical materials for the research were the results of the author’s mass survey, carried out among university teachers from four regions of the Volga federal district.
Results. The authors defined the specifics of intelligentsia as a social community and suggested their own variant of transition to continuum models of description of the given community. The empirical research (n=545) determined the hierarchy of value orientations of modern university teachers; analyzed gender differences in value orientations. The authors revealed main contradictions of teachers’ value self-determination.
Conclusions. Intelligentsia appears to be a value-determined group with its specific functions directed not just to culture reproduction, but to a critical analysis of alternatives of development of the society. From this point of view the professional group of university teachers may be considered as a community that to some extent
approaches to the standards of the true intelligent manner. The experience of the sociological research of values of provincial university teachers showed that when dscribing obligatory functions of university teachers the respondents were close to ideal standards of intelligentsia. At the same time, while characterizing own value
orientations, most respondents are guided by other standards, associated not with the content of professional activity, but with its conditions. Herewith, only a half of respondents announced abouth their readiness to personally realize some functions characterizing university teachers exactly as intellectuals. To define to what extent modern university teachers personify the traits of intelligentsia it is necessary to switch from the analysis of their verbal sets to consideration of external expectations
and external values of their activity.

university teachers, value orientations, social role, intelligentsia, intelligent manner.

1. Tomas U., Znanetskiy F. Amerikanskaya sotsiologicheskaya mysl' [American sociological conception]. Moscow, 1994.
2. Spirin A. P. Professional'nye tsennosti sovremennogo pedagoga [Professional values of modern teahcers]. Volgograd, 2011.
3. Byalyy Yu. Rossiya XXI [Russian XXI]. 1997, no. 5–6.
4. Kosheleva L. A. Intelligentsiya kak fenomen russkoy kul'tury: dis. kand. kul't. nauk [Intelligentsia as phenomenon of the Russian culture: dissertation to apply for the degree of the candidate of cultural sciences]. Moscow, 2000.
5. Shinyaeva O. V., Kayumova L. Kh. Izvestiya vysshikh uchebnykh zavedeniy. Povolzhskiy region. Obshchestvennye nauki [University proceedings. Volga region. Social sciences]. 2014, no. 1 (29).
6. Sovremennaya zapadnaya sotsiologiya nauki [Modern western sociology of science]. Eds. V. Zh. Kelle, E. Z. Mirskoy. Moscow 1988.
7. Stepin B. C. Nauka: vozmozhnosti i granitsy [Science: opportunities and boundaries]. Moscow, 2003.
8. Sotsioanaliz P'era Burd'e: al'manakh Rossiysko-frantsuzskogo tsentra sotsiologii i filosofii Instituta sotsiologii RAN [Pierre Bourdieu’s socio-analysis: literary miscellany of the Russian-French center of sociology and philosophy of the Institute of Sociology of the Russian Academy of Sciences]. Ed. by N. A. Shmatko. Saint-Petersburg, 2001.