«Image of science» in the context of formation of Ukrainian academic culture (based on materials of the publications of the Shevchenko Scientific Society, late 19th – early 20th centuries)

The recent celebration of the 150th anniversary of the Society named after Shevchenko (later transformed into the Shevchenko Scientific Society) prompted many researchers to both analyze his individual achievements and search for forgotten or little-known figures of scientists, and in general to rethink the contribution made by the Society to the development of Ukrainian science. In addition to being a positive example of the crea­tion of a scientific institution that reproduced the model of a typical European Academy of Sciences, ShSS, through the efforts of its members, proposed a new character of scientific behavior, a civilized attitude to the conduct of research activities, and finally modern (at that time) approaches to scientific text creation, i.e. laid the foundations of academic culture. Although the Society did not become an academy of sciences due to political reasons, in fact, it performed its functions for a long time, therefore, the components of academic culture – which are academic institutes, academic activity, academic integrity and academic writing – can be seen very clearly in his activities: partly (the components “academic institutes” and “academic activity”) were directly laid down in the Statute of ShSS, others (academic integrity and academic writing) become obvious when analyzing the publishing products of ShSS. It is from the analysis of these elements of the activity of the Shevchenko Scientific Society that the original “image” of Ukrainian science emerges, which later prevented it from disappearing from the European and even world scientific landscape.

Keywords: Shevchenko Scientific Society (ShSS), academic culture, academic insti­tutes, academic activity, academic virtue, academic writing.

doi: 10.32403/0554-4866-2024-2-88-159-168