MORAL DIMENTIONS OF CHRONOTOPE

Abstract

The paper reconstructs the ethical implications of chronotope in the works of Alexei Ukhtomsky and Mikhail Bakhtin. The development of the concept is analyzed in the historical context of the transition from the ethics of norms (rooted in the timeless and non-spatial absolute) to the ethics of acts (performed in the specific time and space). It is shown that both theories of the chronotope proceed from the idea of the priority of a unique act (committed at a specific time in a certain place) before a general theory, and recognize the need to take into account the Other, who adds the dimension of value to the space-time unity. The chronotope is interpreted as a set of spatio-temporal conditions that sets the possibilities for a moral act. In conclusion the applications of the category of chronotope to the study of contemporary moral reality are discussed.