Earlier among the Eastern Slavs, this concept was associated with blood relationship and came from the old verb "to be born". Single-root words: family, relative. But in modern Russian people is a much broader term. So, this word can be defined by the population of a particular country or a historically established human community. And also a large number of people gathered together, or the working masses. All this is quite successfully applied in the definition of "the people - this", used both in the socio-political sense, and in the general cultural ethnic.
People and Nation
In the political sense, the word people is sometimes identified with the concept of the nation, being something like its synonym. However, this is not quite true. A nation is a socio-cultural community that has developed during the formation of a single state. And the people is also a community of people, but united by the corresponding global features (culture and language, origin and faith, and the like). In this context, the nation is a broader concept that exists within the framework of the country and statehood. A people is something less extensive, but often existing beyond borders andpublic laws. So, a nation can be represented by several peoples. And different ethnic groups, for example, can be united into one nation.
Ethnography and political science
People's description, as a science, is called ethnography. Here, people mean an ethnos (human group), common in origin - connected by ties of consanguinity. Later, when describing an ethnos, they began to use secondary features that promote unification: language and territory, religion and historical past, culture and customs.
In political science and political economy, people are often opposed to the elite that has power. This concept refers to the mass of the population that does not have privileges, in terms of quantity - the main (basis).
Friendship of peoples
Some believe that this is just one of the most used terms of the Soviet past. Does the friendship of peoples really exist as a phenomenon, or is it still a notion of the ideological policy of the state of the USSR? Of course, without ideology, it could not do here. And the friendship of peoples is a segment of interethnic policy, methodically carried out in the Union from the times of Leninism and Stalinism to the very, that neither is, the Brezhnev era of stagnation. Then, according to historians, this policy was supplanted by the idea of the multinationality of the Russian Federation (approximately since the late 80s). The very concept, which includes the concept of "friendship of peoples", and the solution of the national question in the young Soviet country did not arise immediately. It is known that Lenin spoke only about the oppression of certain peoples (not Russians) in the formerimperialist Russia and the urgent need to finally resolve the issues of nationality. But under Stalin in 1935, it was stated that trust had grown between the peoples of the USSR, and that the national question could be considered already resolved. And the Russian people themselves took the place of honor of the “elder brother” in relation to others living in the state.
It is interesting that today the friendship of peoples is fixed, one might even say constitutionally. The Constitution of the Russian Federation speaks of the multinational people of Russia, making it clear that this phenomenon is not empty words, but the unity and good attitude of peoples towards each other is the norm of public life.
Culture of the people
In this context, however, one should not forget that every nation has its own unique culture, heritage, language, customs. All this together, called by a common word - the culture of the people, should be preserved as much as possible and passed on to posterity. For these purposes, there are folk museums, and the true keepers of traditions preserve and increase the cultural heritage of one or another (sometimes already very few) people.
