Cultural Industries: Two Aspects of Comprehension

Cultural industries are a subject of lively discussion in the social and human sciences, which indicates the expansion of theoretical tools in the interpretation of the concept. In understanding the concept of “cultural industries”, two major humanitarian trends are the most expressive. The article offers to define the boundaries of these trends within cultural studies and cultural economy. Through a comparative analysis, there are identified and formulated the distinctive features of the trends. This research results in conclusion that each approach focuses on coverage of different aspects of the cultural industries and on solving different research tasks. In culturology, the cultural industries represent one of the forms of reproduction and dissemination of cultural mea­nings, determined by historical development and involving the study through the analysis of connections between the mea­nings and cultural context. In cultural economy, the cultural industries are a way to intensify the cultural life of a territory, through engaging cultural employees in creative economy and issuing a competitive final cultural pro­duct. The article concludes that comprehensive researches are the most pro­mising. They represent the cultural industries both as a certain form of economic organization of cultural employees and as a regulatory system of cultural meanings reproduction.