Organization: Penn State University
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 09:14:27 EST
From: <BAV2@psuvm.psu.edu>
Newsgroups: soc.culture.soviet
Subject: Re: Soc.Culture.Soviet (was Re: some Soviet emigre restaurant jokes)

First I would like to thank all my opponents. Their comments are very
interesting and fruitful. This discussion is close to MINE understanding
of this newsgroup charter.

A couple of comments. A lot of people think (maybe due to my bad
English) that I consider Russian culture as a superior one. It is not
so. A culture cannot be superior or inferior - just as one cannot
compare Pete and Bob: who is better. People are very complex phenomena,
so are cultures. But a culture may have dangerous trends which must be
rooted out if we want to have a (reasonably) happy society. My point
(and I do not see any arguments against it so far) is that Russian
culture has such trends. The proof is purely phenomenological: just look
on the Russian life - or Russian history. My personal opinion is that
among these  trends is the neglect of personal dignity and freedom.

[BTW, I don't like the distinction between Russkaya Kultura and Russian
Culture introduced by Alex. Culture as a whole may have a number of
sides, but they are sides of the whole thing.]

Can we root these trends out? We must.

I understand the argument that a rogue does not think about these
problems and intelligent person has no such trends, but it does not
held. The problem is that an intelligent person has them as a part of
his/her background - culture is a whole. Maybe it is not very modest to
call myself an intelligent person ["Ya ne volshebnik, ya tol'ko uchus'"-
Shvarts], but I have these trends. And this group postings prove that
not only I.

Now a couple of words about education & literature. They can be better
or worse in different cultures (the same thing: I can say that Physics
in USA is better than in Kuwait, cannot I? I cannot compare Arab and USA
cultures however). I know the theory that our 19 century literature is
the ultimate cause of our problems (see Alex's paper), but I personally
don't like it. In any case our literature is an unique phenomenon, and it's
part of a cultural background of any educated man/woman. To speak about
an education. There IS an American system - not formal, but a bunch of
traditions what should be taught and what not. I still consider ours
superior. An average American high-school student has no idea about
physics - an average Soviet understands a bit. Elitary schools? I worked
in such a school part-time. Cannot say anything about English/French
special classes (we have had no such), but our classes -
Phys/Math/Chem/Comp - were open for everybody passed the exams. Some
people were really poor - I remember their clothes. I remember we even
found some money for one of our best children to pay for his English
private lessons - his English was very poor, as his parents were, and we
(school teachers) understood that such a bright child must have a good
English. Can you find a high school here where University professor
would teach regularly? And I don't like a University education here.
It's too specialized and lacks the general background.

To prove my point. A majority of scientists here are emigrees ar their
children. Winners of the national spelling contests are Chinese or
Vietnamese (I have no racial prejudices, but is not it funny that
AngloSaxs fail in these contests?).

And the last point. I read an article where the author said that we are
going OUT the national catastrophe. I would be happy to share his optimism.
But cannot do it honestly.

Once more thanks for a nice talk. Just like kitchen discussions back
home.

-Boris
Newsgroups: soc.culture.soviet