I would like to direct everyone to this Pulitzer Prize winning news-series: “Above the Law.”
It documents the unbelievable abuses and corruption in the Russian legal system. You will be shocked.
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Monday, April 18, 2011
Language
Noam Chomsky’s linguistic theories have been assailed by none other than Dr. Quentin Atkinson (and Michael Dunn)! As many readers of my blog know, my name is Miles Quentin Atkinson. But that’s immaterial. What’s interesting is that the field of linguistics may face its first major paradigm shift since Chomsky turned the field on its head back in the 50’s and 60’s.
This is interesting to me for a number of reasons. Firstly, it knocks a hole in my image of Chomsky as an impenetrable fortress of intellect. Chomsky, aside from being a linguist, is the torchbearer of modern anarchism. It’s not that I necessarily agree with all of Chomsky’s politics, but I’ve said “I guess I have to be an anarchist because I don’t think I could ever beat Chomsky in a debate.” That’s probably still true, but the man’s shining white visage has been tarnished.
I’m only sort of joking.
More important is the challenge that Dr. Atkinson’s and Dr. Dunn’s papers offer to mainstream linguistic theory. To summarize, Chomsky says that humans are naturally programmed to learn language and that there is a universal grammatical structure underlying all chitchat. Just as our organs develop according to some genetic blueprint as we age, Chomsky says that our ability to learn language develops similarly. That’s a very simplistic summation, but then again, I have a very surface understanding of the topic; don’t cite my summary.
Atkinson’s paper traces languages as a function of the distance from Africa from which it originated and the number of “phonemes” that the language contains. Africa is where humanity finds its origins and “the farther you get from that continent, the less diverse, genetically speaking, people are.” The same is true of languages. Phonemes are the single sounds that distinguish one word from another: f, d, b, and s in fad, dad, bad, sad. Atkinson found that the farther away a language originated from Africa, the fewer phonemes it had. In other words, the farther away from Africa a language developed, the less diversity in sound it contained.
Dunn used computer modeling to find that almost no grammatical uniformity can be found across language groups.
Basically, this challenges Chomsky’s theory of innate language and suggests that languages are shaped much more by culture and other things that we humans create rather than genetics.
Maybe I was being too ambitious in trying to explain all of that since I don’t really know very much about it. But, it leads me to my next point, and what was going to be my main point before my thoughts turned tangential: Russian language and language in general.
I love the Russian language and I intend to become fluent in it, or at least decent. I’ve progressed more slowly than I would have liked in learning the language since I’ve been here, mainly because most of the Russians I know speak English. Recently though I’ve become friends with someone who speaks no English, and that has been good from a language-learning point of view.
Learning another language has got me thinking about my mother tongue and its great dialectical diversity, quirkiness, and structure. I’ve never thought of the different accents and regional characteristics of English as separate dialects, but there is enough variation between the speech of rural Southern black people and English speakers in India, for instance, so that the two are not mutually intelligible.
I use the example of Southern black dialect because I am familiar with it. It is interesting to note the grammatical structure of this dialect and how it often drops or misuses standard English verb conjugation: the present tense of a verb is often substituted for past tense or sometimes the past-perfect tense is used instead of past (“he had told me,” or “he tell me” instead of “he told me”) Also, as Johnson (the Economist’s language blog) pointed out in a recent post, the possessive “s” is often dropped so that “Michael’s sister” becomes “Michael sister.” Really, for the purpose of intelligible communication, the possessive ‘s is an unnecessary addendum.
Also of interest is the heavy use of intonation in this dialect. It is always fun to listen to black folk talk excitedly as their pitch flies up and down, stress is shifted around, and certain words are elongated.
Listen to the people speak in this video: If you don’t want to watch it, it’s about a teacher who is trying to get young black kids to speak proper English (“say ask instead of ax.”)
I don’t really see the difference between black “ebonics” and any other type of dialect. I mean, the Cockney and “deep South” dialects are just as incorrect in a strict grammatical sense. I do think it is important to know proper English, but I also think that our dialects are something to be respected and preserved. Just to note, many of my black friends switch back and forth between more standard English and the Southern black dialect depending on who they’re talking to.
The Russians here who are fluent in English often mention how difficult it is to understand certain English speakers. Some have mentioned how poorly the Dutch speak English, or how Indians make lots of grammatical errors. For my friends who have spent time in America, a lot of them talk about their troubles with talking to black folks. Even I am hard to understand! But, that’s mostly because I talk very quickly and have a hard time enunciating syllables when I am eager to share a thought.
What most of the Russians seem to agree about is that Canadians are the easiest to understand. I’m not sure why.
There are a lot of quirks in our language that the Russians have opened my eyes to. Contextually driven “phrasal verbs” present a major challenge to non-native speakers. For instance, how would one deduce the meaning of a phrase like “let’s hang out?” Hang out of what? Why would we want to do that?
When we “put off” work or “get over” the flu, what are we doing? Only a native speaker would know.
One of my friends asked me: “why do you say ‘he was beaten up,’ instead of ‘he was beaten’?” They mean the exact same thing, so why do we add the “up?” I told him I had no idea.
Almost every English speaking Russian makes the same kind of grammar mistakes. The most common mistake is simple word order confusion. They will say “tell us what is it,” instead of “tell us what it is,” for example.
There are certain sounds that are unique to English. The most difficult for the Russians are the “th” sound in thick, and the “w” sound in well. I just read that “th” is a sound found exclusively in the languages of the European fringe (Iceland, England, Spain, Greece, and Denmark). Interestingly, the “th” sound seems to only appear in areas where a majority of people carry the O-blood type gene.
Unfortunately, the Latin script is not so comprehensive as to include all of the sounds that we use, and for many words there is no obvious pronunciation. I’ve heard one of our Russian friends pronouncing “muscles” with a hard ‘c,’ like “muskels.” Or he will say “charger” with a hard ‘g’.
Many logical mistakes are made. I remember my friend Vasily was telling me that a man I had just talked with was a “nuclear physician” in the Soviet Union. A nuclear physician? Oh, he meant a nuclear physicist.
Russians use English words in ways that we wouldn’t; I assume this is just transposing Russian slang and colloquialisms into English because they certainly didn’t pick them up from English-language mass media or native speakers. When looking for affirmation, they will ask “is it normal,” where we would say “is that alright?” They use “legendary” as the highest endorsement, where we would say “awesome!” Many beginners will look up English phrases that end up sounding very out of place when spoken in a broken accent: instead of “thank you,” they’ll say “don’t mention it,” “not at all,” or “my pleasure.”
I’m sure I sound silly when I use the Russian slang that I’ve been taught. I certainly get laughs when I use words like “ништяк” (nishtyak) or “отстой,” (otstoy) which translate roughly to “that’s sick/cool” and “that sucks.”
Language is one of those marvels of human existence and that’s all there is to it.
This is interesting to me for a number of reasons. Firstly, it knocks a hole in my image of Chomsky as an impenetrable fortress of intellect. Chomsky, aside from being a linguist, is the torchbearer of modern anarchism. It’s not that I necessarily agree with all of Chomsky’s politics, but I’ve said “I guess I have to be an anarchist because I don’t think I could ever beat Chomsky in a debate.” That’s probably still true, but the man’s shining white visage has been tarnished.
I’m only sort of joking.
More important is the challenge that Dr. Atkinson’s and Dr. Dunn’s papers offer to mainstream linguistic theory. To summarize, Chomsky says that humans are naturally programmed to learn language and that there is a universal grammatical structure underlying all chitchat. Just as our organs develop according to some genetic blueprint as we age, Chomsky says that our ability to learn language develops similarly. That’s a very simplistic summation, but then again, I have a very surface understanding of the topic; don’t cite my summary.
Atkinson’s paper traces languages as a function of the distance from Africa from which it originated and the number of “phonemes” that the language contains. Africa is where humanity finds its origins and “the farther you get from that continent, the less diverse, genetically speaking, people are.” The same is true of languages. Phonemes are the single sounds that distinguish one word from another: f, d, b, and s in fad, dad, bad, sad. Atkinson found that the farther away a language originated from Africa, the fewer phonemes it had. In other words, the farther away from Africa a language developed, the less diversity in sound it contained.
Dunn used computer modeling to find that almost no grammatical uniformity can be found across language groups.
Basically, this challenges Chomsky’s theory of innate language and suggests that languages are shaped much more by culture and other things that we humans create rather than genetics.
Maybe I was being too ambitious in trying to explain all of that since I don’t really know very much about it. But, it leads me to my next point, and what was going to be my main point before my thoughts turned tangential: Russian language and language in general.
I love the Russian language and I intend to become fluent in it, or at least decent. I’ve progressed more slowly than I would have liked in learning the language since I’ve been here, mainly because most of the Russians I know speak English. Recently though I’ve become friends with someone who speaks no English, and that has been good from a language-learning point of view.
Learning another language has got me thinking about my mother tongue and its great dialectical diversity, quirkiness, and structure. I’ve never thought of the different accents and regional characteristics of English as separate dialects, but there is enough variation between the speech of rural Southern black people and English speakers in India, for instance, so that the two are not mutually intelligible.
I use the example of Southern black dialect because I am familiar with it. It is interesting to note the grammatical structure of this dialect and how it often drops or misuses standard English verb conjugation: the present tense of a verb is often substituted for past tense or sometimes the past-perfect tense is used instead of past (“he had told me,” or “he tell me” instead of “he told me”) Also, as Johnson (the Economist’s language blog) pointed out in a recent post, the possessive “s” is often dropped so that “Michael’s sister” becomes “Michael sister.” Really, for the purpose of intelligible communication, the possessive ‘s is an unnecessary addendum.
Also of interest is the heavy use of intonation in this dialect. It is always fun to listen to black folk talk excitedly as their pitch flies up and down, stress is shifted around, and certain words are elongated.
Listen to the people speak in this video: If you don’t want to watch it, it’s about a teacher who is trying to get young black kids to speak proper English (“say ask instead of ax.”)
I don’t really see the difference between black “ebonics” and any other type of dialect. I mean, the Cockney and “deep South” dialects are just as incorrect in a strict grammatical sense. I do think it is important to know proper English, but I also think that our dialects are something to be respected and preserved. Just to note, many of my black friends switch back and forth between more standard English and the Southern black dialect depending on who they’re talking to.
The Russians here who are fluent in English often mention how difficult it is to understand certain English speakers. Some have mentioned how poorly the Dutch speak English, or how Indians make lots of grammatical errors. For my friends who have spent time in America, a lot of them talk about their troubles with talking to black folks. Even I am hard to understand! But, that’s mostly because I talk very quickly and have a hard time enunciating syllables when I am eager to share a thought.
What most of the Russians seem to agree about is that Canadians are the easiest to understand. I’m not sure why.
There are a lot of quirks in our language that the Russians have opened my eyes to. Contextually driven “phrasal verbs” present a major challenge to non-native speakers. For instance, how would one deduce the meaning of a phrase like “let’s hang out?” Hang out of what? Why would we want to do that?
When we “put off” work or “get over” the flu, what are we doing? Only a native speaker would know.
One of my friends asked me: “why do you say ‘he was beaten up,’ instead of ‘he was beaten’?” They mean the exact same thing, so why do we add the “up?” I told him I had no idea.
Almost every English speaking Russian makes the same kind of grammar mistakes. The most common mistake is simple word order confusion. They will say “tell us what is it,” instead of “tell us what it is,” for example.
There are certain sounds that are unique to English. The most difficult for the Russians are the “th” sound in thick, and the “w” sound in well. I just read that “th” is a sound found exclusively in the languages of the European fringe (Iceland, England, Spain, Greece, and Denmark). Interestingly, the “th” sound seems to only appear in areas where a majority of people carry the O-blood type gene.
Unfortunately, the Latin script is not so comprehensive as to include all of the sounds that we use, and for many words there is no obvious pronunciation. I’ve heard one of our Russian friends pronouncing “muscles” with a hard ‘c,’ like “muskels.” Or he will say “charger” with a hard ‘g’.
Many logical mistakes are made. I remember my friend Vasily was telling me that a man I had just talked with was a “nuclear physician” in the Soviet Union. A nuclear physician? Oh, he meant a nuclear physicist.
Russians use English words in ways that we wouldn’t; I assume this is just transposing Russian slang and colloquialisms into English because they certainly didn’t pick them up from English-language mass media or native speakers. When looking for affirmation, they will ask “is it normal,” where we would say “is that alright?” They use “legendary” as the highest endorsement, where we would say “awesome!” Many beginners will look up English phrases that end up sounding very out of place when spoken in a broken accent: instead of “thank you,” they’ll say “don’t mention it,” “not at all,” or “my pleasure.”
I’m sure I sound silly when I use the Russian slang that I’ve been taught. I certainly get laughs when I use words like “ништяк” (nishtyak) or “отстой,” (otstoy) which translate roughly to “that’s sick/cool” and “that sucks.”
Language is one of those marvels of human existence and that’s all there is to it.
Monday, April 11, 2011
Unjustified Optimism?
*I wrote this about a month ago, and I think my opinion has changed since. Another blog to follow.
I may be overstepping my boundaries and making assumptions that are beyond my knowledge in writing what I am about to write, but I am an observer and these are my observations.
When it comes to political life, most Russians have a pessimistic streak and a general attitude of hopelessness, which is invariably self-fulfilling. Granted, I hail from the upper-middle class in “the land of the free”, so my outlook on political life is likely to be a bit sunnier than that of the general world population. Still, I believe in the efficacy of peoples, even peoples inured to corruption and mismanagement at the highest administrative levels.
Vladimir Putin, the prime minister of Russia, is often charged with holding dictatorial power. This may be the case, and there are certainly shady things that have happened on his watch, but I don’t think that he is the main problem. Corruption is widespread in Russia and it takes many forms. From the lowliest power monger to the highest officials, the practice of greasing palms is pervasive.
Corruption is always the product of a poorly structured bureaucracy, and in the case of Russia, it is a legacy of the Soviet system, which was notorious for its lack of accountability. Perhaps the mindset that fermented in the days of despotism under forced conformity when dissent carried a death penalty still lingers in the Russian subconscious; perhaps a society used to a strong authoritarian will always want for that paternalistic power.
But, even in Soviet times there were plenty of dissenting voices and they became muffled less as time went on and the Soviet Union liberalized. Dissent under Stalin was not tolerated, but things lightened up a lot under Khrushchev and certainly under Gorbachev. There is a general human tendency to resist oppression and the voices of people like Pasternak, Akhmatova, and Solzhenitsyn still found expression in spite of Soviet censorship (in later years anyway). As far as I know, which is not very much, there is not much serious talk inside the country about the problems of modern Russia, at least not talk with the purpose of bringing about change. What is going on?
Maybe there is a fear factor, what with the suspicious deaths of Anna Politkovskaya, shot in an elevator, and Alexander Litvinenko, poisoned with radioactive material in London. The recent decision to extend the prison sentence on trumped up charges of oil magnate Mikhail Khodorkovsky who funded anti-Putin campaigns, does not instill trust in the legal system. Not to mention the two reporters who were savagely beaten a few months ago after they covered a controversial highway construction story.
It may be the case that many Russians think fatalistically, but fatalism is not “ingrained” in Russian culture as many claim. Recall, if you will, that Russia was the scene of the most dramatic and comprehensive political movement of the twentieth century, if not the history of civilization. It was here that a centuries old imperial system was toppled and with it the nascent roots of international capital in the country. An entirely new societal structure was adopted. Of course, we can see now that this was a misguided attempt, but it was not an attempt made by complacent fatalists. The mood of the time, 1905-1917, was of hope. 1905 brought the first signs of change: a semi-representative Duma and a constitution. February 1917 brought the end of dynastic Russia. October, unfortunately, brought the Bolsheviks. Still, the civil war that followed was fueled by ideology and a hope of establishing a better Russia.
What Russia needs is a change in attitude. My Russian friend said this about change in Russia: “you can’t turn shit into candy.”
That may be true, but you aren’t dealing with shit, you are dealing with a country; a country with one of the most vibrant and diverse cultures on the planet that values education. It is a country that has produced some of the most brilliant artists, authors, and scientists in history and which has tremendous potential for growth. All it takes to create change is a shift in attitude. From that, everything else will follow.
I may be overstepping my boundaries and making assumptions that are beyond my knowledge in writing what I am about to write, but I am an observer and these are my observations.
When it comes to political life, most Russians have a pessimistic streak and a general attitude of hopelessness, which is invariably self-fulfilling. Granted, I hail from the upper-middle class in “the land of the free”, so my outlook on political life is likely to be a bit sunnier than that of the general world population. Still, I believe in the efficacy of peoples, even peoples inured to corruption and mismanagement at the highest administrative levels.
Vladimir Putin, the prime minister of Russia, is often charged with holding dictatorial power. This may be the case, and there are certainly shady things that have happened on his watch, but I don’t think that he is the main problem. Corruption is widespread in Russia and it takes many forms. From the lowliest power monger to the highest officials, the practice of greasing palms is pervasive.
Corruption is always the product of a poorly structured bureaucracy, and in the case of Russia, it is a legacy of the Soviet system, which was notorious for its lack of accountability. Perhaps the mindset that fermented in the days of despotism under forced conformity when dissent carried a death penalty still lingers in the Russian subconscious; perhaps a society used to a strong authoritarian will always want for that paternalistic power.
But, even in Soviet times there were plenty of dissenting voices and they became muffled less as time went on and the Soviet Union liberalized. Dissent under Stalin was not tolerated, but things lightened up a lot under Khrushchev and certainly under Gorbachev. There is a general human tendency to resist oppression and the voices of people like Pasternak, Akhmatova, and Solzhenitsyn still found expression in spite of Soviet censorship (in later years anyway). As far as I know, which is not very much, there is not much serious talk inside the country about the problems of modern Russia, at least not talk with the purpose of bringing about change. What is going on?
Maybe there is a fear factor, what with the suspicious deaths of Anna Politkovskaya, shot in an elevator, and Alexander Litvinenko, poisoned with radioactive material in London. The recent decision to extend the prison sentence on trumped up charges of oil magnate Mikhail Khodorkovsky who funded anti-Putin campaigns, does not instill trust in the legal system. Not to mention the two reporters who were savagely beaten a few months ago after they covered a controversial highway construction story.
It may be the case that many Russians think fatalistically, but fatalism is not “ingrained” in Russian culture as many claim. Recall, if you will, that Russia was the scene of the most dramatic and comprehensive political movement of the twentieth century, if not the history of civilization. It was here that a centuries old imperial system was toppled and with it the nascent roots of international capital in the country. An entirely new societal structure was adopted. Of course, we can see now that this was a misguided attempt, but it was not an attempt made by complacent fatalists. The mood of the time, 1905-1917, was of hope. 1905 brought the first signs of change: a semi-representative Duma and a constitution. February 1917 brought the end of dynastic Russia. October, unfortunately, brought the Bolsheviks. Still, the civil war that followed was fueled by ideology and a hope of establishing a better Russia.
What Russia needs is a change in attitude. My Russian friend said this about change in Russia: “you can’t turn shit into candy.”
That may be true, but you aren’t dealing with shit, you are dealing with a country; a country with one of the most vibrant and diverse cultures on the planet that values education. It is a country that has produced some of the most brilliant artists, authors, and scientists in history and which has tremendous potential for growth. All it takes to create change is a shift in attitude. From that, everything else will follow.
Saturday, April 2, 2011
VDNKh
Today I went on another of my solitary walking tours of Moscow to get some exercise and allow some thoughts to brew. I’ve begun reading my second work by Solzhenitsyn- “The Gulag Archipelago”- and already I sense the tremendous impact it will have in the formulation of my political compass. You see, Solzhenitsyn is the foremost chronicler of the abuses in the GULAG labor camps, and he describes the abuse with such harrowing specificity as to churn up rabid indignation in the most imperturbable and morally relativist of individuals. So you can just imagine my reaction!
Walking around the VDNK (ВДНХ) today I was filled by a desire to desecrate the “temples of the proletariat” built to the glory of a bastardized ideology that was the driving force behind the unspeakable treatment of millions at the hands of the bastards who became so unthinkingly consumed by it!
Getting ahead of myself. The VDNK was a permanent exhibition center for each of the Soviet Socialist Republics (the SSR in USSR) built in 1939 under papa Stalin. In the enormous outdoor complex are magnificent exhibition halls, built like temples, where cultural displays from each of the republics were maintained. Each building has its own unique architectural design but is covered with communist iconography that not-so-subtly suggests the subordinate status of regional culture to global worker’s solidarity.
Today, the cultural exhibits are long gone, replaced with little vendor stalls like the ones we have outside of my apartment building. Inside the Belorussian building there was a purveyor of toothpaste, blow-dryers, and floor-mats. Each of the buildings is full of vendors hawking everything from fancy televisions and high-grade video cameras, to prop swords, hookahs, cookware, and faux-fur.
Strange to see the hand-drawn signs and splintered plywood “storefronts” underneath the intricate plaster medallions on the ceiling. Stepping through the threshold framed by magnificent marble columns and archways and into the hectic bazaar feels much like going to a flea market in the Lincoln Memorial. Really, imagine all of the monuments in Washington D.C. being overtaken by the peddlers in New York’s Chinatown. Counterfeit watches on sale at the WWII memorial; food stands blocking the names on the Vietnam memorial; a big banner advertisement hanging on the Washington monument.
Although initially taken aback by this, it dawned on me that there could be no greater triumph of the noble forces of liberalism over the petulant rottenness that inspired the construction of these halls! Sure, the booths are a bit tacky and out of place, but can you imagine the look on Stalin’s face if he knew that his grand monument to communist unity was being used in this manner? I can think of no greater desecration of his vision. Sure, Khrushchev did a number on Stalin’s reputation when he dismantled the cult of personality, but nothing like this. It makes you want to go stomp on the old bastard’s grave near the Kremlin and joyfully scream:
“You lose, you’ve lost! Everything that you thought good has been dismantled; your memory has been defecated upon by history; you are an object of contempt! Good riddance!”
Walking around the VDNK (ВДНХ) today I was filled by a desire to desecrate the “temples of the proletariat” built to the glory of a bastardized ideology that was the driving force behind the unspeakable treatment of millions at the hands of the bastards who became so unthinkingly consumed by it!
Getting ahead of myself. The VDNK was a permanent exhibition center for each of the Soviet Socialist Republics (the SSR in USSR) built in 1939 under papa Stalin. In the enormous outdoor complex are magnificent exhibition halls, built like temples, where cultural displays from each of the republics were maintained. Each building has its own unique architectural design but is covered with communist iconography that not-so-subtly suggests the subordinate status of regional culture to global worker’s solidarity.
Today, the cultural exhibits are long gone, replaced with little vendor stalls like the ones we have outside of my apartment building. Inside the Belorussian building there was a purveyor of toothpaste, blow-dryers, and floor-mats. Each of the buildings is full of vendors hawking everything from fancy televisions and high-grade video cameras, to prop swords, hookahs, cookware, and faux-fur.
Strange to see the hand-drawn signs and splintered plywood “storefronts” underneath the intricate plaster medallions on the ceiling. Stepping through the threshold framed by magnificent marble columns and archways and into the hectic bazaar feels much like going to a flea market in the Lincoln Memorial. Really, imagine all of the monuments in Washington D.C. being overtaken by the peddlers in New York’s Chinatown. Counterfeit watches on sale at the WWII memorial; food stands blocking the names on the Vietnam memorial; a big banner advertisement hanging on the Washington monument.
Although initially taken aback by this, it dawned on me that there could be no greater triumph of the noble forces of liberalism over the petulant rottenness that inspired the construction of these halls! Sure, the booths are a bit tacky and out of place, but can you imagine the look on Stalin’s face if he knew that his grand monument to communist unity was being used in this manner? I can think of no greater desecration of his vision. Sure, Khrushchev did a number on Stalin’s reputation when he dismantled the cult of personality, but nothing like this. It makes you want to go stomp on the old bastard’s grave near the Kremlin and joyfully scream:
“You lose, you’ve lost! Everything that you thought good has been dismantled; your memory has been defecated upon by history; you are an object of contempt! Good riddance!”
Saturday, March 26, 2011
Churches
There seems to be a degree of superstitious mysticism in Russian culture, and it can be seen especially in the Orthodox Church. There is a tremendous amount of ritual that must be followed before, during, and after being inside. At the threshold, believers will cross themselves (the Orthodox cross-motion is the reverse of the Cathol/Protestant- top, bottom, right, left). Inside, men must remove hats and women must put on headscarves. Women must also be dressed in conservative attire, that is, skirts or loose-fitting trousers. Believers scurry about the dark rooms perfumed with incense, busily crossing themselves and bowing to the gilded portraits of saints.
The whole atmosphere inside the churches plays to the senses: elaborate icons, golden alters and paintings on every bit of wall and ceiling overwhelm the eyes. The strong smell of incense permeates everything, and the warm stuffiness of the sanctuaries contrast sharply with the cold outside. The room is either full of chanting or, more commonly, so quiet that you have to make an effort to stifle the sound of your footfall. This all creates an environment that emphasizes the mysterious and the spiritual, which goes a long way in explaining the raw and emotional form of worship in the church. It is not uncommon to see women weeping before the image of a saint, and most every one of the faithful kisses the saints’ pictures on the walls. In some churches there are the remains of long-dead saints encased in tremendous sarcophagi with transparent glass over the top. I have seen people stand in line to bend over and kiss the glass, which is always smudged with the collective lip-gunk of the faithful.
I should mention that the bodies of the saints are covered in linens, so it’s not like you can see a decomposing face staring back up at you. But, I wonder if people would be so keen on kissing the glass if that were so?
The Russian Orthodox Church is so fundamentally different than the Protestant tradition that I am more familiar with. As far as I can tell, Russian Orthodox services lack sermons in favor of much chanting, singing, incense swirling, and prostration before the Lord (who stares down with a stern face from the ceiling). This worship is much more transcendent and spiritual than the typical Protestant variety, and without much organization or structure. People come in and out, praying to whichever saint they choose and all bowing and crossing whenever they feel like it. I haven’t seen the blank back-and-forth between priest and congregation of the Episcopal tradition, nor have I seen anyone taking communion in any form, or really any interaction between the priests and the people. That’s not to say that it’s not there, but not in a form familiar to me.
Really, it reminds me much more of the type of worship I’ve seen in mosques or synagogues. A great deal of chanting and recitation of prayer in Russian, Hebrew, or Arabic, respectively, with lots of ritualistic bowing, crossing, prostrating, and rocking. From what I can tell, the Orthodox priest plays a similar role to the imam. He leads prayer during a service, and is a spiritual adviser after hours. Unlike Islam, there is a lot more pomp and show in the Orthodox Church and with plenty of pictures of Jesus, God and the saints (strictly forbidden in Islam). So, in that sense, an Orthodox church is also similar to the synagogues that I’ve seen. There is a lot of decoration and they both have big elaborate versions of their holy books, to point out a few things. Well, naturally they will all be a bit similar since they come from the Abrahamic tradition.
There is a lot of formality in church, and being unfamiliar with it can get you in trouble. I was in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior and some бабушка ran up from behind, slapped my arm and issued some reprimand for an unknown violation. In another church, I mistakenly put my hat back on before being all the way outside. I was approached by a youngish man who gestured to me to take it off. It’s difficult to know how to behave inside exactly, but I just try my best to be unassuming and inoffensive.
The whole atmosphere inside the churches plays to the senses: elaborate icons, golden alters and paintings on every bit of wall and ceiling overwhelm the eyes. The strong smell of incense permeates everything, and the warm stuffiness of the sanctuaries contrast sharply with the cold outside. The room is either full of chanting or, more commonly, so quiet that you have to make an effort to stifle the sound of your footfall. This all creates an environment that emphasizes the mysterious and the spiritual, which goes a long way in explaining the raw and emotional form of worship in the church. It is not uncommon to see women weeping before the image of a saint, and most every one of the faithful kisses the saints’ pictures on the walls. In some churches there are the remains of long-dead saints encased in tremendous sarcophagi with transparent glass over the top. I have seen people stand in line to bend over and kiss the glass, which is always smudged with the collective lip-gunk of the faithful.
I should mention that the bodies of the saints are covered in linens, so it’s not like you can see a decomposing face staring back up at you. But, I wonder if people would be so keen on kissing the glass if that were so?
The Russian Orthodox Church is so fundamentally different than the Protestant tradition that I am more familiar with. As far as I can tell, Russian Orthodox services lack sermons in favor of much chanting, singing, incense swirling, and prostration before the Lord (who stares down with a stern face from the ceiling). This worship is much more transcendent and spiritual than the typical Protestant variety, and without much organization or structure. People come in and out, praying to whichever saint they choose and all bowing and crossing whenever they feel like it. I haven’t seen the blank back-and-forth between priest and congregation of the Episcopal tradition, nor have I seen anyone taking communion in any form, or really any interaction between the priests and the people. That’s not to say that it’s not there, but not in a form familiar to me.
Really, it reminds me much more of the type of worship I’ve seen in mosques or synagogues. A great deal of chanting and recitation of prayer in Russian, Hebrew, or Arabic, respectively, with lots of ritualistic bowing, crossing, prostrating, and rocking. From what I can tell, the Orthodox priest plays a similar role to the imam. He leads prayer during a service, and is a spiritual adviser after hours. Unlike Islam, there is a lot more pomp and show in the Orthodox Church and with plenty of pictures of Jesus, God and the saints (strictly forbidden in Islam). So, in that sense, an Orthodox church is also similar to the synagogues that I’ve seen. There is a lot of decoration and they both have big elaborate versions of their holy books, to point out a few things. Well, naturally they will all be a bit similar since they come from the Abrahamic tradition.
There is a lot of formality in church, and being unfamiliar with it can get you in trouble. I was in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior and some бабушка ran up from behind, slapped my arm and issued some reprimand for an unknown violation. In another church, I mistakenly put my hat back on before being all the way outside. I was approached by a youngish man who gestured to me to take it off. It’s difficult to know how to behave inside exactly, but I just try my best to be unassuming and inoffensive.
Friday, March 18, 2011
Superstitions Are Silly
“Superstitions are for the weak of heart, they make you think you’re finished without even having to start…circumstances are the closest thing to luck, the trick is to keep on moving. Whatever you do, don’t get stuck.” So says Mr. Ian Hanawalt.
Russians have a lot of superstitions, and like all superstitions they don’t make one bit of sense. I enjoy superstition though, as long as it doesn’t impede progress or anything, because it is a relic of a primitive mindset where arbitrary actions are attached significance. Superstitious behavior satisfies an obsessive-compulsive tendency in human beings in a relatively harmless way. I like to play along!
I’ll relate a few uniquely Russian superstitions that I have encountered. When pouring a drink, always set the glass down on a table. When pouring a round of drinks, always have one person pour for everyone. When drinking, the first shot must be followed by a third shot (which, of course, necessitates a second shot). When drinking, always wait for a toast before you take your shot. When drinking, always finish your shot in one gulp. Of course, all of these superstitions have been related to us out of context- we certainly wouldn’t be consuming alcohol.
When describing a physical deformity, never show it on yourself. I was talking to Katya and Alisa about a guy I saw with no hands, and when I crinkled up my fingers to show them they both reacted immediately! The superstition holds that showing it on yourself will bring it upon you (but apparently it doesn’t apply in some circumstances like if a girl says “her breasts were way out to here!”).
When sitting between two people of the same namesake, one is granted a wish. This one is good for us because we have three Max’s in our group.
If someone itches their nose, you’re supposed to punch them.
I’m always being called out because I whistle: “whistling money away.”
When people are getting married the guests call out some word that translates into “bitter,” and the groom will kiss his bride while everyone counts. However high they count is supposed to be the number of years they’ll be married.
There are plenty of opportunities to make wishes. On Red Square there are several places to make a wish, but usually you have to throw money or something first.
In the metro station Плошадь Революции, there are bronze statues. All of the extremities of the statue are rub-polished because rubbing them is good luck, of course!
Russians have a lot of superstitions, and like all superstitions they don’t make one bit of sense. I enjoy superstition though, as long as it doesn’t impede progress or anything, because it is a relic of a primitive mindset where arbitrary actions are attached significance. Superstitious behavior satisfies an obsessive-compulsive tendency in human beings in a relatively harmless way. I like to play along!
I’ll relate a few uniquely Russian superstitions that I have encountered. When pouring a drink, always set the glass down on a table. When pouring a round of drinks, always have one person pour for everyone. When drinking, the first shot must be followed by a third shot (which, of course, necessitates a second shot). When drinking, always wait for a toast before you take your shot. When drinking, always finish your shot in one gulp. Of course, all of these superstitions have been related to us out of context- we certainly wouldn’t be consuming alcohol.
When describing a physical deformity, never show it on yourself. I was talking to Katya and Alisa about a guy I saw with no hands, and when I crinkled up my fingers to show them they both reacted immediately! The superstition holds that showing it on yourself will bring it upon you (but apparently it doesn’t apply in some circumstances like if a girl says “her breasts were way out to here!”).
When sitting between two people of the same namesake, one is granted a wish. This one is good for us because we have three Max’s in our group.
If someone itches their nose, you’re supposed to punch them.
I’m always being called out because I whistle: “whistling money away.”
When people are getting married the guests call out some word that translates into “bitter,” and the groom will kiss his bride while everyone counts. However high they count is supposed to be the number of years they’ll be married.
There are plenty of opportunities to make wishes. On Red Square there are several places to make a wish, but usually you have to throw money or something first.
In the metro station Плошадь Революции, there are bronze statues. All of the extremities of the statue are rub-polished because rubbing them is good luck, of course!
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Борис Пастернак
After I’d visited Pasternak’s house I decided I didn’t want to see his grave. His home is kept in such a way that you would think that it is still inhabited. There’s a cat sleeping on the bed, and for being a museum, nothing is roped off or behind glass. His worn paperbacks are still on the shelf and his plain oak desk sits unvarnished and empty.
Nadya and I had spent a while trudging through the cemetery, getting snow in our boots, but we couldn’t find the author. Russian graveyards are a bit of a hodgepodge with a different motif for each headstone. Some are wooden orthodox crosses- a bit more ornate than the protestant variety, with an extra half-X at the bottom, but without the macabre crucified messiah of the Catholics. Others are of black and red granite like Lenin’s mausoleum. Most of the headstones had pictures of the deceased etched into them: one particularly morbid grave was topped by a black obelisk that had on one side a dramatic scene of a beautiful naked girl reaching up towards the sun, and on the other side, a life-size etching of the same girl. Seemed like a strange way to decorate a grave.
We eventually abandoned our search for Pasternak and resolved to go on to his home. Down a residential street with new construction on one side is the dacha where he wrote Dr. Zhivago and where he died. There are neighbors next door and they have barking dogs. Besides a small sign on the gate and another on the side of the house, there is no indication that anything out of the ordinary happened here. Nothing would suggest that one of the greatest novels ever written was penned in one of the upstairs rooms of the little barnyard-red house. Nadya and I were the only people in sight; there were no tourists and no food or Pasternak memorabilia stands outside.
It costs 50 rubles ($1.75) to come inside; an entrance fee is almost just a formality. A friendly Russian woman led us around the house, holding up photographs of the author and showing us exactly where they were taken. Everything is in the same place as in the picture, just as it would have been.
Whenever I’ve visited museums or old estates in the United States or Europe the tour guides claim that “this is just how it would have been.” Somehow though, it always feels a bit contrived. This is not how it would have been. The Vanderbilts wouldn’t have let hundreds of tourists traipse through the Breakers or Biltmore and gawk. There wouldn’t have been yellow grip-tape on the stairs, cameras in the corners of the ceiling, velvet ropes blocking off rooms, or EXIT signs above the doors.
Pasternak has pictures that his father sketched hanging up on the walls in the dining room. Colorful etchings of chubby women in the nude and a painting of a mother breast-feeding. A magnificent grand piano is crammed into his wife’s tiny room. When Boris was dying they moved it there.
Looking out of the upstairs window next to his desk, Pasternak invented Zhivago and Lara. Has it ever happened to you that you feel a strong, almost romantic attraction to a fictional character? How could Zhivago have let Lara go? I don’t understand Boris Leonidovich why you had to make him so miserable. The characters become real people over whose mistakes you can’t help but feel distraught.
Yury Zhivago is loosely based on Pasternak himself, perhaps not in deed but in thought and mindset. That is only natural for an author to make his protagonist in the image of himself. For me, this has the effect of blurring the line between fictional character and the man who created him so that I couldn’t help but picture Yury and Lara going about the rooms. Pasternak’s desk was where Yury wrote his poems and just outside the front door is where Strelnikov shot himself. Perhaps this was Lara’s room and off in the distance is where Yury caught his last glimpse of her.
In the room where Pasternak died, a plaster death mask stares into the dining room. In the corner is a pencil drawing of the corpse. On the opposite wall there is a centerfold from a French magazine with a picture of the author’s funeral procession. It all felt out of place in the house.
We sat at his table on his wicker chairs while our guide flipped through a book to show us a picture of his grave. The panoramic windows let in sun, and cast the room in a cheery springtime light. A porcelain samovar and matching saucers looked ready to be made use of. She told us that the headstone had originally been pure white but some zealous literary enthusiasts wanted to pay special tribute so they burnt flowers on top of it leaving it blackened. She pointed it out in the picture.
We left the house and stepped out into the yard, full of towering pines and the occasional bleached bark of a birch. Across the drive is a guesthouse, or maybe it’s a work shed. At the end is a tiny garage. Down a walkway cut in the snow there is an outhouse where I pissed in Pasternak’s toilet.
On the way back up the road, we walked past the graveyard again but I couldn’t spot the charred headstone.
I can’t help but feel some fraternity with the man, even though he’s been dead for fifty years and lived in a different time in a different country. I haven’t even read his work in its original language. Still, some ideas and emotions transcend time and place and even language so that more than half-a-century after Dr. Zhivago was published and almost a century since it took place, I can still be deeply impacted by a work and the man who created it.
Nadya and I had spent a while trudging through the cemetery, getting snow in our boots, but we couldn’t find the author. Russian graveyards are a bit of a hodgepodge with a different motif for each headstone. Some are wooden orthodox crosses- a bit more ornate than the protestant variety, with an extra half-X at the bottom, but without the macabre crucified messiah of the Catholics. Others are of black and red granite like Lenin’s mausoleum. Most of the headstones had pictures of the deceased etched into them: one particularly morbid grave was topped by a black obelisk that had on one side a dramatic scene of a beautiful naked girl reaching up towards the sun, and on the other side, a life-size etching of the same girl. Seemed like a strange way to decorate a grave.
We eventually abandoned our search for Pasternak and resolved to go on to his home. Down a residential street with new construction on one side is the dacha where he wrote Dr. Zhivago and where he died. There are neighbors next door and they have barking dogs. Besides a small sign on the gate and another on the side of the house, there is no indication that anything out of the ordinary happened here. Nothing would suggest that one of the greatest novels ever written was penned in one of the upstairs rooms of the little barnyard-red house. Nadya and I were the only people in sight; there were no tourists and no food or Pasternak memorabilia stands outside.
It costs 50 rubles ($1.75) to come inside; an entrance fee is almost just a formality. A friendly Russian woman led us around the house, holding up photographs of the author and showing us exactly where they were taken. Everything is in the same place as in the picture, just as it would have been.
Whenever I’ve visited museums or old estates in the United States or Europe the tour guides claim that “this is just how it would have been.” Somehow though, it always feels a bit contrived. This is not how it would have been. The Vanderbilts wouldn’t have let hundreds of tourists traipse through the Breakers or Biltmore and gawk. There wouldn’t have been yellow grip-tape on the stairs, cameras in the corners of the ceiling, velvet ropes blocking off rooms, or EXIT signs above the doors.
Pasternak has pictures that his father sketched hanging up on the walls in the dining room. Colorful etchings of chubby women in the nude and a painting of a mother breast-feeding. A magnificent grand piano is crammed into his wife’s tiny room. When Boris was dying they moved it there.
Looking out of the upstairs window next to his desk, Pasternak invented Zhivago and Lara. Has it ever happened to you that you feel a strong, almost romantic attraction to a fictional character? How could Zhivago have let Lara go? I don’t understand Boris Leonidovich why you had to make him so miserable. The characters become real people over whose mistakes you can’t help but feel distraught.
Yury Zhivago is loosely based on Pasternak himself, perhaps not in deed but in thought and mindset. That is only natural for an author to make his protagonist in the image of himself. For me, this has the effect of blurring the line between fictional character and the man who created him so that I couldn’t help but picture Yury and Lara going about the rooms. Pasternak’s desk was where Yury wrote his poems and just outside the front door is where Strelnikov shot himself. Perhaps this was Lara’s room and off in the distance is where Yury caught his last glimpse of her.
In the room where Pasternak died, a plaster death mask stares into the dining room. In the corner is a pencil drawing of the corpse. On the opposite wall there is a centerfold from a French magazine with a picture of the author’s funeral procession. It all felt out of place in the house.
We sat at his table on his wicker chairs while our guide flipped through a book to show us a picture of his grave. The panoramic windows let in sun, and cast the room in a cheery springtime light. A porcelain samovar and matching saucers looked ready to be made use of. She told us that the headstone had originally been pure white but some zealous literary enthusiasts wanted to pay special tribute so they burnt flowers on top of it leaving it blackened. She pointed it out in the picture.
We left the house and stepped out into the yard, full of towering pines and the occasional bleached bark of a birch. Across the drive is a guesthouse, or maybe it’s a work shed. At the end is a tiny garage. Down a walkway cut in the snow there is an outhouse where I pissed in Pasternak’s toilet.
On the way back up the road, we walked past the graveyard again but I couldn’t spot the charred headstone.
I can’t help but feel some fraternity with the man, even though he’s been dead for fifty years and lived in a different time in a different country. I haven’t even read his work in its original language. Still, some ideas and emotions transcend time and place and even language so that more than half-a-century after Dr. Zhivago was published and almost a century since it took place, I can still be deeply impacted by a work and the man who created it.
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