Originally shared by Daniel J. Stern
Famous international brands reimagined as though from the USSR.
https://b-picture.livejournal.com/7507592.html
Tuesday, November 7, 2017
Wednesday, November 1, 2017
A few years ago, Tanja Maier tried to do for Russian parenting what U.S.
A few years ago, Tanja Maier tried to do for Russian parenting what U.S. expat Pamela Druckerman did in 2012 with her best-selling book on French child-rearing, “Bringing Up Bébé.” Ms. Maier pitched a book on Moscow mothers who zealously push their children to succeed at hobbies and keep them in hats year-round to avoid a draft.
In their rejection letters, one U.K. agent wrote, “the Russian approach doesn’t really resonate.”
Ms. Maier did get one bite—from the Russians. Earlier this year, a Russian publisher released a translated edition titled “Winter Hat, Grandmother, Kefir.” The book praises mothers who don’t let their beauty routines slip and raise children on porridge and kefir, a tangy milk beverage. “It turns out, the Russians wanted to hear somebody saying something good about them,” says Ms. Maier, a 41-year-old Arizona native who moved to Moscow in the 1990s.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/tiger-moms-european-style-dirt-sharp-knives-matches-romantic-sleepovers-1509548218
In their rejection letters, one U.K. agent wrote, “the Russian approach doesn’t really resonate.”
Ms. Maier did get one bite—from the Russians. Earlier this year, a Russian publisher released a translated edition titled “Winter Hat, Grandmother, Kefir.” The book praises mothers who don’t let their beauty routines slip and raise children on porridge and kefir, a tangy milk beverage. “It turns out, the Russians wanted to hear somebody saying something good about them,” says Ms. Maier, a 41-year-old Arizona native who moved to Moscow in the 1990s.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/tiger-moms-european-style-dirt-sharp-knives-matches-romantic-sleepovers-1509548218
Tuesday, June 20, 2017
Mr.
Mr. Kralkin, a truck driver, had returned from a long-haul drive from San Diego that night, to curt words with his son, with whom he and his wife live, Mr. Kralkin said.
“You know what the conditions on the road are, and this life,” said Mr. Kralkin, who emigrated from Belarus eight years ago. “You are waiting for home that they will meet you with pleasure, with love.”
Upset at the unfriendly welcome, Mr. Kralkin said, he downed a bottle of Hennessy cognac and went for a walk.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/19/nyregion/ambulance-jumper-lawsuit.html?module=WatchingPortal®ion=c-column-middle-span-region&pgType=Homepage&action=click&mediaId=thumb_square&state=standard&contentPlacement=3&version=internal&contentCollection=www.nytimes.com&contentId=https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/19/nyregion/ambulance-jumper-lawsuit.html&eventName=Watching-article-click
“You know what the conditions on the road are, and this life,” said Mr. Kralkin, who emigrated from Belarus eight years ago. “You are waiting for home that they will meet you with pleasure, with love.”
Upset at the unfriendly welcome, Mr. Kralkin said, he downed a bottle of Hennessy cognac and went for a walk.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/19/nyregion/ambulance-jumper-lawsuit.html?module=WatchingPortal®ion=c-column-middle-span-region&pgType=Homepage&action=click&mediaId=thumb_square&state=standard&contentPlacement=3&version=internal&contentCollection=www.nytimes.com&contentId=https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/19/nyregion/ambulance-jumper-lawsuit.html&eventName=Watching-article-click
Saturday, March 11, 2017
Fascinating longish read about why Russia is not celebrating the February Revolution of 1917.
Fascinating longish read about why Russia is not celebrating the February Revolution of 1917.
“For one group of people, the revolution was the death knell of Great Russia — it was ‘Brexit,’ when we stopped our development in Europe,” said Mikhail Shvydkoy, Mr. Putin’s special representative on cultural matters, in an interview in the wood-paneled cafe at the Central House of Writers, a prerevolutionary mansion. “For many other people, the Soviet past was the best time of their lives.”
Mr. Putin strives to unite the country, he said, whereas “any festivities on the state level would deepen those divisions.”
...
The president shunted the anniversary off into the realm of academia, appointing a special committee to organize seminars and the like.
Previously, the official narrative was an essay written by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, in which he argued that deep distrust between the court and the educated elite along with German meddling brought about catastrophe.
The latter fits the Kremlin narrative that Russia has long been besieged by foreign aggressors and that the West strives to implant friendly governments everywhere by sponsoring “color revolutions.” Columnists have been lumping 1917 among more recent color revolutions in places like Georgia and Ukraine, naturally listing the United States among the suspected agitators.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/10/world/europe/russian-revolution-100-years-putin.html
“For one group of people, the revolution was the death knell of Great Russia — it was ‘Brexit,’ when we stopped our development in Europe,” said Mikhail Shvydkoy, Mr. Putin’s special representative on cultural matters, in an interview in the wood-paneled cafe at the Central House of Writers, a prerevolutionary mansion. “For many other people, the Soviet past was the best time of their lives.”
Mr. Putin strives to unite the country, he said, whereas “any festivities on the state level would deepen those divisions.”
...
The president shunted the anniversary off into the realm of academia, appointing a special committee to organize seminars and the like.
Previously, the official narrative was an essay written by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, in which he argued that deep distrust between the court and the educated elite along with German meddling brought about catastrophe.
The latter fits the Kremlin narrative that Russia has long been besieged by foreign aggressors and that the West strives to implant friendly governments everywhere by sponsoring “color revolutions.” Columnists have been lumping 1917 among more recent color revolutions in places like Georgia and Ukraine, naturally listing the United States among the suspected agitators.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/10/world/europe/russian-revolution-100-years-putin.html
Thursday, February 16, 2017
Why do Russians frown or glare in public, reserving their smiles for private affairs?
Why do Russians frown or glare in public, reserving their smiles for private affairs? Polish academic researcher Kuba Krys suspects that in corrupt and dangerous countries, smiling is bad for your reputation.
Smiling is a sign of certainty and confidence, so when people in those countries smile, they might seem odd. Why would you smile when fate is an invisible wolf waiting to shred you? You might, in those “low-UA” countries, even be considered stupid for smiling.
Krys also hypothesized that smiling in corrupt countries would be, um, frowned upon. When everyone’s trying to pull one over on each other, you don’t know if someone’s smiling with good intentions, or because they’re trying to trick you.
To test this theory, Krys had thousands of people in 44 different countries judge a series of eight smiling and non-smiling faces on a scale of honesty and intelligence. He compared their answers to the country’s rankings of uncertainty avoidance from a 2004 study of 62 societies and ratings of corruption.
He found that in countries like Germany, Switzerland, China, and Malaysia, smiling faces were rated as significantly more intelligent than non-smiling people. But in Japan, India, Iran, South Korea, and—you guessed it—Russia, the smiling faces were considered significantly less intelligent. Even after controlling for other factors, like the economy, there was a strong correlation between how unpredictable a society was and the likelihood they would consider smiling unintelligent.
In countries such as India, Argentina, and the Maldives, meanwhile, smiling was associated with dishonesty—something Krys found to be correlated to their corruption rankings.
“This research indicates that corruption at the societal level may weaken the meaning of an evolutionary important signal such as smiling,” Krys writes.
H/t Kee Hinckley
Originally shared by Sarah Perry-Shipp
Consider, for NPCs
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2016/05/culture-and-smiling/483827/
Smiling is a sign of certainty and confidence, so when people in those countries smile, they might seem odd. Why would you smile when fate is an invisible wolf waiting to shred you? You might, in those “low-UA” countries, even be considered stupid for smiling.
Krys also hypothesized that smiling in corrupt countries would be, um, frowned upon. When everyone’s trying to pull one over on each other, you don’t know if someone’s smiling with good intentions, or because they’re trying to trick you.
To test this theory, Krys had thousands of people in 44 different countries judge a series of eight smiling and non-smiling faces on a scale of honesty and intelligence. He compared their answers to the country’s rankings of uncertainty avoidance from a 2004 study of 62 societies and ratings of corruption.
He found that in countries like Germany, Switzerland, China, and Malaysia, smiling faces were rated as significantly more intelligent than non-smiling people. But in Japan, India, Iran, South Korea, and—you guessed it—Russia, the smiling faces were considered significantly less intelligent. Even after controlling for other factors, like the economy, there was a strong correlation between how unpredictable a society was and the likelihood they would consider smiling unintelligent.
In countries such as India, Argentina, and the Maldives, meanwhile, smiling was associated with dishonesty—something Krys found to be correlated to their corruption rankings.
“This research indicates that corruption at the societal level may weaken the meaning of an evolutionary important signal such as smiling,” Krys writes.
H/t Kee Hinckley
Originally shared by Sarah Perry-Shipp
Consider, for NPCs
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2016/05/culture-and-smiling/483827/
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