Чем хуже, тем лучше!

[Michael Denner]

In case you missed it... a followup to the IHE article of a few months ago.

Desire to learn Russian heating up again
By Michael Birnbaum
Washington Post Staff Writer

Monday, March 1, 2010; B01

Russian used to be hot, the must-learn language of ambitious Americans looking to talk to their rivals. But the end of the Cold War put the language in a deep freeze -- one from which it's just beginning to emerge.
Students now see Russia as a place to make money, and, with the highly charged rhetoric of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, the country appears to be a bit of a rival again. Russian programs in high schools, which had been shrinking since the fall of the Iron Curtain in 1991, may have stabilized, educators say.

"The worse it gets as far as our relations are concerned, the better it is for our enrollments," said John Schillinger, a professor emeritus at American University who has been tracking Russian class enrollments nationwide since 1984. "That's kind of what's going on now." 

MORE...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/28/AR2010022804407_pf.html


~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
   Dr. Michael A. Denner
   Associate Professor of Russian Studies
   Editor, Tolstoy Studies Journal
   Director, University Honors Program


   Contact Information:
      Russian Studies Program
      Stetson University
      Campus Box 8361
      DeLand, FL 32720-3756
      386.822.7381 (department)
      386.822.7265 (direct line)
      386.822.7380 (fax)

      google talk michaeladenner
      www.stetson.edu/~mdenner
________________________________________
From: SEELANGS: Slavic & East European Languages and Literatures list [SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu] On Behalf Of Andrey Shcherbenok [shcherbenok at GMAIL.COM]
Sent: Monday, March 01, 2010 4:53 PM
To: SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu
Subject: Re: [SEELANGS] Lenin's embalming

I cannot think of a single comprehensive study of the issue, but from what I
have read it was not a single momentous decision. After Lenin died his body
was displayed publically to allow people bid him farewell (you can see this
ceremony in Dziga Vertov's documentary "Three Songs of Lenin"). Then, since
there were a lot of people who wanted to do so and since it took many a long
time to travel to Moscow, the decision was made to embalm the body. Then, a
temporary mausoleum was built to display it. Thus, initial embalmment was
merely to prolong the farewell ceremony which just never ended, so "the
decision" is, in a way, the lack of decision to end the public mourning,
which may explain the absence of a particular agency behind it.

----
Dr. Andrey Shcherbenok
Royal Society Newton International Fellow

Department of Russian and Slavonic Studies
University of Sheffield, Jessop West
1 Upper Hanover St, Sheffield S3 7RA
United Kingdom
Tel: (+44) (0)114 222 7404
Tel: (+44) (0)793 014 3021
E-mail: shcherbenok at gmail.com


-----Original Message-----
From: SEELANGS: Slavic & East European Languages and Literatures list
[mailto:SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu] On Behalf Of ameliede at EARTHLINK.NET
Sent: Monday, March 01, 2010 10:08 PM
To: SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu
Subject: Re: [SEELANGS] Mr. Mayakovsky too died in the gulag,

At 05:20 AM 3/1/2010, you wrote:

>Is there a decent historical study of how the decision to embalm
>Lenin's corpse was arrived at?
>
>Grover Furr
>Montclair State U.

This may be legendary/apocryphal, but I read that the process
specifically of shaping the cult was in the hands of a former
Orthodox seminarian and a Yeshiva "graduate".  I've always thought
that the formula "Lenin lived, Lenin lives, Lenin will live for ever"
comes from the Hebrew prayer book (not about Lenin of course) and is
recited daily.
Jules Levin
Los Angeles

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