Английский язык. Перевод, межкультурная коммуникация и интерпретация языка СМИ. Учебное пособие
.pdfПолитика открытости, которую Германия проводила на протяжении 60 лет, у многих немцев не находит понимания. Критики подчеркивают, что большое число евреев-эмигрантов, приезжавших в Германию, не исповедовали религию, игнорировали еврейские праздники и ритуалы и лишь пользовались субсидиями, которые они получали от еврейских благотворительных организаций.
Хроника, 28.07.06
4.3. Межкультурные различия (Lifestyles)
REPORT: MOSCOW IMPOLITE CITY
The St Petersburg Times
The Russian capital ranked 31st ahead of only Seoul, South Korea’ Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; Bucharest’ Romania; and last-place Mumbai India, according to the survey by Reader’s Digest magazine.
The most polite people live in New York, followed by Zurich and Toronto the survey found.
The magazine sent out a team of reporters – half of them men, half of women – to assess the politeness of residents in big cities in 35 countries
The reporters gauged the polite ness of strangers by carrying out three tests: each followed people into public buildings 20 times to see whether the door would be held open for them, each bought small items from 20 stores and recorded whether sales assistants said thank you, and each dropped a folder filled with papers in 20 busy locations to see whether anyone would help pick up the fallen papers.
The survey found that people were just as courteous in rich countries as in poor ones and that people acted nearly as politely during rush hour as at other times of the day.
St Petersburg Times, 23.06.06
STRAIGHT PEOPLE BANNED FROM GAY BAR IN OZ
Reuters
MELBOURNE, Australia – An Australian hotel catering for homosexuals has won the right to ban heterosexuals from its bars so as to provide a safe and comfortable venue for gay men.
In what is believed to be a first for Australia, the Victorian state civil and administrative tribunal ruled last week that the Peel Hotel in
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the southern city of Melbourne could exclude patrons based on their sexuality.
Australia’s equal opportunity laws prevent people being discriminated against based on race, religion or sexuality.
But Peel Hotel owner Tom McFeely said the ruling was necessary to provide gay men with a non-threatening atmosphere to freely express their sexuality. «If I can limit the number of heterosexuals entering the Peel, then that helps me keep the safe balance», Peel told Australian radio on Monday.
McFeely said that, while the hotel welcomed everyone, its gay clientele had expressed discomfort over the number of heterosexuals and lesbians coming to the venue in the past year.
He said there were more than 2,000 venues in Melbourne that catered to heterosexuals, but his hotel was the only one marketing itself predominantly to gay men. Victoria’s state human rights commission backed the ruling, saying it was in line with equal opportunity guidelines defending the rights of groups subject to discrimination.
Commission chief Helen Szoke said the hotel’s gay clientele had experienced harassment and violence «[They] also have felt as though they’ve been like a zoo exhibit with big groups of women on hen parties coming to the club», Szoke told reporters.
McFeely told the radio that the hotel had received homophobic telephone calls since news of the ruling was made public.
St Petersburg Times, 29 May 2007
VANUATU IS THE ‘HAPPIEST’ PLACE
Agence France Presse
LONDON – The tiny South Pacific Ocean archipelago of Vanuatu is the happiest country on Earth, according to a study published measuring people’s well-being and their impact on the environment.
Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominica and Panama complete the top five in the Happy Planet Index, compiled by the British think-tank New Economics Foundation.
The index combines life satisfaction, life expectancy and environmental footprint – the amount of land required to sustain the population and absorb its energy consumption.
Zimbabwe came bottom of the 178 countries ranked, below sec- ond-worst performer Swaziland, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Ukraine.
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Italy came out better in 66th place, ahead of Germany (81), Japan (95), Britain (108), Canada (111), France (129), the United States (150) and Russia, in lowly 172nd place.
St Petersburg Times, 14.07.06
ОТВЕЗИТЕ МЕНЯ В ВАНУАТУ
Британский исследовательский центр New Economic Foundation (NEF) представил «Индекс всепланетного счастья». Первое место в списке государств, в которых люди чувствуют себя счастливыми, заняла страна, которую непросто найти даже на большой карте.
По версии NEF, самая счастливая страна на планете – Вануату, расположенная на маленьком архипелаге в южной части Тихого океана. В списке из 178 стран она с большим отрывом опережает так называемых мировых лидеров – страны «большой восьмерки». Островное государство Вануату с населением в 209 тысяч человек живет за счет сельского хозяйства и туризма. По валовому внутреннему продукту страна занимает лишь 207-е место в списке из 233 государств. Однако, по мнению авторов исследования, это ничего не значит.
Как сказал в интервью газете «Гардиан» Марк Лоуэн из ин- тернет-издания Vanuatu Online, «люди здесь в основной своей массе счастливы потому, что довольствуются малым. Это не общество потребления. Жизненные ценности здесь – общинность, семья и добрые отношения с соседями. Нас беспокоят только циклоны и землетрясения».
В первой десятке списка NEF присутствуют также такие государства, как Гватемала, Сальвадор, Гондурас, Колумбия.
При составлении рейтинга учитывались не валовой внутренний продукт или средний доход на душу населения, а такие факторы и критерии, как удовлетворенность жизнью, ожидаемая продолжительность жизни и уровень энергопотребления. В итоге Италия оказалась на 66-м месте, Германия – на 81-м, Япония – на 95-м, Великобритания – на 108-м, Канада – на 111-м, Франция – на 129-м, США – на 150-м, Россия – на 172-м. Еще ниже России в «Индексе счастья» оказалась Украина, которая разделяет последние места с Демократической Республикой Конго, Бурунди и Свазилендом. Замыкает же список Зимбабве.
По словам одного из авторов исследования Ника Маркса, целью составления подобного списка было показать, что уровень
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благосостояния не обязательно должен быть привязан к высокому уровню потребления ресурсов. «Ясно, что ни одна страна в списке не может сказать, что у нее абсолютно все в порядке, но он (индекс. – Ред.) выявляет принципы, показывающие, каким образом мы можем достичь более счастливой и долгой жизни для всех», – сказал он.
«Экономика Великобритании всасывает в себя громадные количества скудных мировых ресурсов, а британцы между тем ничем не счастливее колумбийцев», – подтвердила Саймон Балок, экономический координатор организации Friends of the Earth, которая помогала в составлении «Индекса счастья».
New Economic Foundation рекомендует человечеству такой, мягко говоря, давно известный путь к счастью: искоренение нищеты и голода в их крайних формах, признание важности вклада отдельных индивидуумов и безвозмездного труда, а также осуществление экономической политики строго в экологических рамках. Впрочем, счастье – понятие относительное, и счастье Вануату, видимо, подойдет не каждому.
Хроника, 14.07.06 (по материалам Би-Би-Си)
4.4. Религия (Religion)
ART OR SACRILEGE?
The Russian Orthodox Church condemns an exhibition at Moscow’s Sakharov Museum.
By David Novak, staff writer
Paintings portraying Jesus Christ as Mickey Mouse and Vladimir Lenin are prompting charges of abuse of religious symbols by Russian Orthodox Church leaders.
The paintings, part of the «Forbidden Art» exhibit at the Andrei Sakharov Museum and Public Center, went on display March 7.
«The curator has simply broken the law», church spokesman Vsevolod Chaplin said. «Defacing a religious symbol such as Jesus Christ is not art. It is a civil crime».
Curator Andrei Yerofeyev countered: «Chaplin just wants to make a name for himself».
Saying it is not for the church to decide what is art, he added: «Only an artist knows how to portray Jesus».
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Yerofeyev noted that artistic freedom is one of the guiding principles of the exhibit, which features banned paintings, collages and photographs from the last 30 years.
The contentious paintings include a work by Alexander Savko featuring a Christ-like figure in the form of the Walt Disney mouse addressing a crow of saints and disciples. The painting comes from a 1995 series titled «The Journey of Mickey Mouse».
The second eyebrow-raising artwork depicts the crucifixion. In place of Christ’s head, however, is the Order of Lenin medal, which shows a profile of the Father of all Fathers.
Lending all the paintings in the exhibit the cache of forbidden fruit, a giant white screen blocks them from the outside world. To view them, viewers must look through peepholes that are a bit too high for comfortable viewing. The museum has helpfully provided stepladder.
Museum-goers are uncommitted.
«I haven’t decided whether I like the exhibition or not», said Valentina Nikolayeva, 63, an Orthodox believer, as she descended the stepladder after viewing a collage of Jesus next to a McDonalds logo. Beneath the logo are the words: «This is My Body». Nikolayeva added, «But maybe that’s the point».
It is important to document the «social censorship mechanism» at work, Yerofeyev said. «To do that, we are simply showing the dynamic of censorship in Soviet and post-Soviet times», he said.
Other works in the exhibition feature swear words and fornicating soldiers.
The St Petersburg Times, March 23, 2007
BEIJING WANTS MOOD MUSIC
TO IMPROVE WITH VATICAN
Reuters
VATICAN CITY – Beijing approached the Vatican to let the China Philharmonic Orchestra perform for Pope Benedict in an unprecedented concert that could help improve often thorny relations, Church sources said on Monday.
The sources, who spoke on condition that they not be named, said the Vatican realised that China is trying to improve its international image but that Church officials hope the performance could be a seed for eventual diplomatic relations.
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However they have cautioned not to expect any immediate breakthroughs following Wednesday night’s concert at the Vatican.
«I don’t think they (the communist government) are doing it out of love for the pope or love of the Holy See but it will be positive in the end», said one source, a priest who is familiar with the situation.
The orchestra, currently on a European tour, will perform Mozart’s «Requiem» and Chinese folk songs along with the Shanghai Opera House Chorus in the Vatican audience hall.
Benedict has made improving relations with Beijing a major goal of his pontificate and issued a 55-page open letter in June saying he sought to restore full diplomatic ties with China that were severed two years after the 1949 Communist takeover.
Catholics in China are split between those who belong to a statebacked Church and an underground Church whose members are loyal to the Vatican.
The priest said a Chinese diplomatic envoy approached a Vatican official outside Italy and made the offer. An initial offer for the orchestra to play for the pope was made several months ago but the concert could not be arranged.
«It’s very important that they made the offer again», the priest said. «It will be positive for the Chinese people to see the pope too», adding that he expected the concert to be broadcast on Chinese television.
Another source said the Chinese were clearly «shopping for good will» in an effort to improve China’s international image, tarnished by recent unrest in Tibet and disruptions of the international leg of the Olympic torch relay.
«Each side clearly has its own interest in this», the second source said, calling the Vatican’s willingness to host the concert «a good will gesture».
Relations between the Vatican and Beijing have hit low points several times in recent years as the Vatican criticised China for appointing bishops without papal approval.
Benedict accused China of «grave violations of religious freedom» in 2006. Relations warmed significantly last September when the Vatican approved the installation of a new state-approved Catholic bishop of Beijing.
China wants the Vatican to sever diplomatic relations with Taiwan, which it considers a renegade province.
St Petersburg Times, May 6, 2008
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NOT ALL AMONG THE CHOSEN
By Felix Corley and Geraldine Fagan
Something quite mundane seems to have helped one religious community bring together an illustrious assortment of the big international names in the area of religion: oil. Far from the impoverished relative invited to sit in humbly as the G7 grandees conferred, Russia is now holding its head high in the G8, with many suitors pandering for a share of its black riches.
Without this month’s G8 meeting in St. Petersburg, the idea for a Russian-based summit of international religious leaders under the patronage of the Moscow Patriarchate would likely have ended up as a dull sideshow drawing only B-list attendees.
At Moscow’s President Hotel this week, however, the Russian Orthodox Church at last got its moment on the world stage. Patriarch Alexy II took his place next to President Vladimir Putin, and a prospective patriarchal contender, Metropolitan Kirill beside prospective presidential contender Dmitry Medvedev. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan even thought enough to send his greetings.
But hosting the meeting has come at a price. To howls of protest from those among their flock who believe that the Orthodox Church is wrong to sit down with heretics and unbelievers, the patriarchate’s leaders had to invite people from international religious bodies they have long vilified, including the Roman Catholic Church and the World Council of Churches. Following Monday’s opening session, Kirill also had to don a friendly smile as four of Russia’s leading Baptists and Pentecostals – dangerous sectarians in any other context – posed alongside him for photographs.
Letting in a few decorative local religious minority figures is one thing. But the Moscow Patriarchate still could not bring itself to invite two foreigners at the top of anyone’s list of world religious leaders: Pope Benedict XVI and the Dalai Lama. Alexy’s complaints about the Catholic Church’s activities in Russia and Ukraine continue to allow him to maintain that the time is not yet ripe for a meeting with Benedict. As for the Dalai Lama, Kirill stated that the lack of invitation was to avoid souring the Tibetan leader’s own relations with the Chinese.
Nor were any local leaders of «new religions» invited. A patriarchate spokesman explained a month before the summit that this was because many representatives of world religions would refuse to engage in dialogue with them. «In particular, it would be difficult for us
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to sit down at the same table as the Jehovah’s Witnesses, who greatly distort Christian teaching», he argued. One wonders how Koranic pronouncements on the Prophet Isa and his mother are any more palatable for the Russian Orthodox.
Few could object to many of the sentiments expressed on the conference’s declared themes. Avoiding inter-religious hatred, clashes of civilizations and promoting respect for religious and moral values are all admirable aims. But in the light of Kirill’s bold promise that no «political correctness» would prevent the conference from tackling difficult subjects, will there be any serious impact on the conflict in Chechnya or the rise in fatal racist attacks across Russia?
Will it end the complaints from Russia’s religious minorities that the state treats them as second-class citizens? Will Muslim, Catholic, Protestant, Jehovah’s Witness and non-Patriarchate Orthodox now be free to build places of worship, rent state-owned facilities, promote their activities in the public arena and have equal access to state institutions like prisons and hospitals, as guaranteed by the Constitution?
On the contrary, a web site run by Nizhny Novgorod’s Muslim community complained last month that the summit was primarily intended to reinforce the Orthodox Church’s dominant status. Previously used to taking second place in the Patriarchate’s pecking order of «traditional confessions» (Orthodox Christianity, Islam, Judaism and Buddhism), Russia’s Muslim leaders are becoming increasingly disquieted by the church’s penetration of the armed forces to the exclusion of other groups. Like the Old Believers – surely one of Russia’s most «traditional» faiths – they are also alarmed at the inroads now being made into the state education system by the Patriarchate’s «Foundations of Orthodox Culture» course. The key role among the nation’s faiths claimed by Russian Orthodox hierarchs as they led this week’s summit, the Nizhny Novgorod Muslims wrote in a message published on their web site, will result in the world’s religious leaders unwittingly «giving carte blanche for further clericalization of Russia according to the position of the Orthodox Church».
For journalists who endured the 45-minute security checks to make it into the President Hotel – built for the Communist Party Central Committee and now the property of the presidential administration – being shunted into a separate room to watch proceedings on screen was reminiscent of a round of international political meetings, or of Sovietera conferences stage-managed to the last detail, with agendas packed with meaningless platitudes. Putin himself opened his address by re-
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calling that such a «broad and uniquely representative» forum last met under Soviet auspices almost 25 years ago, referring to the World Conference of Religious Workers to Save the Sacred Gift of Life from Nuclear Catastrophe. That event, he maintained, could now «without exaggeration be considered a step toward overcoming world confrontation and the end of the Cold War».
As the fleet of VIP cars leaving the President Hotel on Monday caused gridlock in rush-hour Moscow, however, it was hard to imagine how the summit could produce anything more than irritation for ordinary citizens trying to get home – even those with a crucifix dangling above their dashboards.
Felix Corky and Geraldine Fagan are correspondents for the Oslo-based Forum 18 News Service, which monitors religious freedom in the former Soviet Union.
St Petersburg Times, July 7, 2006
POPE AND ORTHODOX LEADER SEARCH FOR UNITY
The Associated Press
VATICAN CITY – Pope Benedict XVI told a visiting Orthodox leader on Saturday that he held firm hope that the Catholic and Orthodox churches could be united, despite centuries of painful division.
Archbishop Chrysostomos II of Cyprus promised the pope to sound out Russian Orthodox Patriarch Alexy II about prospects for a groundbreaking meeting between the two.
Chrysostomos told reporters that he would pursue his offer to help organize a possible meeting when he meets with Alexy, at the patriarch’s invitation, on July 13 in Moscow.
«I’ll see what his reaction is, I think I can be useful», he said. Chrysostomos said Benedict’s background as a theologian with a
good grasp of Orthodox theology would help the process of reuniting the two churches, which split nearly 1,000 years ago.
The Russian church accuses Roman Catholics of improperly seeking converts in areas that traditionally would be Russian Orthodox. The Vatican has rejected the proselytizing accusations, saying it is only ministering to Russia’s tiny Catholic community of about 600,000 people in a country of 144 million.
«Despite centuries-old divisions, diverging roads and despite the hard work of closing painful wounds, the Lord has never ceased to guide our steps on the path toward unity and reconciliation», Benedict
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said at a ceremony after the two men held private talks for more than 30 minutes.
Both men also had a two-hour lunch together. In a joint signed statement, they pledged to «intensify the search for full unity among all Christians».
Benedict described the archbishop’s visit as a «very useful initiative to make us progress toward the unity desired by Christ».
One major difference between both sides is the Vatican’s teaching of pope supremacy.
«This is a question being discussed on theological level in dialogue», Chrysostomos said. «I am certain a day will come when we will have one flock with one shepherd, even if we won’t be able to see it in our days».
The Vatican sees the Orthodox church as a logical partner in its efforts to push its conservative agenda on bioethical, social and moral issues, including opposition to embryonic stem cell research, abortion, euthanasia and same-sex marriage.
St Petersburg Times, 19.06.2007
РЕЛИГИЯ – ДОПИНГ ДЛЯ ПОЛИТИКИ
Не успели стихнуть страсти вокруг «карикатурного» скандала, как явился новый трансрелигиозный эксцесс: Папа Римский неосторожно процитировал высказывание византийского императора о пророке Мухаммеде.
Между тем в России накал религиозных страстей идет своим чередом: с начала учебного года в нескольких регионах РФ «Основы православной культуры» (ОПК) стали преподаваться в качестве обязательного школьного предмета. Как результат – гневная реакция со стороны лидеров остальных конфессий России.
О том, почему в эпоху хайтека и нанотехнологий люди и власти вдруг начали активно делиться на «своих» и «чужих» по религиозному принципу, размышляет руководитель Центра изучения религий Российского гуманитарного государственного университета Александр Агаджанян:
– Давний западный стереотип о том, что религия – частное дело каждого и не должно путаться с публичной сферой, последние тридцать лет стал мутировать в обратную сторону. Начало трансформации было положено не в западных странах, однако теперь это стало актуальным и для США, и Европы, где периоди-
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