rfmcdonald | Entries tagged with russian language

Window on Eurasia notes the post-Soviet collapse of the numbers of learners of the Russian language, here.

Window on Eurasia reports the claim of a Russian politician that in 1991, securing the nuclear arsenal of Ukraine was a bigger priority than trying for borders changes, here.

Window on Eurasia notes how Belarus cannot protect itself from Russia, here.

Window on Eurasia explains why the Soviet Union let the Armenians and Georgians keep their alphabets, here.

Window on Eurasia explains how Russia's naval and marine power is not doing well, here.

(A day late, I know; I crashed after work yesterday.)

Antipope's Charlie Stross has a thought experiment: If you were superwealthy and guaranteed to live a long health life, how would you try to deal with the consequence of economic inequality?

Vikas Charma at Architectuul takes a look at the different factors that go into height in buildings.

Bad Astronomy notes S5-HVS1, a star flung out of the Milky Way Galaxy by Sagittarius A* at 1755 kilometres per second.

The Broadside Blog's Caitlin Kelly shares photos from two Manhattan walks of hers, taken in non-famous areas.

Centauri Dreams looks at habitability for red dwarf exoplanets. Stellar activity matters.

Maria Farrell at Crooked Timber shares words from a manifesto about data protection in the EU.

Dangerous Minds shares photos from Los Angeles punks and mods and others in the 1980s.

Bruce Dorminey notes a ESA report suggesting crew hibernation could make trips to Mars easier.

Gizmodo notes that the Hayabusa2 probe of Japan is returning from asteroid Ryugu with a sample.

Imageo shares photos of the disastrous fires in Australia from space.

Information is Beautiful reports on winners of the Information is Beautiful Awards for 2019, for good infographics.

JSTOR Daily explains how local television stations made the ironic viewing of bad movies a thing.

Kotaku reports on the last days of Kawasaki Warehouse, an arcade in Japan patterned on the demolished Walled City of Kowloon.

Language Hat notes how translation mistakes led to the star Beta Cygni gaining the Arabic name Albireo.

Language Log reports on a unique Cantonese name of a restaurant in Hong Kong.

Robert Farley at Lawyers, Guns and Money links to an analysis of his suggesting the military of India is increasingly hard-pressed to counterbalance China.

The LRB Blog notes the catastrophe of Venice.

Marginal Revolution notes a paper suggesting states would do well not to place their capitals too far away from major population centres.

Justin Petrone at North! remarks on a set of old apple preserves.

The NYR Daily looks at how the west and the east of the European Union are divided by different conceptions of national identity.

Jim Belshaw at Personal Reflections reports from his town of Armidale as the smoke from the Australian wildfires surrounds all. The photos are shocking.

Emily Lakdawalla at the Planetary Society Blog lists some books about space suitable for children.

Drew Rowsome reviews the Canadian film music stand, inspired by the 1919 Winnipeg General Strike.

The Russian Demographics Blog shares a paper noting that, in Switzerland, parenthood does not make people happy.

The Signal notes that 1.7 million phone book pages have been scanned into the records of the Library of Congress.

Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel explains the concept of multi-messenger astronomy and why it points the way forward for studies of astrophysics.

Strange Maps looks at how a majority of students in the United States attend diverse schools, and where.

Strange Company explores the mysterious death of Marc-Antoine Calas, whose death triggered the persecution of Huguenots and resulted in the mobilization of Enlightenment figures like Voltaire against the state. What happened?

Towleroad hosts a critical, perhaps disappointed, review of the major gay play The Inheritance.

Understanding Society's Daniel Little looks at the power of individual people in political hierarchies.

Window on Eurasia shares an opinion piece noting how many threats to the Russian language have come from its association with unpopular actions by Russia.

Arnold Zwicky explores queens as various as Elizabeth I and Adore Delano.

Bad Astronomer notes the latest news on interstellar comet 2/Borisov.

The Broadside Blog's Caitlin Kelly emphasizes how every writer does need an editor.

Centauri Dreams notes how the gas giant GJ 3512 b, half the mass of Jupiter orbiting a red dwarf star closely, is an oddly massive exoplanet.

Gina Schouten at Crooked Timber looks at inter-generational clashes on parenting styles.

D-Brief looks at the methods of agriculture that could conceivably sustain a populous human colony on Mars.

Bruce Dorminey argues that we on Earth need something like Starfleet Academy, to help us advance into space.

Colby King at the Everyday Sociology Blog looks at how the socio-spatial perspective helps us understand the development of cities.

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io9 looks at Proxima, a contemporary spaceflight film starring Eva Green.

JSTOR Daily looks at how the intense relationship between the US and Saudi Arabia began in, and reflected, the era of Jim Crow.

Language Hat notes a report suggesting that multilingualism helps ward off dementia.

Language Log takes issue with the names of the mascots of the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics.

Lawyers, Guns and Money notes the emergence of a ninth woman complaining about being harassed by Al Franken.

Marginal Revolution links to a new paper arguing that the Washington Consensus worked.

The NYR Daily shares an Aubrey Nolan cartoon illustrating the evacuation of war children in the United Kingdom during the Second World War.

At Out of Ambit, Diane Duane shares a nice collection of links for digital mapmakers.

The Planetary Society Blog looks at how the European Space Agency supports the cause of planetary defense.

Roads and Kingdoms interviews Kenyan writer Kevin Mwachiro at length.

Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel reports on how a mysterious fast radio burst helped illuminate an equally mysterious galactic halo.

Strange Company reports on the mysterious and unsolved death in 1936 of Canadian student Thomas Moss in an Oxfordshire hayrick.

Frank Jacobs at Strange Maps notes how Mount Etna is a surpassingly rare decipoint.

Understanding Society considers the thought of Kojève, after Hegel, on freedom.

Window on Eurasia looks at the falling numbers of Russians, and of state support for Russian language and culture, in independent Central Asia.

Yorkshire Ranter Alex Harrowell looks at how individual consumer responses are much less effective than concerted collective action in triggering change.

Arnold Zwicky reports on some transgender fashion models.

Bad Astronomy's Phil Plait shares images of Jupiter, imaged in infrared by ALMA.

Centauri Dreams looks at ocean upwelling on one class of super-habitable exoplanet.

D-Brief looks at how the Komodo dragon survived the threat of extinction.

Far Outliers reports on a mid-19th century slave raid in the Sahel.

Gizmodo notes that the secret US Air Force spaceplane, the X-37B, has spent two years in orbit. (Doing what?)

JSTOR Daily looks at the economic underpinnings of medieval convents.

Dave Brockington writes at Lawyers, Guns and Money about the continuing meltdown of the British political system in the era of Brexit, perhaps even of British democracy.

The LRB Blog looks at the impact of Brexit on the Common Travel Area.

Marginal Revolution reports on how Poland has tried to deter emigration by removing income taxes on young workers.

Carole Naggar writes at the NYR Daily about the photography of women photographers working for LIFE, sharing examples of their work.

Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel explains why time has to be a dimension of the universe, alongside the three of space.

Frank Jacobs of Strange Maps shares NASA images of the forest fires of Amazonia.

Window on Eurasia notes that many Russophones of Ukraine are actually strongly opposed to Russia, contrary Russian stereotypes of language determining politics.

Bad Astronomy's Phil Plait looks at Abell 30, a star that has been reborn in the long process of dying.

Centauri Dreams uses the impending launch of LightSail 2 to discuss solar sails in science fiction.

John Quiggin at Crooked Timber, as part of a series of the fragility of globalization, considers if migration flows can be reversed. (He concludes it unlikely.)

The Crux considers if the record rain in the Midwest (Ontario, too, I would add) is a consequence of climate change.

D-Brief notes that the failure of people around the world to eat enough fruits and vegetables may be responsible for millions of premature dead.

Dangerous Minds introduces readers to gender-bending Italian music superstar Renato Zero.

Dead Things notes how genetic examinations have revealed the antiquity of many grapevines still used for wine.

Gizmodo notes that the ocean beneath the icy crust of Europa may contain simple salt.

io9 tries to determine the nature of the many twisted timelines of the X-Men movie universe of Fox.

JSTOR Daily observes that the Stonewall Riots were hardly the beginning of the gay rights movement in the US.

Language Log looks at the mixed scripts on a bookstore sign in Beijing.

Dave Brockington at Lawyers, Guns, and Money argues that Jeremy Corbyn has a very strong hold on his loyal followers, perhaps even to the point of irrationality.

Marginal Revolution observes that people who create public genetic profiles for themselves also undo privacy for their entire biological family.

Sean Marshall at Marshall's Musings shares a photo of a very high-numbered street address, 986039 Oxford-Perth Road in Punkeydoodle's Corners.

The NYR Daily examines the origins of the wealth of Lehman Brothers in the exploitation of slavery.

The Planetary Society Blog shares a panorama-style photo of the Apollo 11 Little West Crater on the Moon.

Drew Rowsome notes that classic documentary Paris Is Burning has gotten a makeover and is now playing at TIFF.

Peter Rukavina, writing from a trip to Halifax, notes the convenience of the Eduroam procedures allowing users of one Maritime university computer network to log onto another member university's network.

Dylan Reid at Spacing considers how municipal self-government might be best embedded in the constitution of Canada.

The Speed River Journal's Van Waffle pays tribute to the wildflower Speedwell, a name he remembers from Watership Down.

Strange Maps shares a crowdsourced map depicting which areas of Europe are best (and worst) for hitchhikers.

Window on Eurasia notes the distribution of native speakers of Russian, with Israel emerging as more Russophone than some post-Soviet states.

Architectuul profiles the construction of the Modern Berlin Temple built to a design by Mies van der Rohe in 1968.

Bad Astronomer Phil Plait notes the beauty of galaxy M61.

D-Brief notes new evidence that Mars sustained rivers on its surface at a surprising late date.

Gizmodo notes a theory that the oddly shaped ring moons of Saturn might be product of a collision.

Hornet Stories suggests/u> that recent raids on gay bars in New Orleans might be driven by internecine politics within the LGBTQ community.

Joe. My. God. notes that a court in the Cayman Islands has recently legalized same-sex marriage there.

JSTOR Daily looks at the origins of the Chipko activists of 1960s and 1970s India, whose tree-hugging helped save forests there.

Language Log notes the story of Beau Jessep, who got rich off of a business creating English names for Chinese children.

Scott Lemieux at Lawyers, Guns and Money, looking at the introduction of public healthcare in Saskatchewan and wider Canada, notes the great institutional differences that do not make that a close model for public healthcare in the US now.

Marginal Revolution links to a paper examining the close relationship over time between population growth and economic and technological change.

Roads and Kingdoms interviews documentary filmmaker Nadir Bouhmouch about a Amazigh community's resistance to an intrusive mine on their territory.

The Russian Demographics Blog notes, correctly, that one reason why Ukrainians are more prone to emigration to Europe and points beyond than Russians is that Ukraine has long been included, in whole or in part, in European states.

Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel notes that we still do not know why antimatter does not dominate in our universe.

Understanding Society features a guest post from Indian sociologist V.K. Ramachandran talking about two visits four decades apart to one of his subjects.

Vintage Space makes a compelling case for people not to be afraid of nuclear rockets in space, like the vintage never-deployed NERVA.

Window on Eurasia takes issue with the bilingual radio programs aired in Russian republics, which subtly undermine local non-Russian languages.

Arnold Zwicky starts with lilacs, which include hybrids tolerant of the California climate, and goes on to explore lavender in all of its glories, queer and otherwise.

Bad Astronomer Phil Plait notes new evidence that the Pathfinder probe landed, on Mars, on the shores of an ancient sea.

The Crux reports on tholins, the organic chemicals that are possible predecessors to life, now found in abundance throughout the outer Solar System.

D-Brief reports on the hard work that has demonstrated some meteorites which recently fell in Turkey trace their origins to Vesta.

Colby King at the Everyday Sociology Blog explores sociologist Eric Klinenberg's concept of social infrastructure, the public spaces we use.

Far Outliers reports on a Honolulu bus announcement in Yapese, a Micronesian language spoken by immigrants in Hawai'i.

JSTOR Daily considers the import of the autobiography of Catherine the Great.

Language Hat reports, with skepticism, on the idea of "f" and "v" as sounds being products of the post-Neolithic technological revolution.

Marginal Revolution's Tyler Cowen is critical of the idea of limiting the number of children one has in a time of climate change.

Jim Belshaw at Personal Reflections reflects on death, close at hand and in New Zealand.

Strange Company reports on the mysterious disappearance, somewhere in Anatolia, of American cyclist Frank Lenz in 1892, and its wider consequences.

Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel identifies five types of cosmic events capable of triggering mass extinctions on Earth.

Towleroad reports on the frustration of many J.K. Rowling fans with the author's continuing identification of queer histories for characters that are never made explicit in books or movies.

Window on Eurasia has a skeptical report about a Russian government plan to recruit Russophones in neighbouring countries as immigrants.

Arnold Zwicky explores themes of shipwrecks and of being shipwrecked.

Bad Astronomer Phil Plait looks at planetary nebulas, beautiful byproducts of the ends of stars.

Centauri Dreams shares an essay by Mark Millis looking at how NASA evaluates proposed new propulsion methods.

Bruce Dorminey takes a look at some interesting facts about the development of the Boeing 747.

L.M. Sacasas at The Frailest Thing considers the ways in which deepfakes, allowing for alternate personalities online, evoke the Bunburying of Oscar Wilde.

Gizmodo notes that neutron star collisions might well reveal mysterious quark matter, if only they occurred within sight of us.

JSTOR Daily considers the sensuous nature of the Jane Austen novel Persuasion.

Language Log considers a potential case for Sinitic origins in the Balto-Slavic word for "iron".

Scott Lemieux at Lawyers, Guns and Money considers the weakness of the centre as a major pull for American voters.

Marginal Revolution links to a paper concluding that Chinese workers are not being exploited by the manufacturing companies that may employ them.

Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel considers how the curvature of space-time under gravity can be measured.

Window on Eurasia considers two Kazakhstan observers who argue the country should switch from Kazakh-Russian bilingualism to Kazakh-English bilingualism.

Arnold Zwicky considers, after the Gay & Lesbian Review, the representation of different communities in the LGBT+ acronym, the utility of simple symbols, like "&" or "+".

Bad Astronomer Phil Plait shares a lovely photo of the Earth peeking out from behind the far side of the Moon.

At the Broadside Blog, Caitlin Kelly shares lovely photos of delicate ice and water taken on a winter's walk.

Centauri Dreams looks</> at the study by Chinese astronomers who, looking at the distribution of Cepheids, figured out that our galaxy's disk is an S-shaped warp.

D-Brief notes new evidence that melting of the Greenland ice sheet will disrupt the Gulf Stream.

L.M. Sacasas at The Frailest Thing takes issue with the uncritical idealization of the present, as opposed to the critical examination of whatever time period we are engaging with.

Gizmodo notes that an intensive series of brain scans is coming closer to highlighting the areas of the human brain responsible for consciousness.

Mark Graham links to new work of his, done in collaboration, looking at ways to make the sharing economy work more fairly in low- and middle-income countries.

JSTOR Daily notes how the mystic Catholicism of the African kingdom of Kongo may have gone on to inspire slave-led revolutions in 18th century North America and Haiti.

Lawyers, Guns and Money looks at an exhibition examining the ambitious architecture of Yugoslavia.

The Map Room Blog links to a cartographer's argument about the continuing importance of paper maps.

Marginal Revolution shares one commenter's perception of causes or the real estate boom in New Zealand.

Neuroskeptic considers the role of the mysterious silent neurons in the human brain.

At NYR Daily, Guadeloupe writer Maryse Condé talks about her career as a writer and the challenges of identity for her native island.

Roads and Kingdoms shares a list of ten dishes reflecting the history of the city of Lisbon.

Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel takes a look at the promise of likely mini-Neptune Barnard's Star b as a target for observation, perhaps even life.

Window on Eurasia shares the perfectly plausible argument that, just as the shift of the Irish to the English language did not end Irish identity and nationalism, so might a shift to Russian among Tatars not end Tatar identity.

D-Brief suggests that, in an era of climate change, waves of simultaneous wildfires may be the new normal in California.

The Dragon's Tales shares some news items looking at the history of the Precambrian Earth and of ancient life.

The Island Review shares some Greenland-themed poems by Elżbieta Wójcik-Leese.

JSTOR Daily looks at how the introduced Callery pear tree has become invasive in North America.

Language Log considers language as a self-regulating system.

Personal Reflections' Jim Belshaw notes his new magpie friend. What name should he have?

The Power and the Money's Noel Maurer notes that the democracy of Mexico is in such poor shape that, even now, the democracies of Poland and Hungary despite far-right subversion are better off.

Drew Rowsome reviews the 1993 novel The Night of the Moonbow by Thomas Tryon.

The Russian Demographics Blog notes the falling fertility rates in Syria, and takes issue with one statistical claim.

Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel notes that gravitational waves are affected by gravity, and looks at what this implies for physics.

Towleroad reports that Sarah Silverman has rethought her use of the word "gay" in her comedy routines.

Vintage Space notes the evidence confirming that many--most, even--Apollo astronauts had tattoos.

Window on Eurasia notes how the boundaries of the "Russian world" continue to contract, with the status of the Russian language receding in the education and the media and the public life of neighbouring countries.

Arnold Zwicky considers which part of Europe Switzerland lies in. Is it central European, or western European?

Centauri Dreams considers the magnetic fields of super-Earths, and the impact of these on potential life.

D-Brief reports on the corporate partners selected to accompany NASA on its return to the Moon.

Bruce Dorminey reports on the claim of astronomers to have identified four extrasolar objects already in the solar system.

The Everyday Sociology Blog pays tribute to long-time contributor Peter Kaufman, now departed.

JSTOR Daily asks why Americans, and others, eat three meals a day.

The LRB Blog reports on the underlying factors behind the gilets jaunes protests in France against higher fuel taxes.

Language Hat links to a fascinating essay about the persistence of individuals' first languages.

Neuroskeptic takes a look at possible hacks to the human mind, in the light of a recent announcement of human genetic engineering. What will become possible? What will be done?

Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel notes that Triton, not Pluto or Eris, is the largest world of the Kuiper Belt.

Strange Maps shares a remarkable map of Lake Michigan made solely with a typewriter.

Daniel Little at Understanding Society ruminates on the thought of Scott Page regarding social modeling.

Window on Eurasia looks at the history of the letter "Ё" in the Russian language.

Arnold Zwicky starts from the idea of green flowers to take a look at unusual greenery generally.

D-Brief notes the recent discovery of some ancient cave art in Borneo more than forty thousand years old.

Cody Delistraty profiles Sarah Reid, a Toronto developmental psychologist who can identify the work, even to some extent the identity, of serial killers.

Far Outliers looks at the people who would go on to found, under Meiji, the Nagasaki Naval Academy.

A Fistful of Euros wonders what will happen if the governing coalition in Germany breaks.

JSTOR Daily suggests that the challenges of second-wave feminism to traditional gender norms nearly killed off nursing as a profession.

Lawyers, Guns and Money notes that Jeff Session is ending his career as US Attorney-General on a racist note.

Lingua Franca notes the results of an online informal survey suggesting that people do not become less tolerant of language change as they age.

Marginal Revolution notes a paper suggesting that religion can have protective effects against depression. All I would add is that the issues of the teenager, and of the religion, clearly matters.

Aminatta Forma at the NYR Daily notes the distinctive experiences of the first generations of educated Africans, emerging from colonialism, using Barack Obama.

The Planetary Society Blog looks at the new private SpaceIL moon lander.

Drew Rowsome reviews the new Stephen King novel, Elevation.

Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel notes that trying to explain unusual 'Oumuamua by immediately assuming it to be an alien artifact is not good science.

Strange Company looks at the mysterious 1905 death of the wealthy Margaretta von Hoffman Todd.

Window on Eurasia notes the way in which the boundaries of the "Russian world" are contracting under Putin, notably in Ukraine.

Bad Astronomer Phil Plait goes into more detail about the Milky Way Galaxy's ancient collision with and absorption of dwarf galaxy Gaia-Enceladus.

Centauri Dreams considers SETI in the infrared, looking at the proposal to use a laser to signal our existence to observers of our sun.

D-Brief notes a study of Neanderthal children's teeth that documents their hazardous environment, faced with cold winters and lead contamination.

The Island Review shares three lovely islands-related poems by writer Naila Moreira.

JSTOR Daily asks an important question: Can the United States and China avoid the Thucydides trap, a war of the rising power with the falling one? Things seems uncertain at this point.

Mark Liberman at Language Log looks at the continuing lack of progress of machine translation.

Lawyers, Guns and Money looks at a recent discussion on the Roman Republic, noting how imperialism and inequality led to that polity's transformation into an empire. Lessons for us now?

The Map Room Blog shares a Canadian Geographic map describing the different, declining, populations of caribou in the north of Canada.

Marginal Revolution notes a paper suggesting that global pandemics will not necessarily kill us all off, that high-virulence infections might be outcompeted and, even, controllable.

The NYR Daily takes a look at historical reasons for the prominence of Rembrandt in the British artistic imagination.

Towleroad notes that Massachusetts voted to keep transgender rights protected.

Window on Eurasia suggests that the quality of Russian taught in schools in Uzbekistan is declining. I wonder: Is this a matter of a Central Asian variety emerging, perhaps?

Livio di Matteo at Worthwhile Canadian Initiative takes a look at the long-run economic growth of Australia, contrasting it with the past and with other countries. In some ways, Canada (among others) is a stronger performer.

D-Brief notes that CRISPR is being used to edit the genes of pigs, the better to protect them against disease.

L.M. Sacasas at The Frailest Thing argues that silence on social networks is often not an option, that membership might compel one to speak. I wonder: That was not my experience with E-mail lists.

Joe. My. God. notes that social network Gab, favoured by the alt-right, disclaims any responsibility for giving the synagogue shooter in Pittsburgh a platform.

JSTOR Daily notes the massive, unprecedented, and environmentally disruptive growth of great mats of sargassum seaweed in the Caribbean.

Language Hat notes the poster's problems grappling with Doeteyevsky's complex novel The Devils, a messy novel product of messy times.

Language Log notes the use of pinyin on Wikipedia to annotate Chinese words.

Marginal Revolution links to a paper noting that data mining is not all-powerful if one is only mining noise.

Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel notes that, finally, we are making enough antimatter to be able to figure out whether antimatter is governed by gravity or antigravity.

At the Volokh Conspiracy, Ilya Somin talks about how he was threatened on Facebook by mail bomber Cesar Sayoc.

Window on Eurasia notes the 1947 deportation of more than a hundred thousand Ukrainians from the west of their country to Siberia and Kazakhstan.

Arnold Zwicky ruminates about late October holidays and their food, Hallowe'en not being the only one.

Centauri Dreams notes the lack of evidence for heat plumes around the Europan crater of Pwyll.

Patrick Nunn at The Crux writes about the new evidence for the millennias-long records preserved remarkably well in oral history.

D-Brief notes the discovery of a two-year cycle in gamma ray output in blazar PG 1553+113.

Bruce Dorminey notes a proposal from French astronomer Antoine Labeyrie to create a low-cost hypertelescope in nearby space.

Gizmodo interviews experts on the possibility of whether people who are now cryogenically frozen will be revived. (The consensus is not encouraging for current cryonicists.)

JSTOR Daily notes how, looking back at old records, we can identify many veterans of the US Civil War suffering from the sorts of psychological issues we know now that military veterans suffer from.

Language Hat notes the beauty of two stars' Arabic names, Zubeneschamali and Zubenelgenubi, beta and alpha Librae.

The LRB Blog takes a look at the encounters of Anthony Burgess with the Russian language.

Tyler Cowen at Marginal Revolution is surprised that Canada has allowed China to add deep-sea sensors to its deep-sea observatories in the Pacific, in a geopolitically-concerned American way.

Tim Parks at the NYR Daily talks about the importance of translation, as a career that needs to be supported while also needing critiques.

Drew Rowsome takes a look at two shows on young people coming out, the web series It's Complicated and the documentary Room to Grow.

Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel notes that the evidence of the existence of a potential Planet Nine in our solar system is not necessarily that strong.

Strange Maps shares a map of Europe in 1920, one oriented towards Americans, warning of famine across a broad swathe of the continent including in countries now no longer around.

Window on Eurasia notes that, in multiethnic Dagestan, Russian has displaced other local languages as a language of interethnic communication.

Arnold Zwicky announces the creation, at his blog via the sharing of a Liz Climo cartoon, of a new category at his blog relating to pandas.

Bad Astronomer Phil Plait confirms the discovery of water ice on the Moon.

Centauri Dreams reports on the latest discoveries regarding Beta Pictoris b, notably new evidence that it is a superjovian massing between 9 and 13 Jupiters.

D-Brief notes how oil rigs can support coral reefs.

Far Outliers takes a grim look at the Chinese market in servants and serfs and slaves.

Hornet Stories looks at opinion polling on minorities in Germany. (Gay people do much better than Muslims.)

JSTOR Daily looks at how makeup, at the start of the 20th century highly stigmatized, ended up going mainstream.

Geoffrey Pullum at Lingua Franca considers if Crazy Rich Asians, and other like pop culture successes, might get more Westerners to learn Chinese.

The Map Room Blog shares pictures from space of the smoke produced by the British Columbia wildfires.

The Power and the Money's Noel Maurer takes a look at the way, in federal Mexico, state-level political machines continue to work.

Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel looks at how, in the very early universe, the first elements formed.

Window on Eurasia notes that in Bashkortostan, two-thirds of students opted for Russian-medium education, a proportion considerably above the proportion of ethnic Russians in that republic.

Bad Astronomer Phil Plait shares the latest images of asteroid Ryugu.

Centauri Dreams reports on the equal-mass near-Earth asteroid binary 2017 YE5.

Far Outliers notes how corrosive fake news and propaganda can be, by looking at Orwell's experience of the Spanish Civil War.

The Frailest Thing's L.M. Sacasas looks at swarms versus networks, in the light of Bauman's thinking on freedom/security.

Joe. My. God. reports on how American pharmacy chain PVS fired a man--a Log Cabin Republican, no less--for calling the police on a black customer over a coupon.

JSTOR Daily links to a paper making the case that national service plays a useful role in modern countries.

Language Hat quotes from a beautiful Perry Anderson essay at the LRB about Proust.

Jeffey Herlihy-Mera writes/u> at Lingua Franca about his first-hand experiences of the multilingualism of Ecuador.

The NYR Daily takes a look at the art created by the prominent members of the Romanov dynasty.

The Power and Money's Noel Maurer has reposted a blog post from 2016 considering the question of just how much money the United States could extract, via military basing, from Germany and Japan and South Korea

Window on Eurasia <>suggests a new Russian language law that would marginalize non-Russian languages is provoking a renaissance of Tatar nationalism.

Adam Fish at Anthro{dendum} takes a look at the roles of drones in capitalism, here.

Bad Astronomy talks about the discovery of a nascent planet in orbit of young star PDS 70.

Centauri Dreams notes what the discovery of a Charon eclipsing its partner Pluto meant, for those worlds and for astronomy generally.

D-Brief notes a demographic study of Italian centenarians suggesting that, after reaching the age of 105, human mortality rates seem to plateau. Does this indicate the potential for further life expectancy increases?

Dead Things shares the result of a genetics study of silkworms. Where did these anchors of the Silk Road come from?

Jonathan Wynn at the Everyday Sociology Blog considers the role of the side hustle in creative professions.

Far Outliers reports on the time, in the 1930s, when some people in Second Republic Poland thought that the country should acquire overseas colonies.

Hornet Stories reports on how, in earlier centuries, the English word "pinke" meant a shade of yellow.

JSTOR Daily reports on how, nearly two decades later, Sex and the City is still an influential and important piece of pop culture.

Language Hat links to Keith Gessen's account, in The New Yorker, about how he came to teach his young son Russian.

Lingua Franca, at the Chronicle of Higher Education, reports on the decent and strongly Cuban Spanish spoken by Ernest Hemingway.

The NYR Daily looks at the mystique surrounding testosterone, the powerful masculinizing hormone.

The Power and the Money's Noel Maurer shares his thoughts on the election, in Mexico, of left-leaning populist Andrés Manuel López Obrador. Worst-case scenarios aren't likely to materialize in the short and medium terms, at least.

Vintage Space notes how, at the height of the Cold War, some hoped to demonstrate American strength by nuking the Moon. (Really.)

Window on Eurasia links to an essayist who suggests that Russia should look to America as much as to Europe for models of society.

Despite Brexit, the English language is continuing to make inroads against French in the halls of the European Union. Politico Europe reports.

The State of Louisiana has made a formal application to join the Organisation international de la francophonie.

This article in The Scotsman noting how some African slaves taken to plantations in the Carolinas came to use Gaelic, not English, as their common language is fascinating. What other influences came unexpectedly from Gaelic Scotland to African America?

Can Hong Kong use the Cantonese language to extend its influence deeper into China and elsewhere? The SCMP considers.

This article/a> in New Eastern Europe makes interesting arguments about how, in the post-Soviet world, the Russian language now has multiple centres and multiple standards. I'm unconvinced about the political arguments, though.

Hornet Stories has a list of some of the key LGBTQ destinations in New York City. This is something for my next trip, I think.

Robert Everett-Green writes about the transformation of Montréal's Viauville, once a model neighbourhood funded by 19th century cookie magnate Charles-Théodore Viau, over at The Globe and Mail.

Hong Kong is exceptionally pressed for space for housing, making land for commerce all the more difficult to come by. Bloomberg reports.

France is planning to make a suburban wasteland in the northeast of the conurbation of Paris over into a vast forest. CityLab reports.

DW reports on how, one hundred years after Estonia first became independent, the country's Russophones, particularly concentrated in the northeastern city of Narva, are now engaging with (and being engaged by) the wider country.

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Page generated Apr. 3rd, 2026 12:15 pm

A Bit More Detail

Assorted Personal Notations, Essays, and Other Jottings

Entries tagged with russian language

[BLOG] Five Window on Eurasia links

[BLOG] Some Friday links

[BLOG] Some Tuesday links

[BLOG] Some Wednesday links

[BLOG] Some Thursday links

[BLOG] Some Saturday links

[BLOG] Some Tuesday links

[BLOG] Some Saturday links

[BLOG] Some Thursday links

[BLOG] Some Sunday links

[BLOG] Some Saturday links

[BLOG] Some Monday links

[BLOG] Some Wednesday links

[BLOG] Some Sunday links

[BLOG] Some Wednesday links

[BLOG] Some Thursday links

[BLOG] Some Tuesday links

[BLOG] Some Tuesday links

[NEWS] Five language links: English, French, Gaelic, Cantonese, Russian

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: New York City, Montréal, Hong Kong, Paris, Narva

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February 2021

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