Featured topics in this issue: American New Year Traditions

Dropping the Ball

Watch Night Service

Auld Lang Syne

The New Year’s Night

-- 12/31/2008 >>>

Featured topics in this issue: Christmas, Santa Claus, and Unemployment

Christmas in a Nutshell

Christmas in the United States; Facts, Numbers and History

A Rare Profession

Unemployment, Piecing the Puzzle

Collecting the Unemployment Benefits

Unemployment Insurance and its Affect on the Economy

Evolution of the Unemployment Benefits in the United States

-- 12/26/2008 >>>

Karal Ann Marling is a Professor Emeritus, a well-known specialist in American culture, and the author of many books, one of them is Merry Christmas! Celebrating America’s Greatest Holiday. Since 1977 she has been teaching at the University of Minnesota, where she was professor in both Art History and American Studies. “I think when children grow up they learn something about generosity, and generosity of spirit when they are young. They don’t have to believe in Santa Claus anymore, but they become Santa Claus and they give presents to their own children, people they love and poor people at Christmas time.”

-- 12/26/2008 >>>

Featured topics in this issue: Thanksgiving and the Economic Outlook

The Financial Crisis: Causes and Consequences

Thanksgiving: In Search of Origin

Turkey Day

Why Turkey is called Turkey?

Black Friday

-- 11/28/2008 >>>

Gregory Guroff, president of the “Foundation for International Arts & Education”: "There has been long debate about what is American culture. It is all of these trends of all the immigrants who came here, and I think people don’t understand how much Russian artists contributed to it."

-- 08/08/2008 >>>

The President of Moldova, Vladimir Voronin, expressed his opposition to renaming the Moldovan language to Romanian and renouncing Moldova’s communist past for the sake of easing integration into the European Union. -- 02/26/2008 >>>

The Minister of Education of Belarus Alexander Redkov announced at a Council of Ministers session dedicated to the discussion of the 2007-2016 general public education program, that by 2011 Belarus will have the lowest rates of primary school enrollment since the country’s independence. -- 06/01/2007 >>>

The number of tourists arriving in Armenia will exceed 400,000 by the turn of 2007, Ara Petrosyan, deputy minister of trade and economic development of Armenia, announced at a press conference. -- 05/03/2007 >>>

The president of Tajikistan Emomali Rakhmonov, during a meeting with the country’s intelligentsia, appealed to his people and urged them to start using traditional Tajik first and last names. -- 04/02/2007 >>>

The Mykolaiv Oblast Council declared Russian a regional language, thereby authorizing local authorities in the southeastern region to use Russian, along with Ukrainian, in official dealings. -- 06/15/2006 >>>