Pushkin Places in St. Petersburg and Russian as a Foreign Language (Ardatova Ye.V., Nazarevskaya V.V., Popkova Ye. D., Tolstuhina I.I. “And I was there…” (through Pushkin Places in St. Petersburg)”. St. Petersburg, 2019. 144 p.)

Цель данной статьи – рассказать об учебном пособии «И я там был…» (по пушкинским местам Петербурга), выпущенном в РГПУ имени А.И. Герцена в 2020 г. и предназначенном для студентов-иностранцев, изучающих русский язык. Пособие может быть использовано для организации литературных экскурсий по пушкинским местам Петербурга. Пособие включает тексты о памятных местах великого города, связанных с жизнью и творчеством А.С. Пушкина. Каждый текст сопровождается заданиями, рассчитанными на расширение лексического запаса студентов, развитие их речи, а также на знакомство студентов с ценностями русской культуры. The purpose of this article is to tell about the textbook "And I was there ..." (in the Pushkin places of St. Petersburg), published in 2020 at Russian State Pedagogical University named after A.I. Herzen and intended for foreign students who are studying Russian. The textbook can be used in order to organize literary excursions around Pushkin places in St. Petersburg. It includes texts about the memorable places of the great city associated with the life and work of A.S. Pushkin. Each text is accompanied by tasks which are designed to expand students’ lexical stock, develop their speech, as well as familiarize them with the values of Russian culture.

Face-to-Face and Central Place: Covid and the Prospects for Cities

This contribution looks at how great-city working life and business are increasingly oriented towards the activities in high-added-value trades and 'opaque' markets, where face-to-face interactions are still a vital part of what they offer. It argues that whilst the pandemic has undoubtedly hit hard, its longer-term impacts should not be over-stressed: the world cities look set for continued dominance, centrality and scale will still be vital for the smaller conurbations, and the prospects for more peripheral locations may not be as positive as proponents of ex-urban flight might anticipate.

Freund Vilmos munkássága a Fővárosi Középítési Bizottmányban

Freund Vilmos (1846 –1920), Gottfried Semper tanítványa a dualizmus korabeli Budapest egyik igen termékeny építőművésze volt. Több mint félszáz épületet alkotott a fővárosban. Főleg olasz neoreneszánsz stílusban tervezte meg épületeit. 1900 után már szinte egyáltalán nem alkotott építészként. Építészi tapasztalata megszerzését követően, 1891 körül egyre aktívabb szakmapolitikai tevékenységbe kezdett. Tanulmányunk ismerteti a Fővárosi Középítési Bizottmány szerepét, majd Freund itt végzett munkáját mutatja be, beszédeinek nagyrészt az egykorú Fővárosi Közlönyben megjelent szó szerinti rögzítése alapján. Először a gyakor lati, technológiai ügyek terén tett felszólalásait ismertetjük. Itt többek között kiviláglik Freund útburkolatokkal kapcsolatos komoly tudása, és az, hogy figyelemmel kísérte azon útvonalak állapotát, ahol általa tervezett paloták álltak. Ezt követik a más építészek plánumaival és épületeivel kapcsolatos megszólalásai. A vele egykorú vagy nála fiatalabb alkotók műveivel kapcsolatos javaslatait, illetve véleményét ismerhetjük meg. Végül pedig a „legizgalmasabb” témát, a városrendezés terén elhangzott hozzászólásait tárgyaljuk. Meglepő, hogy néhány, városképileg igen meghatározó épület létrejöttében vagy megépült formájuknak kialakításában is szerepe volt. Például az új tőzsdepalota kezdeményezését és Szabadság térre helyezését két másik építész (Hauszmann Alajos és Quittner Zsigmond) mellett ő kezdeményezte. A piaristák Duna-korzón álló épületének megjelenésére is hatással volt. Freund az igen jelentős építészeti életművén kívül a szakmapolitikai tevékenységével is figyelemre méltót alkotott Budapesten.Vilmos Freund (1846–1920) was a prominent Hungarian architect who lived during the period of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. He was a student of Gottfried Semper. The majority of the buildings by Freund were built in Budapest. His most preferred style was the Italian Neo-Renaissance. From about 1891 he had an architectural political carrier too. After 1900 he radically reduced the number of his designing work. This study is written about his work in the Metropolitan Commission of Public Architecture (Fővárosi Középítési Bizottmány). His speeches in this commission survived until today as word-by-word recordings published in the old bulletins. The first chapter deals with his speeches in relation to practical, technological affairs for example the paving of the roads of Budapest. He reported his opinion of the designs by other architects, this is the topic of the second chapter. Finally, we can read about his speeches about the great city planning actions. It is interesting that several buildings of Budapest were constructed because he and a few of his colleges initiated them.

The Great Town – Man Kermen in The Secret History of the Mongols

The city name Man Kermen in The Secret History of the Mongols is identified with Kiev in the chapters concerning the great western Mongol campaign against Eastern Europe. It is based on the datum of Rashīd al-Dīn: ‘the great city of the Rus, which was called Man-Kermen.’ It is beyond doubt that the Cumans called Kiev as Man Kermen meaning Great Town in Turkic as the spiritual and ecclesiastic center of Kievan Rus. However, there is another possibility. The capital of the Volga Bulghars in the first decades of the 13th century has been excavated near to village Biljarsk. It is called by the contemporary sources as Velikij Gorod in the Russian annals, magna civitas in the work of the Hungarian friar, Julian both meaning Great Town.

The Great City Is Fragile

This article explores issues covered in Wuhan Diary, a day-by-day account by the Chinese author Fang Fang of her experiences during the height of the pandemic crisis in the city of Wuhan during the early months of 2020. It seeks to bring out what is distinctive and innovative about the text. Most notably, this concerns the mobilization of social media, such as Weibo and WeChat, as a basis for social communication and the dissemination of information within and beyond the city. The resultant text is not a diary in the conventional sense but, rather, a vast montage of diverse kinds of material that have been electronically cut up and pasted together. A particular focus of the discussion concerns ethical support and solidarity among citizens of Wuhan at this time of acute disruption. In this context, the article suggests a significant, and maybe surprising, affinity between Fang Fang's immediate concerns and issues raised in the ethical philosophies of Paul Ricoeur and Gabriel Marcel.